Demand for a domestic abuse helpline in Nottinghamshire has not returned to pre-pandemic levels after cases doubled in 2020.

Juno Women's Aid, the largest domestic abuse organisation in Nottinghamshire, says it's still seeing "very high" demand for support.

And the group is also currently seeing double the number of 'high risk' survivors needing help than it did pre-pandemic.

"That's something that keeps increasing rather than decreasing", said Rebecca Atchinson, senior public health and commissioning manager for domestic abuse at Nottinghamshire County Council.

Juno Women's Aid runs a 24-hour helpline for women in the city and county.

Ms Atchinson added: "We are concerned by the cost of living challenges and the impacts that might have. This is further compounded by issues around the recruitment and retention of staff."

The comments were made at the Health and Wellbeing Board at Nottinghamshire County Council on December 7.

It follows a report published by the council on the impacts of the Covid pandemic on domestic abuse.

The report shows the highest levels of domestic abuse incidents were recorded in Ashfield (which includes the town of Hucknall) and Mansfield from 2020-22. Rushcliffe had the lowest number of incidents.

But the total number of domestic abuse-related crimes recorded in Nottinghamshire decreased by 9.4 per cent from April 2020 to March 2021 – which the report states could be due to the pandemic and under-reporting of offences.

The report stated: "Throughout the pandemic there has been swathes of negativity around policing, events such as Sarah Everard, the police involvement and such like may have discouraged certain individuals from approaching the police in the first instance."

Ms Atchinson added: "We found that the helpline cases doubled during the pandemic. These have not returned to pre-pandemic levels to date.

"The demand is still very high for domestic abuse services and capacity is stretched. Our services are under immense pressure.

"Survivors felt the enforcement of lockdown created an initial and continued entrapment.

"Many people identified during the pandemic were first time survivors because of the increased time at home with the perpetrator.

"This led to very emotional and difficult calls being taken.

"The pressures [on staff] increased significantly. This has resulted in increased sickness within the team, this has continued into long term sickness due to Covid or stress related absences.

"The impact of Covid will live long with a lot of the survivors. This has continued to be demonstrated with the high numbers of referrals we have and high numbers of requests for counselling to recover from the abuse that took place during the last two years."

Sue Foley, Public Health Consultant at Nottinghamshire County Council, said domestic abuse was the "pandemic within a pandemic" during the coronavirus outbreak.

She said: For domestic abuse in particular the viewpoint was that we are already, unfortunately, in a pandemic of domestic abuse.

"The pandemic acted as an escalator and intensifier of existing abuse.

"It provided perpetrators with different methods of reasoning for coercive behaviour."

Cllr John Wilmott (Ind), who represents Hucknall North, said: "I am concerned about the impact of abuse during the Covid pandemic.

"It must be hard to assess the true under-reporting of this issue."

Councillors unanimously approved the eight recommendations with the report – including that policy makers should prioritise domestic abuse within emergency planning.