In a crisis, a policymaker’s attention is focused on those most obviously represented as vulnerable. After all, we have all seen the plight of migrant workers on our TV sets.
But very few cameras can get inside abusive homes. Fewer will dare to talk about the stress, misery and indignity of women’s domestic labour with the newly unemployed or work-from-home husbands.
Instances of domestic abuse rise in periods of recession. New research has showed that, during the Great Depression, financial uncertainty caused by the economic crash increased the prevalence of controlling behaviour between domestic partners.
And we are about to face the biggest recession ever. By association, we are about to have the biggest domestic abuse crisis too.