Developments affecting victims of violent crime

Since 1964, victims of violent crime have been able to apply to the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority (CICA) for a measure of compensation. In early days, this was calculated in line with damages awarded for injury by the courts. However, since 1996 a tariff scheme has been introduced and a cap of £500,000 imposed on an individual award, however horrendous the injury and far reaching its consequences.

The civil courts can award well over £10 million in the most serious of cases, but will also compensate minor hurts on the basis that if damage could be demonstrated as a result of someone’s acts, there is a right to appropriate compensation.

Financial restraint forced reconsideration of CICA awards in 1996 and has continued to do so. However, recent plans to scrap compensation payments to victims of minor criminal assaults have fallen to parliamentary and public pressure.

It was suggested that only ‘seriously’ injured victims would be eligible, saving £50 million on a bill of £449 million in 2011. The categories of ‘serious’ excluded, for example, significant facial disfigurement and loss of a finger.

The Government has just announced a rethink of those plans. At Ashtons Legal, we hope that it will be accepted that a scheme that already pays a fraction of the compensation which is thought fair and appropriate in our courts, will continue to cover the range of injuries now compensated – and at a similar level. It has to be a mark of a compassionate society that we acknowledge that those injured through the violent acts of others through no fault of their own, need assistance to return to their former lives.