Hearing a New Story About Intimate Partner Violence and Abuse

In Chapter 5 , our focus shifts to the implications of our findings for policy and practice. We begin with a brief overview of current policy and practice responses to both LGB and/or T+ intimate partner violence and abuse (IPVA) and perpetrators of domestic violence and abuse (DVA) within the UK, with significant gaps in provision for all perpetrators being noted. However, we demonstrate in this chapter that although participants widely reported support needs and a desire to change how they behaved in relationships, few would have been at the threshold for a perpetrator intervention. This leads us to argue for a more holistic, ‘relationships services’ approach to responding to different types of IPVA. We discuss participants’ help-seeking experiences and barriers, including those related to the intersections between being LGB and/or T+ and other aspects of their identities and biographies. Finally, we introduce the Coral Project Power, Control and Space for Reaction Wheel as a new tool for practitioners. Accompanying this are recommendations for providing more nuanced, safer and inclusive responses to LGB and/or T+ people who are experiencing and/or enacting ‘abusive’ behaviours, many of which would enhance responses to heterosexual, cisgender people too.