Risk of domestic violence referrals to council up by over 50%

Anthony Lewis, Local democracy reporter

The number of people being referred to a Welsh council because they are at high risk of domestic violence has gone up by more than 50% in five years.

Gary Black, head of the community wellbeing and resilience service at Rhondda Cynon Taf (RCT) Council, told a meeting of the community services crime and disorder committee the number of high-risk referrals received had increased significantly over the past five years.

He said there had been a 52% increase in referrals since 2021.

Mr Black said they unfortunately anticipated an increase during Covid but that those numbers had continued to rise.

He said he thought nationally there was a domestic abuse crisis and they needed to look at ways they can make a difference from a local, regional, and national perspective.

In 2024-25 a total of 112 high-risk victims of domestic violence completed their individual packages of support provided by the council and 99% of the high-risk victims felt safer at the end of the intervention.

At the end of quarter three of 2025-26 a total of 130 high-risk victims have completed their package of support and 95% of the high-risk victims felt safer at the end of the intervention, the committee report said.

In terms of overall violent crime Mr Black said RCT was seeing a “positive trajectory” with violence with injury falling to 2,127 incidents in 2024-25 from 2,405 the year before.

Mr Black said that this reflected the impact of targeted intervention, night-time economy operations, and the joint work through the regional violence prevention board.

But he said that violence without injury did increase in 2024-25 from 2,487 to 2,677 with much of that relating to harassment and stalking offences, a significant proportion of which takes place online or via social media.

He said this mirrors national trends and highlights the need for a continued focus around online harms.

There was a slight increase in hate crime in 2024/-25 of 1.2% from 416 the previous year to 421 and Mr Black said while small this was consistent with the national picture and demanded continued attention and that local cohesion officers had responded proactively.