Agenda and minutes

There were no disclosable pecuniary interests.

The Minutes of the meeting held on 6th April 2022 were agreed and signed as a true record.

There were no matters arising.

Briefing Note of the Director of Health and Wellbeing

Councillor P Akhtar, Deputy Cabinet Member for Policing and Equalities, introduced the item in his role as Chair of the Domestic Abuse Local Partnership Board. He provided an overview of the work of the Partnership over the last year including the completion of the needs assessment, extending the Domestic Abuse Strategy to 2025 with a new action plan. The Partnership Board’s role was to support, guide and evaluate the strategy that aims to reduce repeat victimisation and risk of harm, prevent domestic abuse occurring and reduce offending.

The Committee then received a presentation on Coventry’s Response to the Domestic Abuse Act 2021 Progress Update which outlined the following points:

•  The governance system including the Local Partnership Board and a Steering Group.

•  Progress on each section of the Domestic Abuse Act, including the provision and the commencement date

•  Data on demand including helpline calls and MARAC cases

•  Data from the police covering total number of reports both crime and non-crime, number of charges and summons, number of cases where there are evidential difficulties and the number of cases where the victim does not support or withdraws from prosecution

•  Coventry’s response to the Domestic Abuse Act

o  Strategic Needs Assessment published October 2021

o  Strategy Update and Addendum – Published Oct 2021

o  Refreshed Action plan – Updated Oct 2021

o  Training Needs Assessment - ongoing

o  Training Delivery – ongoing

•  Details of the needs assessment including surveys, focus groups, data analysis and 1-2-1 interviews

•  Information about commissioned services and what they offer to both victims and perpetrators

•  New provision for victims and children in safe accommodation

•  Information about the Early Intervention Pilot based with the Police, as well as Domestic Abuse champions in a wide range of agencies

•  The implementation of the plan including Safe/Supported Accommodation, Voices of Victims/Survivors and other groups

•  The challenges working with perpetrators

•  Representatives from partner services, the Haven and Panahghar, provided information and case studies

Following the presentation, the Committee asked a number of questions and the following points were discussed:

•  The recovery of the criminal justice system from covid, including the police and the courts and the impact this had on resources, experience and capacity

•  Age and elder abuse were included in the action plan

•  Information about service in the Armed Forces was gathered as part of an assessment and signposting was made where relevant to support obligations under the Armed Forces Covenant.

•  Services were user led and responded to their needs, staff were recruited from a range of cultural backgrounds and language skills

•  There was no waiting list as there was a network of services which could be referred to if needed. Service providers were always looking to see how they could share learning from other services and organisations.

•  Communication materials were consulted on with service users and former service users

•  There was a lot of training and support being offered to the judicial system  ...  view the full minutes text for item 3.

Briefing Note of the Director of Law and Governance

The Scrutiny Co-ordination Committee received the Scrutiny Annual Report 2021-22.

RESOLVED that the Scrutiny Co-ordination Committee:

1)   Accepts the content of the draft report

2)   Recommends that Council consider the Scrutiny Annual Report at its next available meeting

Briefing Note of the Director of Law and Governance

The Scrutiny Co-ordination Committee considered their Work Programme for the current Municipal year.

RESOLVED that the Scrutiny Co-ordination Committee:

1) Agrees the draft work programme

2) Add a task and finish group on Inequalities to the work programme

3) Circulate an invite to committee Members to participate in a task and finish group on Inequalities

Any other items of public business which the Chair decides to take as a matter of urgency because of the special circumstances involved.

There were no additional items of urgent public business.