Following the tragic deaths of Sarah Everard and Sabina Nessa, multiple organisations have desperately reached out to the government to put more serious measures in place to protect women and girls.
Earlier this year, we saw the cases of non-fatal strangulation being included as specific crimes relating to domestic violence under the Serious Crime Act 2015.
The Home Secretary, Suella Braverman, now details the latest on the matter: criminalising street harassment. With prison sentences of up to two years, street harassment includes catcalling, purposely obstructing someone’s journey, driving slowly beside a person or following them with a vehicle, and walking closely behind a person as they walk home at night.
Braverman stated that the government need to crackdown on these laws as ‘Every woman should feel safe to walk our streets’, following the BBC data released highlighting that two-thirds of women do not feel safe walking home alone at night.
Whilst behaviours such as catcalling have been covered by sexual harassment laws for many years, the government have introduced new legislation to criminalise these under specific street harassment laws, called the Protection from Sex-Based Harassment in Public Bill.
This is in the hopes that this law encourages more victims to report such activity and help police act when it does occur.
Lawmakers also discussed potentially including misogynistic violence under a type of hate crime, but this was later struck down. Although devastating cases involving the brutal murder or assault of women and girls have created headlines and promoted change, Stella Creasy (Labour) reflects on the decades of women activists protesting and campaigning for bills such as this to be enforced.
Further reading
Criminal injury (CICA) claims – Oakwood Solicitors
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Ella McCarthy joined Oakwood Solicitors in March 2022 in the Vetting team before quickly progressing onto the role of Paralegal in the Criminal Injury Department.
Currently, Ella works in the Emplo…
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