"A signal is being sent that if you get drunk, you are to blame"
The Chair of the National Assembly’s Working Group on Trafficking of Women and Children, JOYCE WATSON AM, has responded angrily to news that full compensation has yet to be paid to 16 victims of rape.
Mrs Watson’s comments came as it was revealed the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority has not awarded full payment to 16 victims of rape who were deemed to have consumed an “excessive” amount of alcohol at the time of their attack.
Of the 23 victims in England, Scotland and Wales who had had their compensation wrongly cut over the past three years, only seven have been reimbursed. The remaining 16 are still outstanding because the Authority says it cannot be sure victims would welcome being contacted.
Labour Assembly Member for Mid and West Wales JOYCE WATSON AM said:
“It is unacceptable that these 16 victims of crime have still not received their full compensation. I do not accept the argument that they may not wish to be contacted. Financial compensation hardly makes up for the crime they have suffered, but it is their money which they are owed.
“If they do not receive what is owed to them then a signal is being sent that if you get drunk and then raped you are less deserving of sympathy or compensation: that you are somehow to blame. This does not apply for other crime victims such as those who are mugged while drunk, so why should it apply to rape victims?”
