Throughout March, LimeCulture CIC is providing a series of free workshops to support the roll out of the Safety and Support (SAS) Assessment for Independent Sexual Violence Advisers (ISVAs.)
Prior to the development of the Safety and Support (SAS) Assessment, there was no commonly available standardised risk and needs assessment specific to victims of sexual violence. This has meant that in many ISVA services, risk and needs assessments have been carried out informally (based on a mostly unstructured approach), or that ISVAs are not carrying out any risk and needs assessment at all.
While it is clear that some ISVA services have developed their own risk and needs processes and documentation, generally the assessment of risk and needs amongst the ISVA workforce as a whole is anecdotal and inconsistent. Largely, information collected by ISVAs has not been gathered systematically, and any information considered relevant is not entered into the formulation of risk/need in a consistent and/or standardised way.
As a result, a range of individual ISVAs, ISVA Managers and Commissioners of ISVA Services expressed concerns to LimeCulture about the lack of any standardised risk and need assessment available for use by ISVAs.
In Autumn 2016, LimeCulture CIC was awarded funding from the Home Office Support for Victims and Survivors of Sexual Abuse (SVSSA) Fund to develop a Risk and Needs Assessment Tool for use by all ISVAs working across England and Wales to support victims and survivors of sexual violence. It is hoped that the Safety and Support (SAS) Assessment will be supported by all Commissioners of ISVA Services and adopted for use as soon as possible by all ISVAs working across the England and Wales.
 Key Facts about the development of the SAS Assessment:
- The Safety and Support (SAS) Assessment has been developed specifically for use by Independent Sexual Violence Advisers (ISVAs).
- It is available for all ISVAs to use free of charge.
- The SAS Assessment and Support Plan templates and accompanying toolkit are available in the Research section of the LimeCulture website and can be downloaded at no cost.
- The templates can be customised and amended to include service specification, commissioning or management requirements.
- The development of the SAS Assessment has included consultation and feedback from more than 50 ISVAs (and their Services).
- Five ISVA Services were selected to become ‘Pathfinder Sites’ to test the effectiveness, quality, design and operational use.
- LimeCulture has arranged a series of regional workshops during March 2017 intended to support the implementation of the SAS Assessment.
Further information
If you would like further information about the Safety and Support (SAS) Assessment or the accompanying templates or toolkit, please contact:
Becky Dewdney-York
Programme Delivery Manager
LimeCulture Community Interest Company
Becky.Dewdney-York@limeculture.co.uk
0203 633 0018
