Domestic Abuse Act 2021

71 Consent to serious harm for sexual gratification not a defence

(1) This section applies for the purposes of determining whether a person (“D”) who inflicts serious harm on another person (“V”) is guilty of a relevant offence.

(2) It is not a defence that V consented to the infliction of the serious harm for the purposes of obtaining sexual gratification (but see subsection (4)).

(3) In this section—

• “relevant offence” means an offence under section 18, 20 or 47 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861 (“the 1861 Act”);

• “serious harm” means—

  (a)

  grievous bodily harm, within the meaning of section 18 of the 1861 Act,

  (b)

  wounding, within the meaning of that section, or

  (c)

  actual bodily harm, within the meaning of section 47 of the 1861 Act.

(4) Subsection (2) does not apply in the case of an offence under section 20 or 47 of the 1861 Act where—

(a) the serious harm consists of, or is a result of, the infection of V with a sexually transmitted infection in the course of sexual activity, and

(b) V consented to the sexual activity in the knowledge or belief that D had the sexually transmitted infection.

(5) For the purposes of this section it does not matter whether the harm was inflicted for the purposes of obtaining sexual gratification for D, V or some other person.

(6) Nothing in this section affects any enactment or rule of law relating to other circumstances in which a person’s consent to the infliction of serious harm may, or may not, be a defence to a relevant offence.