An internal restructurING at the criminal injuries compensation authority means it is still coming to grips with simplifying the claims process, writes Grania Langdon-Down


More than a year after the Home Office launched a Green Paper promising a ‘major simplification’ of the Criminal Injuries Compensation Scheme and increased support for those most seriously injured by crime, lawyers are still waiting to see whether the end result will actually benefit victims.



The Home Office says it will respond ‘soon’ to the submissions made. However, Yasmin Waljee, pro bono manager at City law firm Lovells, says: ‘The government opened up the consultation process in December 2005 with the Rebuilding Lives – Supporting Victims Green Paper. It was all very pressured and we were given a short time to respond, so it is disappointing that, more than a year later, they still haven’t produced anything.’



The Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority (CICA), which is in the process of relocating its London office to Glasgow, has been under close scrutiny for its handling of applications arising

out of the 7 July London bombings, with concerns over the level and speed of payments.



More recently, the levels of compensation have come under fire after it was disclosed that Colin Stagg, cleared of killing Rachel Nickell in 1992, could receive about £250,000 from the Home Office after the case against him was thrown out on the grounds that the police had entrapped him. Ms Nickell’s son, traumatised after seeing his mother’s horrific murder on Wimbledon Common, received just £90,000 in criminal injuries compensation.



The authority’s rules for paying compensation – which has to be for physical or psychological injuries caused by ‘violent crime’ – are also being challenged. A motorcyclist, who killed a 12-year-old boy playing ‘chicken’ on a dual carriageway, is hoping to change the rules by claiming compensation for the injuries he suffered in the crash and by arguing that the CICA should pay his costs.



Since the first scheme was set up in 1964, it has paid out more than £3 billion in compensation, which the authority claims makes it among the largest and most generous of its type in the world – although its £11,000 compensation for a fatality is far less generous than some European schemes.



Since April 1996, the level of compensation has been determined by a tariff, set by Parliament. The scheme, revised in 2001, describes more than 400 injuries, with compensation ranging from £1,000 to £250,000, supplemented by ‘special expenses’ and loss of earnings, paid after 28 weeks off work. Under the old scheme, awards of more than £1 million were possible for victims needing lifelong care but, since 1996, the cap has been unchanged at £500,000.



The authority, which has 470 staff and a budget of £20 million, pays out more than £200 million in compensation annually. It receives about 85,000 applications a year and in 2005/6 issued decisions within 12 months in 70% of the 62,073 cases it resolved.



In 2004/5, the authority made 35,446 tariff awards, with just over half (56%) receiving between £1,000 and £2,000. There were six cases where applicants received £250,000, while the maximum award was paid in ten cases. Some 13,000 applications were refused because of the applicants’ behaviour, including their criminal record or character.



The CICA is undergoing considerable upheaval at its London office, with 140 staff being relocated north of Hadrian’s Wall. Most staff did not want to move, so they are being redeployed within the Civil Service, with cases sent up to Glasgow as they recruit caseworkers. The authority has also disbanded the special unit set up to deal with the London bombing applications.



South-west-based law firm Withy King is one of 40 practices that took on 7 July bombing cases under the Law Society’s pro bono scheme. Personal injury partner Christine Chan says that, of the 11 cases the firm accepted, it has settled more than half. ‘So far, I feel those with relatively minor injuries have been dealt with fairly. I don’t know whether I will say the same in six or 12 months’ time when I am looking at the awards for the more seriously injured.’



Former Association of Personal Injury Lawyers (APIL) president Colin Ettinger, whose firm Irwin Mitchell took on 15 cases, also questions the handling of more serious cases. His appeal on behalf of one bereaved family successfully converted a nil award into a very substantial one.



‘General criticisms of the authority apply equally to the bombing cases – it is slow, tough with decisions, it’s mean on interim payments when the media scrutiny is off it, it forces you to seek reviews and appeals that take a long time, and victims incur legal fees that come out of their compensation.’



Neil Sugarman, who is on the APIL’s executive committee, is concerned that the authority’s response to the bomb cases ‘was probably done at the expense of other applicants’.



So does he think the Green Paper proposals would improve the scheme? Mr Sugarman, managing partner of Manchester-based GLP, is sceptical: ‘The proposals would strip thousands of applicants with lesser injuries out of the scheme, with talk of vouchers for counselling or cosmetic treatment but no practical detail. They would also stop public sector workers, such as nurses and the police, claiming.



‘But the claim that the money saved would go on higher-value cases is illusory unless the criteria are also changed. Care costs are payable only if they are not available free from another publicly funded body, but that is often wholly inadequate so people will still fall through the gap.’



In the ‘chicken’ case, the motorcyclist’s solicitor, Andrew Campbell at Withy King, says the core of the argument is in the definition of ‘crime of violence’.



He explains: ‘We are arguing that this was a crime of violence because it is an offence to play chicken on the highway and it would have been reasonably foreseeable, even to a 12-year-old, who is criminally accountable, that his actions were likely to cause injury or death.



‘We are also hoping to be the first case to succeed in getting costs for an applicant on the grounds that refusing legal costs is an infringement of the article 6 right to a fair trial under the European Convention of Human Rights. Without expert legal advice, he wouldn’t have known he had a claim at all. If he is successful, the finding will have significant implications for others making claims in unusual cases.’



Ms Waljee says there is an argument for some people to have representation automatically – ‘I would say from the start but certainly on appeal. A lot of claims are dismissed because the victims haven’t argued their case properly and there is a danger that vulnerable clients will end up going to claims farmers.’



Many firms act for victims on a pro bono basis. Lovells took on 15 families after the London bombings. But Ms Waljee says: ‘In the long term, God forbid we ever have another terrible incident like that because I don’t know how many firms could absorb more cases.’



The lack of legal representation has caused ‘unease’ among members of the Criminal Injuries Compensation Appeals Panel (CICAP), particularly where the applicants are young children or adults with serious mental impairments.



Solicitor Roger Goodier, who has chaired CICAP since 2002, says research has found that having representation does not make a lot of difference to the outcome. ‘But it is not quite so easy to endorse that when it comes to potentially high-value catastrophic injury cases where particular expertise comes in,’ he says.



According to Richard Fowler, head of communications at the CICA, about a third of applications in 2005/6 were supported by lawyers. Just under half of those applications proved ineligible, a slightly higher average rate than other representative groups, such as Victim Support.



He says the rate of ineligible applications varies between law firms. ‘We are working with solicitors with a good rate to work out how they do things and whether that can be spread to other firms.’



On criticisms over delays and payments, Mr Fowler says the CICA is working on speeding up the process and improving communication with clients so they understand more clearly the reasons for decisions.



About 20% of applicants ask for a review of the CICA decision, with a fifth – 4% of the total number of applications – taking their case to the appeals panel, which awards more than the authority in about half of the cases.



Mr Goodier expects the number of outstanding appeals to ‘plateau’ at about 2,500 by March. ‘We have spare capacity to hear more appeals but we are reliant on the authority to tell us when cases are ready for hearing.’



At present, the compensation scheme only applies to victims of crime in the UK. However, there is growing pressure on the government to extend the scheme to cover victims of terrorism overseas in a Bill being brought before the House of Lords by former Bar Council chairman Lord Brennan QC.



Overall, Mr Ettinger says the scheme needs more money so the authority is better resourced and payments are more than a gesture. He says: ‘It is a political issue but if you want a scheme that looks after victims of crime, then it needs reform because, under its current construction, it can fail.’



Grania Langdon-Down is a freelance journalist