While there is not yet a statutory definition of Honour Based Abuse, or HBA, in England and Wales, a common definition used across government and criminal justice agencies is ‘A crime or incident which has, or may have been, committed to protect or defend the honour of the family and / or community’. Honour Based Abuse can take many forms, including child marriage, virginity testing, forced marriage, female genital mutilation (FGM), as well as physical, sexual, and economic abuse, and coercive control. There can be multiple perpetrators within the family and/or community.
Dealing with HBA often requires a different approach to other domestic abuse cases. In this session, we talked to Karma Nirvana, a charity that runs the UK’s Honour-Based Abuse helpline and campaigns to end all forms of HBA. We also heard from survivors of HBA and discussed how employers can play a crucial role in tackling this issue.
