Dr Marsha Scott from Scottish Women's Aid says the failure to have a legal instrument to deal with coercive control for 40 years sends a powerful message.

Dr Scott cites the powerful testimony from the Crown Office and the police that they have been trying to make a law that is not fit for purpose work.

She says it is up to the MSPs to listen to voices of survivors and victims and stand above every other legislature which has tried to tackle coercive behaviour.

If this Bill is passed it will be the gold standard says Dr Scott.

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Dr Marsha Scott from Scottish Women's Aid says the invisibility of older women in police reports and social work assessments was shocking.

Dr Scott says service providers for older women and men need to understand domestic abuse.

She says Scottish Women's Aid are committed to the focus being on gender based balance.

Heather Williams from Scottish Women's Aid says a lot of perpetrators of abuse think that what they are doing is perfectly OK.

Ms Williams says this Bill moves away from an incident based response because it is not about one incident but tactics and a series of treatment.

Tory MSP Oliver Mundell says that may work both ways in terms of a defence and that is what worries him.

Girijamba Polubothu from Shakti Women's Aid says often family members do not support the victims and make excuses for abusers and that judges must be aware of this.

Ms Polubothu says you often can't really trust what is being said by family members.

Dr Marsha Scott from Scottish Women's Aid says this law requires the personal circumstances and context of a case to be considered.

Dr Scott says putting a lighter on the table may seem reasonable but when the context is understood threatening to burn a women is not reasonable.

Heather Williams from Scottish Women's Aid says the change is that the Bill will mean an incident based approach will not be taken but the circumstances of the the relationship will be taken into consideration.

Girijamba Polubothu from Shakti Women's Aid says it is about society looking at situations and perhaps thinking that nothing is wrong with it and it is not domestic abuse.

Dr Marsha Scott from Scottish Women's Aid says there are so many situations where behaviours are explained away as not being abuse because of the culture.

Dr Scott says there must be a shift as to what is acceptable in terms of the way you treat your partner.

Ms Polubothu says it is about what is acceptable to the woman, not to society, but to the woman.

She says she had a client who's abuser would use a lighter for coercive control and, even in other company, the abuser would put the lighter on the table.

Ms Polubothu said that no one else knew what the lighter meant but that the woman did and this is coercive control.

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Heather Williams from Scottish Women's Aid says domestic abuse causes fear and its about control and it has an ongoing patter which this Bill will tackle.

Ms Williams says the legislation has thresholds in it and it strengthens the base where we currently work from.

Dr Marsha Scott from Scottish Women's Aid says trivial events that are in fact bad behaviour and are responded to by police.

Dr Scott says there is a much bigger problem in that a lot of domestic abuse never gets to the court.

She says "we need to be able to criminalise coercive control."

Dr Scott says there is no appetite to bring trivial events as domestic abuse cases.

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Lib Dem MSP Liam McArthur says there have been concerns that the threshold for abusive behaviour in the Bill may be to low.

Mr McArthur says simply bad or unpleasant behaviour may be criminalised.

Dr Marsha Scott from Scottish Women's Aid says that is an academic and sophisticated way of saying "it's just a domestic".

Dr Scott says the legislation down south is not working well and there is a hierarchy of harm.

She says there are multiple tests in the Scottish Bill that mean that trivial and mundane bad behaviour are never going to make it through.

Heather Williams from Scottish Women's Aid says domestic abuse is a parenting choice which impacts on a child's behaviour.

Ms Williams says there are questions on whether abusers should have access to their children if they are affecting them negatively.

She says there are "massive issues" with how women get protection through the civil process.

Dr Marsha Scott from Scottish Women's Aid says she can't see any problem with presuming there would be non-harassment orders in domestic abuse convictions.

Dr Scott says if one is not issued it should require a really good case to be made to explain why.

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She says in the existing framework they could be used more often and they are not.

Heather Williams from Scottish Women's Aid says quite often non-harassment orders are not given due to contact with children having to be facilitated.

Ms Williams says when the procurator fiscal has to ask for a non-harassment order it is more difficult and the change proposed will make a huge difference.

Lib Dem MSP Liam McArthur says Police Scotland and the Crown Office said this Bill would give more confidence and an increase in domestic abuse reports.

He asks if the witnesses agree with this point of view and think it may take a bit of time for this to happen.

Dr Marsha Scott from Scottish Women's Aid says any policy that is implemented takes "quite a long time" to have an impact.

Dr Scott says the area where there will be the biggest challenge is not in policing but in health.

She says "it will take time".

SNP MSP Maree Todd asks about non-harassment orders.

Dr Marsha Scott from Scottish Women's Aid says it is really, really important to realise the vast majority of non-harassment orders do not work well.

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Dr Scott says they are not working and are really a problem for women.

She says there should be expectation that non-harasssment orders will be put in place with domestic abuse convictions.

Dr Scott says it is critical that they cover children.

Dr Marsha Scott from Scottish Women's Aid says there has been lot of engagement in the role of children.

Dr Scott says there are libraries of evidence that says children who are in households where there is abuse experience it.

She says that is not particularly well reflected in the Bill.

Dr Scott says the Bill should reflect that, if there are children in the abusive household, then there are child victims.

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Dr Marsha Scott from Scottish Women's Aid she thinks it is a very good bill but she thinks it could be improved a bit.

Dr Scott says at the moment Scotland does not have enough legal interventions to help women in crisis due to domestic abuse, like emergency barring orders.

She says: "We need a legal mechanism that allows a woman to stay at home and a perpetrator to be removed."

Dr Scott says: "An emergency barring order would be an enormous improvement to this bill."

Girijamba Polubothu from Shakti Women's Aid says sometimes the woman and man have the same family due to cousins marrying which can lead to coercive control.

Ms Polubothu says despite a man having orders not to approach a woman, he can arrange to visit his family at the same time she does.

SNP MSP Maree Todd says the committee has heard privately from some victims of domestic abuse.

Ms Todd says one victim talked about the influence of her mother encouraging her to put up with the abuse.

Heather Williams from Scottish Women's Aid says it is about recognising the tactics that are used by abusers who live in rural areas.

Ms Williams says the abuser may be the only one who drives and goes for the food shopping which means they are controlling the food that comes into the household.

She says the abuser may be refusing to let the victim go shopping and may check the bins to see how much of the food the victim has eaten during the day.

Dr Marsha Scott from Scottish Women's Aid says any sheriff or judge hearing a domestic abuse case must have proper training.

SNP MSP Rona Mackay asks about the defence of reasonable behaviour and asks about the concerns of the witnesses.

Dr Marsha Scott from Scottish Women's Aid says in the final assessment she is happy that the reasonable assessment is there.

She says the test of reasonableness can be very scary to her as individual incidents do not indicate a pattern of coercion.

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Dr Scott says she welcomes the demand that the course of behaviour is looked at and she says the vast majority of people don't think coercive control is acceptable.

She says: "Again it is about implementation."

Dr Scott says the threshold for reasonableness needs to be the same across Scotland.