Assessment

One of the main issues identified is the lack of assessment of service. The government seek to hold service providers to account and have given the Office of Police and Crime Commissioner responsibility for victim code compliance across the Criminal Justice System (CJS). Nationally it is recognised that victim code compliance is difficult to measure and as such, it is important to identify the key areas. Having consulted with victims of crime, the Ministry of Justice have identified five key areas as the issues that the public consider most important and have made a requirement for quarterly returns to be submitted in relation to whether a victim:

1. receives a written acknowledgement in relation to the report of crime
2. has been referred to support services
3. has been provided updates within the stated time-frames and are of a sufficient quality
4. has been given the opportunity to provide a victim personal statement
5. received communication regarding the release date of the offender in advance

In line with our culture and values, we seek to go much further by putting in place measures to consistently assess, report and learn from our delivery of entitlements and quality of service provided. Assessment will cover point of first contact through to conclusion of a victim or witness’s experience within the CJS. It will seek to include measurement against:

• initial identification of vulnerability
• time between report and first response
• method of first response
• written confirmation of report of crime sent and in what format
• supervisor investigation direction recorded
• method of engagement (is it appropriate)
• completion and recording of needs assessments, special measures and evidence capture
• timeliness and quality of support services referral and involvement (core and specialist)
• statement quality and victim personal statements offer
• mandatory and investigative updates, completion and quality
• victim status (engaged or declining) including reason recorded if victim declines
• post charge support
• eventual outcome, accurately recorded and victim updated
• victim satisfied

Our culture, values and priorities seek to ensure that the service delivered is the best quality possible. Our assessment processes will ensure focus is both quantitative and qualitative. We must continually seek to identify ways to improve and enhance the quality of the service that every individual victim and witness experience.

We will:

• implement a comprehensive assessment process, to measure the quality of service provided
• identify changes to technology and business processes that allow for delivery and measurement of all aspects of the victim code and witness charter
• we will seek to maximise the contribution our information technology services and systems can provide both now and in the future through the evolution of the Athena crime and case management system and exploiting and adapting existing technology processes