Statistics

In the triangle below are the baseline statistics drawn up prior to implementation of the Standing Together initiative in 1998. The top half of the triangle uses research and population figures to set the context.

The lower half of the triangle presents actual figures from the Fulham part of the borough and starkly represents the high attrition rate in domestic violence cases. This is the problem that the Standing Together initiative set out to address.

Data collected by Standing Together

Since 2000, Standing Together has monitored the effectiveness of the co-ordinated response in general, and of each member agency’s performance in particular, using a specially developed computer program called STATS.

The use of STATS enables detailed and accurate domestic violence incident and case data to be gathered, stored, disseminated and analysed.  This requires input of data from sources such as the police, court, ADVANCE and Probation/DVIP and means that an incident can be tracked from the initial crime report being taken by police through to completion of sentence by the offender.

In enabling this tracking process of incidents and cases through the criminal justice system, STATS also enables the potential to identify risk, improve victim safety, and stop offenders from slipping through the cracks in the system.

Through STATS the partnership is developing its understanding of the detail and pitfalls of monitoring information, and the issues involved in measuring for example repeat victimisation. STATS is ground-breaking in its ability to simultaneously track cases through all stages of the criminal justice system, and provide a statistical overview (against user-definable criteria, and within user-definable time frames) of the performance of the system as a whole.

Police data

Crime reports taken by police are filtered so that only reported incidents involving intimate partners and former intimate partners are input onto STATS.  Details of police action and adherence to the Borough’s Positive Arrest Policy can be monitored and information provided to aid risk assessment.  The database has incident data from 2000 so full histories of incidents between intimate and former intimate partners can be seen and monitored for feedback into the Operations Meetings held between core partners of Standing Together.

The level of repeat victimisation is also calculated from STATS.  Standing Together define a repeat incident as ‘an event of domestic violence whose perpetrator and victim have also been the perpetrator and victim of a previous Hammersmith & Fulham domestic violence event as judged by the presence/absence of a pre-existing record involving the same victim and perpetrator on the STATS database within the previous 12 months.’

Standing Together can only maintain the gold standard method of calculating repeat victimisation and its successful reduction by using the STATS database.  Because STATS contains details of all domestic violence incidents that are reported to and recorded by police in Hammersmith & Fulham, as accurate identification and calculation of incidents in relation to previous reports of incidents is possible.

The extensive amount of police data that is inputted into STATS also enables a picture to be gained of trends over time via analysis of quantitative data.  In particular, it is possible to examine the impact of changes in policy and practice within the Government and Criminal Justice System on the way in which domestic violence is dealt with.

Court data

In cases where the offender is charged with an offence of domestic violence, detailed information from West London Magistrates Court continues the data trail onto STATS.  Weekly observations made within the Specialist Domestic Violence Court (SDVC) at West London allow for details to be added to STATS regarding the progression of cases, bail conditions and case outcomes.  This is backed up by regular information exchange between Standing Together and West London Magistrates Court to cover hearings that are not heard in the SDVC on a Thursday, thus capturing all the cases of domestic violence that are within the court system.  Details of the outcomes of cases that are sent to Crown Court are also captured and fed back to STATS via an information exchange.

Since West London Magistrates Court deal takes cases from both Hammersmith & Fulham and Kensington & Chelsea boroughs, the progression and outcomes of cases from Kensington & Chelsea can also be monitored by Standing Together.

The systematic exchange and capture of data enables Standing Together to track the outcomes of every reported incident of domestic violence within the Hammersmith & Fulham borough. 

Advocacy and support of victim/witnesses at court

Data relating to the women referred to ADVANCE, The Advocacy Project is shared with Standing Together.  This serves to examine where referrals are coming from, and who is being referred according to ethnicity, gender and location.

Further, data relating to those victim/witnesses involved in court cases heard by the SDVC is gathered from the core agencies involved in the support of women at court from Hammersmith & Fulham and Kensington & Chelsea boroughs.

Qualitative data

The data contained in this section relates to quantitative data that is collected and analysed by Standing Together.

Standing Together also recognises the value and insight gained from examining the qualitative data, in particular in relation to feedback from service users, partner agencies and survivors. Qualitative data is gathered in many ways, some of which follow:

• Standing Together Steering Group oversee all the operational work of the partnership at bi-monthly meetings.
• Standing Together holds annual reviews of the Specialist Domestic Violence Court as well as annual planning days with the partner agencies in the co-ordinated response. 
• Feedback from service users is collated at these meetings and is incorporated into Standing Together’s various reports (see Publications)
• Standing Together has pioneered consultation with survivors and publishes full reports on the results and the process.  (see Publications and Survivors)
• A Standing Together representative observes the SDVC every Thursday and gathers information in relation to decisions made by the court, comments made in court and so on.
• Feedback is gathered from victims and witnesses in relation to their experience of the criminal justice system.
• Training that is delivered by Standing Together is followed by written feedback from participants.  This is then summarised and fed back to partner agencies.

For more information about information sharing, see the recent Home Office report: Safety and justice: sharing personal information in the context of domestic violence — an overview.

Quantitative Data

For a detailed data report, please see Briefing Paper 1 (2008): Data and Monitoring report for the Specialist Domestic Violence Court 2003-8.

Glossary

Glossary of abbreviations used in data tables