177 'forced to wed' (From Bradford Telegraph and Argus)

177 'forced to wed'

9:00am Monday 20th November 2006

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Almost 200 cases of women being forced to marry or about to be made to marry were reported in Bradford in 12 months, the Telegraph & Argus can reveal.

From October 2005 to September 2006, 211 cases were reported to West Yorkshire Police - with 177 of those being in the Bradford district.

And despite the high number of cases reported, there are concerns many go unreported due to fear.

Philip Balmforth, full-time vulnerable persons officer for Bradford, said most of his work was with women of an Asian appearance - many being British.

The alarming number of cases reported in just 12 months could only be a proportion of cases as statistics are dependant of victims coming forward. Mr Balmforth said: "Since about 1988, I have dealt with about 4,000 people coming to me.

That can be people from Bradford or who have a link to Bradford or those who have run away to the area - but they all have a Bradford connection.

"For the past six or seven years West Yorkshire Police has about a 200-a-year average. In all the years I have done this I have never had a parent that has accepted they have forced their child into marriage, whether they are 13 or 33."

In some cultures, until a woman is married, she is the property' of her family and when she is forced to marry, she is handed over to her in-laws.

Mr Balmforth said educating people about the reality of forced marriages was essential in stamping out the attitude, where people always think this behaviour happens elsewhere.

He said: "I had someone write to me and said she did not understand how the forced marriage happened. She was told she was going to DisneyLand in Paris - she saw tickets.

"Other times people are tricked by their families into going abroad saying a cousin is getting married and when they arrive they find it is actually them that is getting married."

Keighley MP Ann Cryer described Mr Balmforth as a "knight in shining armour" in the House of Commons, for the "crucial" help he had been to many girls in the Bradford district, "saving them from a forced marriage or violence that has erupted following one".

Labour backbencher Mrs Cryer told MPs the marriages often go ahead because threats are made.

She said: "The parents remove a woman's passport and say, for example, You will not come back to Keighley and your friends until you have married this man'.

"Sometimes the women are told that they cannot go back until they consummate the marriage or even that they cannot return until they are pregnant."

She said now girls were becoming aware they did not need a passport to come back but with help they can be brought back and housed safely.

e-mail: newsdesk @bradford.newsquest.co.uk

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