To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Keen of Elie on 8 April (HL14792), what financial structures are in place to govern decisions about where the Victim and Witness budget is spent; and whether they ensure that receiving organisations ring-fence the funding they receive from that budget.
Answered on
24 April 2019
The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) allocates around £96m from within its Victim and Witness Budget to fund crucial support services for victims of crime. The majority of this funding has been devolved to Police and Crime Commissioners (PCCs) as they are best placed to respond to local demands and priorities, and commission services supporting victims in their communities. This area of spend is allocated using a population based funding formula, as it is a simple and transparent method for assigning funds. This funding is provided to PCCs via grants from the MoJ, which carry the condition that the funding provided is only to be used to fund support for victims of crime and that PCCs report to the MoJ on spend within that funding.
Where the MoJ directly funds and commissions support services from within its Victim and Witness budget, the money is allocated via grant funding and decisions on such funding are guided HM Treasury’s Managing Public Money publication, and overseen by the MoJs financial and accounting structures. Grant recipients need to comply with the terms of the grant and must only use their allocation for the delivery of services supporting victims of crime. Compliance with the terms of the grant is measured through bi-annual monitoring reports and annual financial accounts.