Primary prevention was one of the VAWG sector’s 5 key tests for the Strategy, so the focus on prevention and young people is welcome. However, ambition must be matched by meaningful, sustained resourcing. Our analysis highlights why specialist ‘by and for’ Black and minoritised services must be funded to deliver prevention work in schools and communities, including approaches that address adultification, hyper-sexualisation, and racialised sexual harassment experienced by Black and minoritised girls. 

We also emphasise that tackling online misogyny must include the wider reality of racism, xenophobia and far-right ideology, and the impact of racially aggravated violence on children and young people. 

We welcome acknowledgement that race, ethnicity and immigration status shape victim-survivors’ experiences of the criminal justice system, including risk of criminalisation. We also welcome steps to improve the criminal justice response to VAWG such as the national roll-out of Raneem’s Law and specialist rape investigation capability (RASSO units), while being clear that training and specialist units alone cannot repair decades of harm and mistrust that prevent access to justice for Black and minoritised victim-survivors. 

We raise serious concerns about proposals that expand surveillance-led policing. Resources should prioritise structural reform and survivor-centred practice, commissioned with and delivered by specialist VAWG organisations, including ‘by and for’ Black and minoritised services. 

We also reject the weaponisation of VAWG to justify anti-migrant policies. The VAWG Strategy must address the specific risks and support needs of migrant and asylum-seeking women, including safe, appropriate accommodation. 

We welcome the government’s commitment of £550 million for three years for victims’ services and ring-fenced funding for ‘by and for’ advocacy. But there is limited clarity on what the ring-fencing will look like, whether it sits within the headline figure, and how much will reach specialist VAWG services as opposed to generic victims’ provision. 

We set out why ‘by and for’ support cannot be reduced to narrow roles alone. Specialist services provide holistic models rooted in community trust, expertise and long-term safety. 

Our analysis also covers commissioning reform, including how short-term, competitive models continue to disadvantage specialist ‘by and for’ services, despite clear evidence that many marginalised victim-survivors prefer them.  

For migrant women, we note the positive step of requiring consent before police share information with Immigration Enforcement, while being clear this is not a firewall and may not function as protection in practice within a context of power imbalance and trauma. We reiterate our longstanding call to end NRPF conditions and address current systemic barriers to support. 

We also highlight areas where the VAWG Strategy continues to exclude women, including safe accommodation access for migrant and asylum-seeking victim-survivors, and key opportunities such as forthcoming guidance on Domestic Homicide Reviews (including the need for ‘cultural expert’ input led by ‘by and for’ Black and minoritised services and paired with domestic abuse expertise). 

We welcome recognition of the health system’s role in tackling VAWG and highlight the importance of ensuring any referral pathway (including Steps to Safety) is trauma-informed and rooted in an understanding of VAWG and intersecting inequalities. 

We also address the ongoing commissioning gap: specialist ‘by and for’ VAWG organisations play a crucial role in early intervention yet are rarely commissioned or engaged by Integrated Care Boards. Guidance must prioritise collaboration and funding for specialist ‘by and for’ services and include evidence-based examples of what good looks like. 

If the Government is to meet its target of halving VAWG in a decade the VAWG Strategy monitoring framework must reflect how violence is shaped by intersecting inequalities. Our analysis sets out why progress must be measured using disaggregated data (including sex, ethnicity, disability, age, immigration status and other protected characteristics), and why inconsistent recording (including ethnicity) undermines accountability. The Government must also draw on the wide-ranging expertise of the ‘by and for’ sector for scrutiny and insight over how the VAWG Strategy is implemented.