As the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, and the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, explained, these probing amendments explore whether an application for a domestic abuse protection order should be an automatic consequence of the police issuing a domestic abuse protection notice. Although I fully understand the motivation behind this—namely, to build further flexibility into these provisions—these amendments would remove a key strength of the process as we envisage it. The domestic abuse protection notice is designed to give
victims immediate protection and breathing space from the perpetrator following a crisis incident. If it has been judged necessary to issue a notice, it will be evident from the situation that the victim needs longer-term protection. Consequently, it is right that, once a notice has been issued, an application for an order should follow automatically within 48 hours.
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The perpetrator will, of course, be able to challenge in court whether it is necessary and proportionate for an order to be made to protect the victim from the risk of abuse and make representations about the duration of such an order. That is the time when some of the issues raised by noble Lords in this brief debate can be aired. This approach reflects the existing position with the domestic violence protection notice and order; as such, we see no good reason to change that approach with the new notice and order. It was welcomed by a number of organisations when the Bill was explored in the other place. The Magistrates Association, for example, in its written evidence, said that the approach had the potential to take the burden away from the victim of having to apply for the order; that, in some circumstances, will clearly be beneficial. I hope, therefore, that noble Lords will accept that this is a valuable part of process and central to the core objective of providing protection to victims for as long as it is needed. I hope that the noble Baroness will withdraw the amendment.