Debate contribution: Domestic Abuse and Civil Proceedings Act (Northern Ireland) 2021: Section 26
Debate contribution by Mrs Naomi Long on .
- MLA
- Mrs Naomi Long
- Party at the time
- Alliance Party
- Date
- 24 February 2025
- Type
- Debate contribution (made as a minister)
- Business
- Oral Answers to Questions
- Heading
- Domestic Abuse and Civil Proceedings Act (Northern Ireland) 2021: Section 26
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 4813804
Read the official Assembly record
Text
As I said, since the commencement of the pilot, there have been over 30,000 referrals to schools, which shows how necessary that information-sharing protocol has been. The sharing of information creates an administrative demand on policing, particularly on sharing and then on teachers receiving that information. However, all parties fully agree that the ethos behind Operation Encompass is incredibly worthwhile and are now working together to streamline it and to automate the sharing of information where possible. That will reduce the administrative burden but, more importantly, should allow the information-sharing to be undertaken more quickly and without any delay so that we can provide the support to young people in the classroom more expeditiously. In the past six months, the Police Service introduced an email facility for schools to ask for a callback when they were unable to reach the designated teacher. That alerts the designated teacher that there is a referral to be received. I am advised that the PSNI and the Education Authority are developing a mechanism to fully automate the process and make the referral via public protection notices (PPN). A PPN is required for every domestic abuse incident or crime that the police attend, and it collates a significant amount of relevant information to share with the schools. A small number of pilot schools in Belfast have been identified to test that latter concept via secure email accounts. It is hoped that the new phased pilot will be able to be rolled out and provide more timely interventions for young people.
255 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
Assessment
Jev’s structured answers met the documented threshold for “not qualifying”.
- Overall probability that the activity is being used to promote, exploit or escalate an identity-based controversy: 0.02 (qualifying needs at least 0.70; at or below 0.30 is not qualifying).
- None of the five culture-war criteria was met (each was below 0.60).
- Assessed as legitimate policy scrutiny (0.84).
- No identity-based framing was identified (1.00).
- Subject area: Gender, sexuality, abortion and related social issues.
- The overall probability was at or below the not-qualifying threshold.
This is an AI-generated assessment of the text, made against published criteria. It is not a finding of fact about the MLA or their intentions. The Assembly record itself is the fact.
Jev’s structured answers
| Question | Probability | Met? |
|---|---|---|
| Identity framing | 0.02 | No |
| Sectarian or communal antagonism | 0.02 | No |
| Cultural grievance politics | 0.01 | No |
| Dog-whistle messaging | 0.01 | No |
| Controversy escalation | 0.02 | No |
| Legitimate policy scrutiny | 0.84 | Yes |
| Overall judgement | 0.02 | At or below not-qualifying threshold |
| Option | Probability |
|---|---|
| No identity-based framing (chosen) | 1.00 |
| Reports or questions it | 0.00 |
| Criticises or condemns it | 0.00 |
| Adopts it | 0.00 |
| Subject | Probability |
|---|---|
| Gender, sexuality, abortion and related social issues | 0.40 |
| No identity-related subject | 0.39 |
| Sexism, misogyny, ageism and other equality groups | 0.14 |
| Education structures, integration and community division | 0.07 |
| Flags, emblems, symbols, names and memorials | 0.00 |
Assessed 21 October 2026 at 11:58 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.
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