Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how much her Department spends annually to fund victim support.

The department with overall responsibility for victim support is the Ministry of Justice. The Home Office and other departments provide funding for specific
services. This is part of the government’s commitment that all victims of abuse have access to the support they require.

The Government has ring-fenced nearly £40 million of funding up to 2015 for specialist local support services and national helplines. The Home Office contribution is £28 million over the spending review period, and of this £1.72 million is provided per year to part-fund 87 Independent Sexual Violence Advisors, and £150,000 on their training. A further £400,000 per year is spent on funding 13 Young Persons Advocates to provide direct support to young women who have been victims, or are at risk of sexual violence from gangs.

These roles provide support to victims of abuse, including signposting further specialist support including therapeutic counselling. The proportions allocated to different types of support, and to victims who are now adults and whose abuse occurred in their childhood, is a local decision. The Home Office does not collate figures on this.

This support is in addition to the funding allocated from the Ministry of Justice Rape Support Fund to rape support centres, Department of Health support to Sexual Assault Referral Centres and Child & Adolescent Mental Health Services, and Department for Education’s support for counselling via their Innovation Fund.