What action the Cabinet Secretary for Justice will take in light of the postponement of designating a specific offence of domestic abuse.

It is not correct to say that a specific offence of domestic abuse has been postponed. In our Programme for Government in November 2014 we committed to consult on the principle of creating a specific offence of domestic abuse. We consulted between March and June 2015. The views received to that consultation revealed broad support for the principle of having a domestic abuse offence, but no consensus on how such an offence should be developed.
In light of this, we committed in this year's Programme for Government to consult on a draft specific offence of domestic abuse. We consider the right approach is to listen to key stakeholders and take forward the development of such an important new offence informed by their views so that a consensus can be achieved. A draft offence will be shared with stakeholders in the next few weeks.