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About us

Co-ordinated Action Against Domestic Abuse (CAADA) is a national charity supporting a strong multi-agency response to domestic abuse. Our work focuses on saving lives and saving public money. CAADA provides practical tools, training, guidance, quality assurance, policy and data insight to support professionals and organisations working with domestic abuse victims. The aim is to protect the highest risk victims and their children – those at risk of murder or serious harm.

Saving lives

In the UK, an average of two women per week are killed by domestic abuse. One in four women will experience abuse in their lifetime. CAADA estimates that around 10 per cent of these victims - around 120,000 - are at high risk of serious harm or death. In a climate of restricted resources, focusing on high risk victims will save more lives.

An essential component of multi-agency working, Independent Domestic Violence Advisors (IDVAs) are independent professional advisors that work with victims from the point of crisis to assess the level of risk, discuss the range of suitable options and develop co-ordinated safety plans. Over 900 Independent Domestic Violence Advisors (IDVAs) have now received accredited training by CAADA, and tens of thousands of victims are already safer today as a result of this, but this is less than the 1,500 permanent posts we believe are needed for national coverage. With the vast majority of IDVA practitioners coming from the voluntary sector, ongoing funding is required to train more.

Domestic abuse is a crime which takes place behind closed doors. No single agency or individual can see the complete picture of the life of a victim, but all may have insights that are crucial to their safety. By enabling agencies to work together to share information, identify and protect the highest risk victims, more lives will be saved. In the 12 months up to March 2010, over 40,000 high risk adult cases and 55,000 associated children were supported and made safer by the partnership model (Multi-Agency Risk Assessment Conferences or MARACs) we helped develop and now train nationally. MARACs are voluntary meetings where information is shared on the highest risk cases between representatives from local police, health, child protection, housing practitioners, IDVAs and other specialists from the statutory and voluntary sectors. A co-ordinated safety plan for each victim is then created.

Early analysis shows that following intervention by a MARAC and an Independent Domestic Violence Advisor (IDVA) service, up to 60% of domestic abuse victims will be made safer. There are currently over 249 MARACs operating today, but more are desperately needed to achieve national coverage across England and Wales.

Properly functioning IDVA and MARAC services continuously demonstrate reduced repeat victimisation levels, so our quality assurance and service standards programme ensures that participating services operate to an excellent and safe benchmark, where victim safety is always prioritised. To further support professionals in their day-to-day work, CAADA provides a wealth of practical toolkits and publications. CAADA also helps shape a national policy agenda through the contribution of practical solutions supported by robust evidence.

Saving public money

Severe domestic abuse causes spiralling, entrenched costs to the tax payer. CAADA estimates that it costs around £20,000 in public money to support the average high risk domestic abuse victim, based on an assumed average number of police call outs, A&E attendances and GP support. With at least 120,000 high risk cases in the UK today, this results in estimated direct costs of around £2.4 billion per year to the tax payer, and still more to employers. By proactively engaging with identified high risk victims and establishing safety plans as quickly as possible, our model for intervention aims to substantially reduce that cost.

We believe that one of the key historic weaknesses of the domestic abuse sector was the lack of data in relation to safety outcomes. To this end, CAADA is piloting an Insights service that will allow all IDVA services and MARACs to measure their outcomes and the subsequent cost-benefit implications of these.

To download a copy of CAADA's financial statements to the financial year ending 30th June 2009, click here.