Alliance Health spokesperson Paula Bradshaw MLA has welcomed a move to include Northern Ireland in Domestic Abuse Offence provisions in a Bill published today.

Legislation to protect domestic abuse victims from coercive control will be extended here as part of the Home Office Bill at Westminster. Coercive control has been a crime in England and Wales since 2015.

“These provisions are long overdue, as Northern Ireland has long lagged behind the rest of the UK in making domestic abuse a clear offence and ensuring appropriate penalties,” said Ms Bradshaw.

“It is welcome this is to be corrected to some degree. However, I and other colleagues have been working on Northern Ireland-specific provisions – which, as ever, require Northern Ireland-specific legislators.

“I am sure much of this preparatory work has helped in ensuring Northern Ireland can be included in domestic abuse legislation applying across all or most of the UK, and that is good news.

“However, we are still missing out on delivering precisely what is needed for Northern Ireland because of the absence of our own Executive.”