Just before MPs went on their long recess on 20th July this article appeared in the Guardian explaining about an investigation by 5 childrens charities on the way in which the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority appears to be denying compensation to children who have been raped and sexually assaulted, on the grounds that they gave their consent to these actions. This is at odds with the idea that such consent is not accepted in the legal system for very good reason. After the article appeared in which the CICA stated “We are urgently reviewing our guidelines to ensure they are robust enough to deal with cases where grooming may be a factor.” and at the end of the recess the issue was raised in the House of Commons last Tuesday by Sarah Champion MP. The short exchange between Sarah and David Lidington who is the The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice can be found here. Two other MPs also spoke on this subject, one of whom frankly was speaking nonsense and Liz Saville Roberts who is a Plaid Cymru MP. As part of the exchange Mr Lidington pointed out that one of the reasons for the grey area within the CICA when it came to sexual offences involving children, something that was introduced by the previous Labour Government. He stated “Its purpose was to ensure that we did not end up in a situation where, for example, two 15-year-olds engaging in sexual intercourse automatically led to a claim for compensation —it would be left to the authority to look at the facts of the case.”

It seems to make sense for this logic to apply, but equally logical for anyone to work out the difference between two 15 year olds having sex and the group of men who groomed and raped a number of people in Rotherham and were jailed for doing so. One of those whose story led to these convictions was Sammy Woodhouse whose case was mentioned in the Guardian article on 18th July and who was then interviewed by the paper for this article published on 7th September. As the articles states “CICA initially refused her application for compensation, stating: “I am not satisfied that your consent was falsely given as a result of being groomed by the offender. The evidence does not indicate that you were manipulated or progressively lured into a false relationship.” When Woodhouse appealed against the decision she was offered a small settlement, which was eventually altered and she was awarded the maximum amount.”

David Lidington explained in the House of Commons:

Following some of the concerns expressed earlier this year, CICA decided to mount an urgent re-examination of its own internal guidelines—in particular, to make sure that there is no risk that a child could be disqualified from compensation because they had given consent when that consent had, in effect, been forced from them by a subtle process of grooming. The Department is also aware of concerns that have been raised about how the rules of the scheme work more generally in relation to cases of child sexual abuse. We are talking to organisations such as Barnardo’s and Victim Support in detail about those concerns and the reforms that they propose to deal with them.

The CICA is a Government body and as such it has a website, according to the website, there are 4 announcements that have been made this year. Each of them relates to a terrorist incident (Westminster, Manchester, London Bridge and Finsbury Park). There is no indication when the ‘urgent re-examination’ of the CICA guidelines began and there is no indication in the words of David Lidington when the ‘urgent re-examination’ will be completed. If this is a matter of urgency it seems perfectly reasonable to have some indication of the timescale which is intended. These are matters that impact on our nation when it comes to the way we respond to victims of crime that we now know is happening in many communities and has been for years.