Vigil for Sarah Everard (Debate)

Tue 16 Mar 2021, 10:48

The government's Criminal Justice Taskforce met last night in response to the murder of Sarah Everard and calls from women and girls that there needs be substantial movement from the government, the Police and the CPS to protect women from harassment and assault. 

The government's answer is to extend the pilot Project Vigilant, which involves officers attending areas around clubs and bars in plain clothes, along with increased police patrols as people leave at closing time. It also involves a doubling to £45m of the Safer Streets fund, which provides neighbourhood measures such as better lighting and cctv.

My initial thoughts are these: 

Clubs and bars are not yet open and at the moment no one knows when they will be back to business as usual. This solution also relies on the narrative that all harassment and assault happens after dark, when a good proportion of assault and harassment happens in broad daylight, in workplaces, in schools, in university's, and in people's homes. It feels like a non-answer to big problem.

Better lighting, presumably this comes from local Council's budget, which as we all know, is practically non-existent thanks to the government. I for one would welcome more lighting on the way up from the train station, particularly on the right-hand side, and having heard from other women, I know this would be welcome, but a) is this feasible and b) again falls back on the narrative that all harassment happens at night.

Cctv, again does this come from local Council's budget? Also, even if this is possible, you can put as much cctv up as possible, but given that rape prosecutions are at an all time low and that The Court of Appeal has recently dismissed a legal challenge against the Crown Prosecution Service over its policy on prosecuting serious sexual offences, it seems unlikely cctv is going to help. You can have all the cctv evidence in the world, but if the Police refuse to take these allegations seriously and the Cps refuses to prosecute, it means nothing.

It would helpful to hear from Liz Leffman and Andy Graham as well as those on the Town Council regarding the government's new initiative particularly surrounding extra lighting and cctv and whether it is even likely to happen.

There is also no mention of re-opening the closed Police stations or more specially trained officers...