The development of the equalities scheme in the Crown Prosecution Service

1
The development of the equalities scheme in the
Crown Prosecution Service

• Shehla Husain
• Equality and Diversity Unit
• 12 April 2007

2
CPS Single Equality Scheme2006-2010

• Published 4 December 2006
• Race Equality Scheme, Disability Equality Scheme
  and Gender Equality Scheme
• Also encompassed developing legal obligations
  with respect to the new equality strands of
  sexuality and gender identity, religion or belief
  and age

3
Gender and Gender Identity Equality and Inequality

• The Evidence Base Employment
• 66.8 of staff were women 32.2 men
• Grades with highest representation of women were
  A1(78.3), A2 (77.9), legal trainee (72) - CCP
  (24.5)
• 28.5 of women staff worked alternate working
  patterns 3.3 men
• Staff perception and satisfaction broad
  similarities in views
• Note data from 2004-05

4
The Evidence Base Defendants, Victims and
Witnesses

• Charging Impact Assessment, 2004-05
• Over 99 recording of gender data
• Men (39.5) more likely than women (34.8) to
  receive a charge
• Women (5.3) more likely than men (3.3) to have
  their case finalised by a decision to
  caution/reprimand/warning
• Women (35.7) more likely than men (32) to
  receive NFA on evidential grounds

5
CPS Prosecution Policies

• CPS responsible for prosecution of criminal
  offences of violence against women
• domestic violence, rape and other sexual
  assaults, human trafficking, prostitution, child
  abuse developing policy on elder abuse
• forced marriage, so-called honour crimes and
  female genital mutilation are addressed under the
  umbrella of domestic violence
• Development of a co-ordinated strategy of
  Violence Against Women in 2007-08 a key
  component of the Gender and Gender Identity
  Equality Action Plan

6
CPS Data Collection

• Manual Domestic Violence Snapshots since 2002
  based on one months data
• Electronic recording of Domestic Violence data
  since 2004-5
• Hate crime indicator introduced in 2005-6
• Hate crimes racially and religiously aggravated
  crimes, homophobic crimes, domestic violence -
  and from April disability hate crimes
• 36 national target to reduce unsuccessful hate
  crime outcomes by April 2007 (target met by Dec
  2006)

7
Monitoring of hate crime target

• Quarterly assessment of each CPS Area performance
  on tackling hate crimes
• Meetings at least once a year with Director of
  Public Prosecution and Chief Executive
• Project and Performance Advisors in 4 Regions
• Also measure community engagement 2nd key
  equality performance indicator

8
Data breakdown

• Defendant outcomes analysed
• Successful and unsuccessful gender and
  ethnicity
• Breakdown of reasons for unsuccessful cases
• Principal offences
• Victim/witness data analysed
• Witness Management System police and CPS
• Difficulties in getting data on gender and
  ethnicity

9
Gender data

• From 2006-07 all hate crime data is broken down
  by gender and ethnicity for defendants and
  victims
• Analysis of details of outcomes by gender of
  defendant
• Cross flagging of DV cases by child abuse, rape,
  racially/religiously aggravated crimes
  homophobic crimes drug intervention programmes
• Rape cases are also flagged though regular
  reporting not yet in place

10
Results

• The numbers of recorded domestic violence
  prosecutions from April December 2006 had
  increased by 19 from the same period in 2005
  (from 35,231 to 41,860 cases)
• Discontinued domestic violence cases reduced from
  33 to 28 and the use of bindovers from 15 to
  8 in the same period
• Successful prosecutions had increased from 46 in
  December 2003 to 65.4 by December 2006

11
Results

• An indicator was also used to identify the
  proportion of successful prosecution outcomes in
  relation to the number of incidents where an
  arrest was made with quarterly reports From
  April September 2006 the average was 17.1
  (compared with 15.4 in 2005)
• From April 2006, DV data analysed by gender and
  ethnicity of defendant From April to December
  2006, 95 of defendants were male, with 17 from
  minority ethnic communities (analysis only
  currently carried out between July and Sept 2006
  for ethnicity).

12
New flags

• New flags on details of victim retractions in
  hate crimes from April 2007
• New flags piloted from June 2007 on forced
  marriage and so-called honour-based violence in 4
  Areas
• From November 2007 monitoring of relationship
  between defendant and victim in hate crimes and
  support from specialist hate crime services

13
Future plans

• 28 national target Hate crime target to reduce
  unsuccessful outcomes for 2007-08
• Split of target for each type of hate crime DV
  (80 of hate crime) will have 30 target
• Report of all 2007-08 data and analysis by autumn
  2008 CPS Annual Hate Crimes Report published

14
CPS priorities

• Single Equality Scheme Gender and Gender
  Identity Equality Action Plan
• For 2007-08 CPS has one of its key priorities
• Ensuring we respond to public needs by delivering
  on community justice, developing our responses to
  hate crime, violence against women and community
  engagement