Liverpool review

The current political strategic boundaries between domestic abuse, male victims, and serious youth violence policy does not support a full and humanising approach to those affected. There needs to be serious consideration of the way in which the current siloed policy and support structures create gaps for vulnerable young people. Partner agencies should report to CitySafe what actions they are taking to improve professional curiosity in this field and implement trauma informed practice across their organisation. CitySafe Together, working with partners, should consider how best to coordinate activity to socialise systemwide trauma-informed practice in Liverpool. This should inform every interaction with individuals, families, and communities, including within criminal justice agencies. There should be a focus on closer joint working between domestic abuse and gender-based violence organisations and youth offending/ OCG outreach organisations so that the impact of domestic abuse on boys can inform policy and practice development in response to the learning from this case.

Probation services provide assurance to the partnership on the impact of actions they have taken to address the learning identified in this review. Specifically, Probation Services to evidence how learning within their IMR has been integrated into practice and demonstrate how they monitor that there is now adherence to the ‘Enforcement of Community Orders, Suspended Sentence Orders and Post-sentence supervision and Practitioner: professional curiosity insights’ guidance.

Support services for children who have experienced domestic abuse have been cut significantly in the past decade. This is not only due to the wider cuts related to austerity, but also because of the increasing shift in domestic abuse support work to address ‘high-risk’ victims without adjoined children’s support. Now children are explicitly recognised as direct victims through the Domestic Abuse Act 2021, Citysafe should explore how a gendered understanding of how children process domestic abuse should inform health relationship programmes and direct support for child victims of domestic abuse. This should include the development of gender-specific and masculinity-aware interventions for male child survivors. This should recognise the impact for boys experiencing early male violence on their own identities and how this may affect the way in which they instrumentalise violence themselves. Community based and/or ‘by and for’ domestic abuse specialist services, together with specialist domestic abuse commissioners, should report to the partnership on the support that is available to encourage victims of domestic abuse, and their family members to seek support, particularly focussed on specific ‘isolated’ geographical communities and male victims.

City Safe and partner agencies should promote awareness of male victims across frontline services to facilitate improve professional curiosity and the identification of male victims within the wider community. This will better support abused men to recognise victimisation, understand what services are available and know it is acceptable to seek help and receive practical support.

Statutory safeguarding agencies should provide assurance to the Partnership (and Liverpool Safeguarding Children Partnership and the Safeguarding Adults Board) that children are recognised as victims of domestic abuse ‘in their own right’, with responses in place to respond to their trauma, consider gender and support their recovery. This should extend into adolescence and mirror the aspirations detailed within the knowledge briefing ‘Bridging the Gap’.52 This should include reporting on how agencies can work together to dynamically identify young people who are at increased risk due to transitional/ contextual safeguarding risks and what the expectation is for partners to work together to offer therapeutic, preventative support to reduce that risk into adulthood.

Housing Services should provide City Safe assurance in terms of their learning and actions taken following their internal review of this case. This should include assurance of how the service has improve professional curiosity within their teams regarding domestic abuse and that it is responding to requirements to provide safe accommodation as detailed in the Domestic Abuse Act 2021.

DISARM and the Violence Reduction Partnership [VRP] should ensure that domestic abuse is included in their strategic and operational responses to prevent and respond to knife crime and that this considers best practice / possible approaches to prevent the use of kitchen knives as a weapon as far as possible. DISARM and VRP should be invited to engage with the MARAC remodel to explore how support professionals to safely engage with victims and perpetrators where offensive weapons are a feature. CitySafe to consider if all domestic abuse incidents resulting in injury with an offensive weapon (including non-life threatening) should automatically be graded as Gold risk level.

Merseycare and Liverpool City Council should review guidance to partner agencies on when to use professional judgement and refer safeguarding concerns (including through VPRF forms submitted by the police). Merseycare and Liverpool City Council should also explore internal information gathering processes to ensure relevant case information is available to the triaging staff so that appropriate consideration can be given to whether duties under s42 Care Act (safeguarding adults) or access to multi-disciplinary meetings (such as the MARAM or Complex lives panel) are considered alongside referrals to the MARAC process.