Latest editorial
THE Lords were urged today to make non-fatal strangulation a specific crime in the Domestic Abuse Bill, which is making its passage through Parliament.
The push to make it a specific offence is being led by former victims’ commissioner Baroness Newlove, a Tory peer who is campaigning for the change via an amendment, which has cross-party support, as the Bill returned to the Lords.
She told peers it would be “an unforgivable missed opportunity” if the Bill did not address the issue of strangulation and suffocation.
As peers prepare to debate reform of the 1861 Offences Against the Person Act, Labour MP Tonia Antoniazzi leads a bid to end the criminalisation of women who end pregnancies at home. LYNNE WALSH reports
Evidence to peers from medical leaders, patient safety officials and the children’s commissioner has intensified fears that the Bill’s safeguards are inadequate, writes ADAM JAMES POLLOCK
DANIEL GOVER considers the procedural complexities awaiting a Private Member’s Bill in its passage through Commons and Lords