Information relating to the CPS Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) strategy

Request

Please supply the details of all;

1. Internal networks, organisations and individuals consulted or contributing to, in the preparation of the CPS VAWG strategy 
2. External networks, organisations, and individuals consulted or contributing to, in the preparation of the CPS VAWG strategy 
3. Copies of all minutes relating to the preparation and publication of the CPS VAWG strategy.

Response

The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) does hold information that falls within scope of your request. However, it should be noted that the Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) strategy is still under development. We can only therefore provide information concerning parties consulted to date and the information disclosed is not a definitive or final list.

1. A one-off meeting took place with former defence solicitors and barristers chaired by District Crown Prosecutor Olivia Rose named a ‘Defence Round table’. Furthermore, Domestic Abuse and VAWG Leads (Baljit Ubhey Director of Strategy and Policy Directorate, Graham Ritchie Deputy Director Strategy and Policy Directorate, CCP Kate Brown, CCP Jaswant Narwal and DCCP Olivia Rose) attended workshops in development of strategy.
2. There were four workshops held in development of VAWG from November 2022 to April 2023. I attach an Excel spreadsheet labelled ‘11404 DELEGATE ORGANISATIONS’ outlining who registered for these workshops, which included engagement with national third sector stakeholders and a VAWG Community Accountability Forum (which was chaired by the then CPS interim CEO Sue Hemming CBE). The CPS do not hold a list of final attendees to those workshops. We do however hold information detailing CPS staff who attended at those workshops who took part and assisted with facilitating them. However, this information is exempt from disclosure and is withheld under section 40(2) of the FOI Act – Personal Information. Please see the attached section 17 notice for an explanation of our decision.
3. No minutes were drafted for the VAWG Strategy workshops or the defence roundtable.

Section 17 Notice under the Freedom of Information Act 2000

WITHHOLDING INFORMATION

Section 40(2) – Personal Data Relating to Third Parties

The information you have requested concerning CPS employees in attendance at those workshops contains personal data. Personal data can only be released if to do so would not contravene any of the data protection principles as outlined in Data Protection Act 2018 and set out by Article 5 of the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR)

Personal data shall be processed lawfully, fairly and in a transparent manner.

We believe releasing the information requested into the public domain where there is potential for individuals to be identified would be unfair to the individuals concerned; CPS employees have a clear and strong expectation that their personal data will be held in confidence and not disclosed to the public under the FOI Act.