£12 million boost to local victims’ services
3 Jul 2014 03:30 PM
£12 million of
innovative technologies and specialist services, funded by offenders, to
support victims of crime.
Successful projects put forward
for funding by Police and Crime Commissioners (PCCs) include:
- body-worn cameras to support
victims of racial hate crime and capture evidence of new
incidents
- a specially designed audiovisual
system to comfort young victims of sexual abuse during medical
examinations
- dedicated counselling for
victims of female genital mutilation (FGM)
Most of the successful bids will
support victims of sexual and domestic abuse, but there are also projects that
will help victims of hate crime, young victims and LGBT victims, among others.
PCCs have worked with local voluntary organisations to identify the services
that best meet the needs of victims of crime in their areas.
Victims’ Minister Damian
Green said:
Victims of crime need and
deserve the best possible support to cope with what they have been through.
That’s why government is raising more money than ever before from
offenders to fund vital services to help victims move on with their
lives.
The excellent and innovative
ideas put forward for this fund show exactly why PCCs are best placed to
understand the needs of their local communities and commission the majority of
victims’ services. I’ve no doubt they will make a difference to
victims up and down the country.
Some examples of the projects
being funded are:
- £12,000 for an interactive
system to support young sexual violence victims in a newly established Sexual
Assault Reference Centre in Suffolk
- £35,000 for discreet
body-worn cameras for victims in Merseyside who have been subjected to racial
abuse in their working environments
- £1.2 million to support
young victims of crime, and support for vulnerable or persistently targeted
victims of fraud or other economic crimes in London
- facilities in several locations
for sexual violence victims to give evidence via video link in a setting
outside the criminal justice system rather than having to go to
court
- £150,000 to improve
support for victims with mental health problems in
Cambridgeshire
- more than £120,000 for
rural rape crisis centres in Dyfed Powys, Wales
- £66,000 for specialist
LGBT hate crime case workers in Cornwall, Devon, Dorset and
Wiltshire
The £12.5 million comes
from additional receipts from offenders, raised through the victim surcharge
and increased financial penalties such as Penalty Notices for Disorder. It is
in addition to the 2014 to 2015 budgets of £31.55 million which have
already been confirmed to PCCs. The Ministry of Justice launched a competition
to allow PCCs to bid for money to support victims of the most serious crimes,
persistently targeted victims and intimidated or vulnerable
victims.
This funding is in addition to a
range of measures brought in by the government to provide unprecedented support
for victims, including the new and improved Victims’ Code and pre-trial
cross-examination for young and vulnerable witnesses.