§ Mr. Clemitsonasked the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will list the areas where there are now refuges for battered wives; and whether he will make a statement.
§ Mr. FreesonMy information is that there are now refuges in the following 75 local authority areas:
LONDON BOROUGHS
- Brent
- Camden Croydon
- Ealing
- Greenwich
- Hackney
- Hammersmith
- Haringey
- Havering
483 - Hounslow
- Islington
- Lambeth
- Lewisham
- Merton
- Newham
- Richmond
- Southwark
- Sutton
- Tower Hamlets
- Waltham Forest
- Wandsworth
DISTRICT COUNCILS
- Allerdale
- Bath
- Bedford
- Birmingham City
- Bradford
- Brighton
- Bristol
- Broxtowe
- Canterbury
- Chelmsford
- Corby
- Derby
- Doncaster
- Exeter
- Gateshead
- Grimsby
- East Hertfordshire
- Kettering
- Kingston upon Hull
- Kirkless
- West Lancashire
- Lancaster
- Leeds
- Leicester
- Lincoln
- Liverpool
- Luton
- Manchester
- Mansfield
- Milton Keynes
- Newcastle upon Tyne
- Northampton
- Norwich
- Nottingham City
- Nuncaton
- Oxford
- Plymouth
- Poole
- Reading
- St. Edmundsbury
- Salford
- Scunthorpe
- Sneffield
- Southend on Sea
- Stockton-on-Tees
- Sunderland
- Tameside
- Thamesdown
- Wakefield
- Wellingborough
- West Wiltshire
- Wigan
- Woodspring
- York
I understand, too, that there are Women's Aid Groups in the following areas in which there are no refuges:
LONDON BOROUGHS
- Barnet
- Bromley
484 - Kensington & Chelsea
- Westminster
DISTRICT COUNCILS
- Adur
- Basingstoke
- Bath
- Charnwood
- Cheltenham
- Chichester
- Durham
- Great Yarmouth
- Hartlepool
- Hastings
- Hove
- Ipswich
- Kingswood
- Medway
- Mid-Sussex
- Newark
- West Norfolk
- Peterborough
- Sedgemoor
- Slough
- Southampton
- Stafford
- North Tyneside
- Warwick
- Wirral
This growth is encouraging; in 1972 there was only one refuge. I should like to congratulate the member groups of the National Women's Aid Federation, and other local groups, who have played such an important part in developing this network of aid and refuges. I am also delighted to learn that the federation, which receive financial assistance from DHSS, is taking further steps to bring the existence of refuges to the notice of all the agencies with which a battered wife may come into contact, so that appropriate help can be extended to women in a crisis as soon as they need it.
As I indicated in my answer on 9th April to my hon. Friend the Member for Wood Green (Mrs. Butler) we intend to issue a circular giving advice on how, within our policies for relieving homelessness, authorities can take further steps to relieve overloading of existing accommodation for battered wives and their families. I hope that, within their controlled housing budgets, they will make further hostel provision where needed with the benefit of housing subsidy or housing association grant.