Victims support in policy and legal process in Australia: Still an ambivalent and contested space

Historically, the role for a victim in an adversarial system of justice has been limited to an instrumental one as a witness for the Crown. Victims were largely silenced in the criminal justice process and had no role in critical threshold decisions such as whether or not to proceed with criminal proceedings against alleged offenders. They were rarely informed about the progress of matters, delays, and/or decisions to drop charges or to accept a less charge in exchange for a guilty plea (Zedner, 2003:436). The increasing politicisation of the ‘crime victim’ over the past 30 years however and the concomitant change in the status of victims in political agendas and penal policies from ‘outsider par excellence’ (Ryan, 2003: 68) to the ‘centre of contemporary discourse’ has been well-documented (Garland, 2001:11). During the last decade in Australia in particular, victims’ causes have achieved particular importance in public consciousness as well as criminal justice policy. For instance, Rosie Batty, 2015 Australian of the Year and prominent advocate for the rights of victims of domestic violence, has lead a remarkable campaign to raise public awareness in relation to the needs of such victims, particularly the dearth of appropriate services. A significant outcome in September 2015 was the Australian federal government’s announcement of a $100 million funding package directed to improve the services and support available to victims of domestic violence. For the first edition of this book, our chapter traced the increasing political and penal prominence of victims through the emergence of victims’ movements and support groups, the enactment of charters of victims’ rights, the expansion of victim support services, and the integration of victims in legal proceedings through victim impact statements (VISs) in sentencing and parole. In this chapter, we focus on the implications of the expansion of victims’ services post-crime and the practical application and operation of victims’ legal entitlements in the sentencing process in Australia. We argue that despite an apparent expansion of services and legal entitlements for victims, the politics of victims’ rights remains fraught in Australia from the perspective of crime victims