Calls for overhaul of victims’ compensation scheme amid claims it adds to trauma

Calls have been made for a compensation scheme for victims of crime to be overhauled amid claims it is adding to distress for victims through its shortcomings.

The Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority (CICA) was criticised for rising waiting times for victims to get a decision over whether they would get compensation, with nearly a fifth of claimants waiting more than two years for an answer according to its latest annual report. Some have to wait more than five years for a verdict.

Meanwhile, more than a third of decisions by the body that had been appealed were successfully overturned. The number of complaints has more than doubled in a year.

The Ministry of Justice has blamed this on a record number of applications. A spokesperson said it was hiring more staff and attempting to improve its communications.

Concerns have led a dozen Labour MPs, led by Laurence Turner (Birmingham Northfield) to support a Private Member’s Bill that would launch a “fundamental” review of the scheme.

Baroness Newlove, the late Victims’ Commissioner criticised it before her death in November, as the Government declined to alter the scheme five years after it began a consultation on changes.

Natalie Queiroz applied to the compensation authority after her partner attempted to kill her and her unborn baby in Sutton Coldfield in 2016.

Ms Queiroz, now 49, was stabbed 24 times in a nine-minute attack while she was eight months pregnant. She and her daughter received lifesaving treatment – with her applying to CICA for them both afterwards.

She criticised its “horrendously complex process” and the need to rank your own injuries. She has since had to have her finger amputated, and certain injuries have since worsened in the nine years after the attack.

Ms Querioz said: “I incurred significant traumatic injuries in my chest which led to me taking nerve blockers initially to cope with the pain.

“When the knife went through my ribcage it caused significant nerve and cartilage damage between my ribs which led to horrendous pain, as well as leave significant scarring in my lungs from the stabbing.

“Nobody knew how my lungs would recover and unfortunately I’ve had pneumonia four times since then due to my lungs being unable to clear any chest infections.

“So, you end up in this situation of how do I rank them? Then there’s often psychological elements, I’m literally writing out all my injuries, but you have to pick your top three.”

She added: “You have a time limit of how long it is you can apply, so you’re in this kind of horrible situation where you are recovering from physical and emotional trauma, you’ve got this complex form, and you’re thinking ‘I don’t know what the extent of these injuries will be.’”

Ms Queiroz’s application to get compensation for her daughter, who was delivered urgently after the attack, was rejected but won on appeal.

She also believes the scheme should be extended to cover unborn babies who are physically affected at birth as a result of a crime.

Ms Queiroz has since been appointed victims commissioner for West Midlands, where she has spoken to others who have applied to CICA. She was awarded an MBE in Queen Elizabeth II’s final birthday honours in 2022 for services to young people and the prevention of knife crime.

She said: “People just find it really confusing, really quite scary, don’t really understand it, some people call it like a dark art of how you write out the forms to get compensation.”

Mr Turner, who applied to CICA after a violent assault before the Covid pandemic led to four operations, told the Press Association: “It was a typical experience that many victims report; impersonal contact, very long delays in getting the case resolved, and the outcome never felt like adequate recompense for the nature of injuries.”

He had to wait almost two years to get his case resolved and said: “By the time you get to the end of that exhausting process where you’ve had to repeat and relive some really quite traumatic experiences, lots of victims just want the process to be over.”

Mr Turner added: “I always knew I wanted to try and do something about it because when you’ve had a very negative experience, you want some good to come out of it.”

The scheme was set up in the 1960s to provide compensation to the victims of violent crime. However it has been criticised, including by the late Victims Commissioner Baroness Newlove, who reported in 2019 that the system was adding to victims’ upset, including with an overly complex application process and long waits for decisions.

The Government commissioned a consultation to find how the scheme could be made simpler. Yet after an almost five-year wait, Justice Minister Alex Davies-Jones said she would not be taking on recommendations of the inquiry.

Ms Davies-Jones said changes to time limits and unspent convictions that could benefit the victims of child sexual abuse could “be detrimental to other deserving victims of crime”.

The decision was criticised by Baroness Newlove, who died in November.

Alex Mayes, external affairs manager at Victim Support urged the need for fundamental changes.

Mr Mayes said: “We definitely need to be in a place where CICA are processing claims at pace, where there’s not a substantial backlog, where victims aren’t having to wait long periods of time to get outcomes and to have their claims dealt with.

“While they’re waiting, victims need to be treated with sensitivity, compassion, respect, and we need to have a victim-first approach to compensation claims and victims don’t need to be in a position where they’re waiting years and years and years for an outcome.”

Labour MP Alex Sobel (Leeds Central and Headingly) said he had two constituents who had put claims forward, including someone who had to wait six years for an outcome.

Mr Sobel said medical evidence which had been sent in to support claims had been lost by CICA, and people were left feeling ignored by slow response times.

He said: “We want them basically to improve their performance, timescales, delivery, communication, and the realism of it.”

He added: “There’s a lack of oversight, there’s a lack of rigor in the governance of the organisation, and those are all things that need improvement.”

A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: “The rise in complaints reflects record application volumes and CICA is strengthening its service by hiring more staff and improving how victims can contact it.”