Call to Action - Friends, Family and Community (360G-CR-4926043)

WWiN is a women-led, specialist domestic abuse service established in 1983. We deliver a range of direct services to victims and children (see below) and have a strong community footprint across Wearside covering Sunderland, Washington and the Coalfields area; a population of 350,000. We want to test and implement an early intervention and prevention approach to domestic abuse which equips family, friends and the wider community to actively support and protect victims. We will build the knowledge and resilience of families, friends and communities, increasing their ability to recognise and respond to victims of violence and abuse at the earliest opportunity, preventing harm (including homicide) and ultimately kick-starting generational change towards a rejection of all forms of Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG). Covid 19 has shone a light on a pre-existing, but major gap in provision, highlighting both the reliance on access to victims through self or agency referral pathways that were disrupted and reduced during lockdown, and the absence of any support for concerned family and friends aware of potential abuse with no idea how to act. Having explored this further through a small study of our own, it is clear the gap in provision is a wide one and we have worked closely with survivors, their families, Northumbria Police, Sunderland Council, voluntary sector partners, Advocacy After Fatal Domestic Abuse (AAFDA) and Alice Ruggles Trust (ART) in developing this proposal. There is significant support from all parties to this approach and a recognition that it addresses the missing link between victims and services as we currently have no pathways for third-party information sharing, or support networks for family and friends who are trying to support loved ones on their own. Some funding already supports 'champions/ ambassadors' training which is of value in (mostly) training other professionals and we already run a very popular programme. However, there is evidence to demonstrate it is family and friends, not professionals who are the first line of defence in tackling this endemic problem. We draw on evidence from our own research, and Domestic Homicide Reviews (DHRs), to demonstrate the need for this approach. A survey of survivors via our social media revealed over 60% had initially told family and friends about the abuse - by far the highest field (with only 11% telling the police and 4% telling a specialist service). Time and again, evidence from DHRs show that families and friends knew about, or suspected, abuse but didn't know how to intervene or offer support safely and effectively. Our proposed focus on family and friends is not being systematically applied at scale anywhere else: we want to test and refine this approach, developing a replicable model that can be used in other areas, by other services. Over the last 15 years we and other specialist organisations across the country have been providing crisis services to the best of our abilities but the murder rate for victims of domestic abuse is unchanged. It's time to try a new approach.