The Tory leadership hopeful unveils plans to create a criminal offence for street harassment as well as a national domestic abuse register
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Public sexual harassment like wolf whistling and cat calling could become a crime under plans to make the streets safer.
A long-awaited strategy to combat violence against women and girls will be unveiled today, with Home Secretary Priti Patel vowing to ‘take action’ against street harassment in England and Wales.
In the wake of the public outcry sparked by the abduction and murder of Sarah Everard by then-Met Police officer Wayne Couzens, the Government received 180,000 responses to help shape the strategy to better protect women and girls.
A new national police lead will be created to ensure officers take abuse and violence against women more seriously and improve their response time to such crimes.
Ms Patel wrote in The Times: ‘We will continue to look at gaps in existing law and how an offence for sexual harassment could address those.’
‘I am committed to ensuring not only that the laws are there, but that they work in practice and women and girls are confident their concerns will be taken seriously,’ she added.
‘It is important that the police enforce the law and give women the confidence that if they report an incident, it will be dealt with.’
The review is published against a backdrop of recent dismal conviction rates for rape – the lowest level of 1.6% since records began – despite the number of reported incidents increasing.
Under plans, a ban on so-called virginity testing – a medical examination to see if a woman or girl’s hymen is intact – is also set to be introduced after MPs described it as a ‘medieval practice’.
