Thames Valley Police & Crime Commissioner

1. Thames Valley Police & Crime Commissioner Draft service specifications: workshops October 2014

2. Local Commissioning Guiding principles: • Thames Valley coverage • Single contract/ leader provider or consortia • Quality and consistency of services (clear reporting; evidence of impact) • Capacity building • Enhancing the capacity of local VCSE providers to provide services where this is in the best interests of victims

3. 6 priority themes • Practical and emotional support for victims of sexual assault • Practical and emotional support for victims of domestic violence • Practical and emotional support for children and young victims of crime • Psychological counselling for victims in the priority categories and/or victims who have been unable to recover from the impact of the crime • 3rd party reporting mechanism for victims of hate crime • Victim-centred restorative justice

4. Funding 2015/16 Victims Grant: £2,467,000 to cover: • PCC’s commissioning costs, contingency funds, full costs of the regional ‘referral mechanism’ and local ‘non-specialist’ support (£1M), • Victim-centred/pre-sentence RJ services (£250-350K), • Young Persons Service (£250-350K) • ISVA service (£250-350K) • DV Service (£250-350K) • Counselling (250-350K) • Hate Crime (£50-£100K)

5. Timeframe First wave Invitation To Tender (ITT) Nov 2014: • RJ, ISVA, Young People’s Services – Open procedure, 3 years +1 +1. • Standard OJEU process – 40 day ITT, evaluation, clarification, award, 10 day standstill (*any variance to be confirmed) • Standard procurement evaluation (a) Cost 40% (b) Deliverables 60% (*any variance to be confirmed) • Deliverables scored 0 to 10, where:- • 10 (meets requirement in full) • 6 (meets most of the requirement but with at least one significant concern) • 2 (provides little of the requirement)

6. Draft: Sexual Violence In Scope: • Victim centred: help victims to copeand to recover • Meets the EU Directive 2012/29 • Provides an equitable and accessible service delivering emotional and practical support to victims of sexual violence, aged 18 years and over Out of Scope: • Those under the age of 18 other than with the agreement of the Police and Crime Commissioners commissioned service for young victims of crime • Does not provide Psychotherapy and/or Counselling support • NB Discussion and feedback sought on age range

7. Sexual Violence Essential requirements • An accessible, confidential and free service to all victims of sexual violence that meets the identified individual levels of need • A range of routes into the service, at any time following the crime and regardless of whether the crime is reported to the police or not • A culture of continuous improvement in service delivery, balancing innovation and development; with confirmed quality standards and evidence base • Advice and support across the 8 categories of need • Enable individuals to move through a process of positive change, helping them to become independent of the service • Improved community and organisational awareness within Thames Valley of the service delivered; with the aim of informing and improving access of potential clients to the service

8. Sexual Violence Desirable requirements • Ensure there is an appropriate geographical spread of services and consistency across such services addressing shared purpose, resourcing, identity, standards and communication • Regularly review victim needs assessments and through consultation with victims of sexual violence to ensure services delivered are victim-centred & assist in strategic planning and development • Help victims of sexual violence to have an effective voice, to help inform improvements to the wider Criminal Justice System • Facilitate consultation with victims of sexual violence, when requested by the Commissioner to help shape future service provision • Consider the needs of those around the victim of sexual violence and seek to ensure they are recognised and supported

9. Draft: Restorative Justice In Scope • Victim-Led and Pre-sentence RJ • Meets the EU Directive • Meets the six National Restorative Justice Standards • Helps victims to cope and recover Out of Scope • Offender-initiated RJ • RJ arising due to anti-social behaviour or behaviour not arising from a criminal offence • Where the service offer does not include the option of a Victim Offender Conference (VOC)

10. Restorative Justice Essential requirements • A confidential and free RJ service to all victims of crime • A range of routes into the service, at any time following the crime and regardless of whether the crime is reported to the police or not • Capacity to offer a menu of interventions including restorative conferences or, where a conference is not appropriate, other restorative options that do not involve meeting the offender face-to-face • Promote improved community and organisational awareness across Thames Valley of the service delivered by the Provider to victims, with the aim of informing and improving access for potential clients • Achieve a sustainable throughput of eligible and suitable cases • Promote a culture of continuous improvement in service delivery, balancing innovation and development with confirmed quality standards • Support the implementation of the Public Services (Social Value) Act 2012 through added social, economic or environmental benefits to local communities arising from the Service model • Evidence-based services in alignment with national Restorative Justice Standards

11. Restorative Justice Desirable requirements • Help embed victim-initiated RJ into the wider Criminal Justice System • Facilitate consultation with victims to improve understanding of the victim’s experience of RJ, and to help inform future service improvements • Consider the needs of those around the victim and seek to ensure they are recognised and supported • Develop and implement a communications strategy aimed at increasing public awareness of the benefits of victim-led RJ • Develop and evaluate RJ approaches appropriate for victims of very serious offences, or circumstances normally excluded from RJ schemes, such as cases involving domestic or sexual violence, and road death • Develop an integrated system of RJ alongside provider(s) of offender-led, statutory and community RJ • Promote best practise and quality standards through provision of commissioned training and consultancy to other organisations and bodies across Thames Valley • Conduct evaluation and research on RJ activity to contribute to the evidence-base and promote continuous improvement • Contribute to responses to government consultation documents and other enquiry processes

12. Draft: Young Victims In scope • Giving young people information to increase their feelings of safety and help them to keep themselves safe • Improving young people’s confidence and knowledge about coming forward • Improving adults’ ability to identify if a young person has been a victim of crime • Improving the support available for young victims to deal with the impact of crime • Ensuring that young people are listened to about how to tackle crime, how to support victims and how to get offenders to payback to the community • Enabling all relevant organisations and agencies to work together to deliver the outcomes above Out of scope • Under the age of 8 years and over the age of 17 • Who have withdrawn consent for, or not consented to, referral • Judged to have been the offence perpetrator rather than a victim • Not resident within the contract area, or who have returned to a residence outside of the contract area • NB Discussion and feedback sought on age range

13. Young Victims Essential requirements • Toreceive referrals from a wide range of agencies and individuals; promote and deliver high quality support services providing practical and emotional support tailored to the individual identified needs of young victims of crime • Achieve improvements in every young victim’s ability to cope and recover from the impact of crime; assist young victims, where appropriate, to access further relevant support • Promotes improved community and organisational awareness within Thames Valley of the Provider delivered service to young victims, with the aim of informing and improving access of potential clients to the service • Improves young victims’ experience, through advocacy and intermediary support with the Criminal Justice System acknowledging this engenders a more positive outcome • Provides and enables young victims to access and have an active engagement with the eight key categories of support • Reduces young victims’ risk of further victimisation or turning to offending as a result of their experience • Enable young victims of crime to recover a sense of safety, providing them with strategies to regain confidence and stay safe helping them to become independent of the service • Provide ways for young victims of crime to support and share their views and experiences with each other • Ensure the service aligns with the eight categories of need underpinning young victims of crime support assessing the social value impact through evidence and measuring activity protocols for a a culture of continuous improvement with confirmed quality standards and evidence-based services

14. Young Victims Desirable requirements • Help young victims and witnesses of crime to have an effective voice, to help inform improvements to the wider Criminal Justice System • Facilitate consultation with young victims, when requested by the Commissioner, to improve the Commissioner’s understanding of the experiences of young victims of crime, their support needs, and to help shape future service provision • Regularly review victim needs assessments and through consultation with young victims of crime to ensure services delivered are victim-centred and assist in strategic planning and development • Consider the needs of Parent(s) and/or Guardian(s) of the young victim of crime and seek to ensure they are recognised and supported • Promote greater use of technology and other appropriate developments to enhance young victims’ and witnesses interaction and engagement with the justice system • Identify ways of promoting and engaging with young people to aid their understanding of what constitutes being a victim of crime and encourage them to report crime committed against them • To advocate for individual young victims of crime as well as for social, institutional and legal change

15. Overview: Counselling Current Provision: Statutory • Step 1 – Wellbeing Services • Step 2 – Talking Therapies • Step 3 – IAPTs specialist services • Step 4 – Complex Needs Service VCSE sector • ‘Ad hoc’ counselling services accessed by specialist victim services - how funded? Needs assessment • Identified counselling support for a sub-set of victims • Some Statutory/Specialist Victim Services have small budgets to access private counselling • Current (statutory) services can be • Difficult to access due to threshold • Takes too long to begin • Too few sessions offered • The wrong sort of counselling

16. Counselling Information Gaps • How many victims of crime need specialist counselling? • Why do they require counselling? • What type of counselling do they require? • Why are they not able to access it via existing services? • What would a good model of support look like (what is different for victims)? • How would they access those services? • What would the cost be per victim/overall? • How else can the PCC add value in relation to improving counselling for victims (eg training existing providers)?

17. Counselling Possible options: next steps • Commission a lead provider to receive referrals, triage and fund counselling from existing services • Co-Commission with CCGs e.g. top-up statutory arrangements (IAPTs services) to give quicker or longer service (adults/children/both) • Training for existing providers • Option to commission an independent clinical lead to undertake further work to map existing services and fill the information gaps – a specialist needs assessment on counselling for victims • A pilot study(s) to evaluate options in more detail

18. Contract Management For all services • Management throughout the life of the contracts shall take place through a performance management framework covering : Quality, Corporate Governance and Finance • Audit: governance charts; contract implementation plan; policy/procedure documents •  Reporting will involve a set of “hard” performance measurements as well as audit arrangements covering more qualitative elements of the contract • Reporting (Risk logs; action plans; client feedback/complaints) • Quarterly (Schedule quarterly performance meetings) • Half yearly (Strategic performance issues) • Annual (Annual contract review) • Ad hoc (case file audit, inspection, independent service user survey/focus group, peer review)

19. For further information • http://www.thamesvalley-pcc.gov.uk/Partnership/Victims-Services.aspx All other inquiries • jhopkins@citadelcommunications.co.uk