My Lords, this Bill will be remembered in years to come for the many important changes and reforms that will be introduced through it, but without doubt one of the most welcome changes will be the recognition of non-fatal strangulation in law and, we hope, the effective response by the criminal justice system. I say “welcome”; this particular amendment will be most welcomed by the most severely abused women who suffer this particularly horrible crime. As others have said, the noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, has done a superb job, supported by some pretty superb people, in steering the amendment to this point. She has said pretty well all that I would have said, and therefore I will be extremely brief.
The only point that has not been mentioned is that if we really want the amendment to achieve what it should achieve, which is the appropriate response by the police, the courts and so on, then training police officers so that they are aware of this stand-alone offence will be very important, and maybe a little training for doctors, although they should certainly be aware of what a strangulation looks like. Can the Minister say anything about that?
Like others, I say a tremendously sincere thank you to our Ministers, who have really listened. The noble Baroness, Lady Williams, has been a marvellous Minister in this House for a long time now, and we now have the benefit of the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, as well as
the noble Lord, Lord Parkinson. We are very lucky to have those Ministers in this House and I pay credit to them.