Domestic abusers feed off crises Men will use the cost of living to coerce their partners

Dillon is all too familiar with how coercive control operates. Survivors have told her about men who say: “You’re not feeding your kids. They’ve got holes in their shoes. I’m going to tell social services you’re a bad mother.” That is a terrifying threat to make to a woman who, through no fault of her own, is struggling to put food on the table or having to rely on charity shops to clothe their children. They already feel intense shame about their supposed shortcoming as mothers, something perpetrators understand very well and are eager to exploit. Women fear losing their children above all else — and abusive men can sound very plausible. How can a woman prove she’s not to blame — that money is being kept from her deliberately — when her partner sounds so reasonable to outsiders?

Shortage of money increases the pressures within relationships in other ways, as men who can’t afford to go to the pub or a football match spend more time at home. Researchers used to wonder why intimate partner abuse rises during big sporting occasions, such as the football World Cup, speculating that perpetrators were punishing women when their team lost. The answer turned out to be much simpler: domestic abuse increases whenever men spend more time at home, which is why the big rise during the Covid lockdowns came as no surprise to anyone. There were a spate of domestic homicides — 16 in three weeks — in the first month of lockdown.

Eventually, the government noticed. Covid “acted as an escalator and intensifier of existing abuse”, a joint report from the Home Office, National Police Chiefs’ Council and College of Policing belatedly admits. “It seems to have been weaponised by some abusers as both a new tool of control over victims and… as an excuse for domestic abuse and even homicide.” Two men, Anthony Williams and Hussein Egal, blamed stress caused by Covid when they were charged with killing their wives. Egal inflicted 70 injuries on his wife, Maryan Ismail, after (he claims) she had threatened to throw him out for having the virus. Williams strangled his wife to death, and then pleaded guilty to manslaughter, having told the police that lockdown restrictions had had a negative impact on his mental health. He received a reduced sentence of five years. It remains to be seen whether, in a few months times, men accused of murder will claim they were driven to it by anxiety about not being able to pay the mortgage.

Homicides were not the only deaths linked to domestic abuse: there were also 38 suspected suicides of victims in the first year of the pandemic, a phenomenon so under-researched that we do not have previous years’ figures to compare it with. It attests to the desperate circumstances some women found themselves in, locked in with their abusers, as well as important questions about whether the women’s actions were voluntary.

Surely, surely, ministers would never make the same mistake again? But that appears to be exactly what is happening. “The suicide rate will definitely increase,” Dillon predicts. “It will happen if women can’t flee safely.” She asks herself every day how she can help victims, knowing that her organisation is struggling with its own costs, including soaring heating bills. Some of her employees are single mothers and survivors of abuse, and the cost of living is already hitting them hard. “I’m worried about my staff,” she says. Most earn between £24,000 and £26,000 a year, when they could get more than £30,000 in less stressful occupations. “We are going to lose staff hand over fist. We’re constantly fire-fighting,” Dillon says wearily.

Women’s Aid has addressed the looming crisis in an August report, offering a stark warning: “The cost of living is preventing women from fleeing domestic abuse.” Two-thirds of survivors told the organisation that abusers were using the cost of living increase as a tool for coercive control, “including to justify further restricting their access to money”. Almost three-quarters said that shortage of cash had prevented them from leaving. With private rents beyond the means of most victims, and mortgages prohibitively expensive, women feel trapped. “I feel like my only option to keep my kids is to go back to the marital home where he nearly killed me,” one survivor told the organisation.

Two months ago, a group of charities said they were “disappointed” by the lack of government action on tackling the cost of living crisis. Women’s Aid is calling for mortgage payment holidays for victims, an emergency domestic abuse fund, and discounts on energy bills for organisations that provide services for women and children. Refuge has asked for the £20 universal credit uplift to be restored. The government says it is working across departments to ensure that victims, survivors and their families are fully supported, citing a £230m investment in its Tackling Domestic Abuse Plan.

What the government did not say, however, is just as important. The plan was announced in March, under a different administration, and some of the money is earmarked for long-term projects such as training to recognise abuse. The vast scale of the economic crisis has since become clear, yet one of Liz Truss’s first actions as prime minister was to abolish the role of women’s minister. The decision has been criticised by some Conservative MPs, including the chair of the women and equalities select committee, Caroline Nokes. Having a dedicated women’s minister gives us a voice — and also acts as a brake, forcing government departments to think twice about the impact of policies on women and girls.

If the government is planning a substantive response to a situation many women regard as an emergency, it is keeping very quiet about it. This time round, with so much evidence of the disastrous consequences of its predecessor’s tardy action in lockdown, it has no excuse. Another crisis is playing into abusers’ hands — and there is very little time left to save their victims.

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Joan Smith is a novelist and columnist. She was previously Chair of the Mayor of London’s Violence Against Women and Girls Board, and is on the advisory group for Sex Matters. Her book Unfortunately, She Was A Nymphomaniac: A New History of Rome’s Imperial Women was published in November 2024.

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