Governance and accountability
The Domestic Abuse Act 2021 required Local Authorities to appoint a multi-agency Domestic Abuse Local Partnership Board. In response, the longstanding West Cheshire Domestic Abuse Partnership expanded to meet this duty. Whilst the Statutory Duty to convene the DALPB is placed on the Council, there must be specific representation by a number of agencies. It is this Board who commissioned the needs assessment that informs this strategy. The DALPB is a subgroup of the Community Safety Partnership. The CSP reports annually to the Health and Wellbeing Board.
The DALPB is a partnership group responsible for supporting the Council in meeting its duty under the Domestic Abuse Act, namely that people harmed by domestic abuse have access to adequate and appropriate support within safe accommodation services.
The Board will also work together to assess ongoing performance against the Strategy action plan and support, advise, and work in partnership with Cheshire West and Chester Council regarding issues relating to men and women who are harmed or who harm others in a domestic abuse context and their children. In doing so, the DALPB aims to improve outcomes for those who are harmed.
The DALPB is responsible for reviewing information for exceptions, trends, and good practice. Due to the cross-cutting nature of domestic abuse, the DALPB will liaise with Boards such as the Local Safeguarding Adults Board (LSAB), the Safeguarding Children's Partnership (SCP), the Sub Regional Domestic Abuse Board and the Protecting Vulnerable People's Board.
A number of subgroups feed into the DALPB, including the MARAC Steering group.
The MARAC steering group have a key role in quality assurance. Its role is to:
- review MARAC processes against practice standards (safelives)
- offer challenge and recommendations to agencies to ensure victims of domestic abuse are safe and protected from harm
- monitor volume heard at MARAC, identify trends, themes and referral structures
- quality assure the decisions and actions agreed at MARAC by way of case auditing
- monitor MARAC representation, attendance and quality of engagement from partner agencies
- review data in relation to outcomes
- to consider changes in policy and research
- to share information from the Local domestic abuse board.