New rights for victims of crime in Europe - The vital contribution of Victim Support

The Framework Decision refers to the importance of specialist services for crime victims and the vital contribution of national victims' organisations. Below we look at five examples of best practice:

a groundbreaking project in the Republic of Ireland providing a specialist service to tourist victims
the first national, comprehensive Witness Service in the world, which has just been completed in England and Wales
an enhanced service to be run by Victim Support in Northern Ireland to help people to access compensation from the state
a specialist project, based in Glasgow, to address the many and diverse problems faced by homeless victims of crime
a specialist service for asylum seekers, run by Victim Support Scotland.

Each of these services has been set up by Victim Support, which has also negotiated ongoing funding for these projects nationally. We would like to see these examples of best practice extended throughout the UK and Ireland, and to the rest of Europe.