Updates and Campaign Wins
As with buses, you can wait ages for a campaign win and then three come along at once…
This year has been a big year for campaign wins and amendments to bills going through Parliament. Here is a summary of some of the main ones achieved.
HMICFRS Accepts Super Complaint (Jan 2026)
In December 2025, a super-complaint was submitted by the Centre for Women’s Justice, Rape Crisis England and Wales, Cambridge Rape Crisis Centre (CRCC), and Bindmans LLP, regarding soaring police delays, which have left over 37,000 survivors of sexual offences waiting for more than three years for their cases to be investigated, over the last decade.
They said that the ‘situation of very lengthy investigations was inhumane and untenable for many survivors.’ This meant that less people were likely to seek justice or more likely to withdraw from the Criminal Justice System as a result.
The super-complaints system is designed to help identify and address systemic issues in policing, allowing organisations to raise issues on behalf of the public. HMICFRS accepted the Super Complaint in January 2026 as eligible for investigation.
Maxine Rowson, Head of Policy and Public Affairs at Rape Crisis England & Wales (RCEW), said:
“We welcome the news that this super-complaint has been assessed as eligible for investigation, and eagerly await the findings. For far too long, survivors of sexual violence and abuse have been asked to engage with a process that no longer resembles a functioning criminal justice system. We hear from survivors who have no choice but to withdraw from the process completely because of the devastating impact is has on their mental health. We know that the journey to reform is long, but we are determined to ensure that survivors who choose to engage with the criminal justice system can do so without enduring further harm.”
‘Bad Experiences, not Bad Character’ Campaign Win (Dec 2025)
The government has committed to law change that will restrict victims’ previous experiences of rape and sexual violence being used against them in court.
As it stands, when a survivor of rape reports an offence to the police, previous disclosures of rape and sexual violence they have made are used against them as evidence of their ‘bad character’, even when these previous experiences are completely unconnected to the case.
This enables the defence to present an unfair or twisted narrative that the survivor is untruthful, when there is actually no evidence of this. This is a harrowing and re-traumatising experience, often used without any warning during the trial.
It is not unusual for survivors to have experienced more than once in their lives and this is an important win. Office for National Statistics (ONS) data shows that 1 in 2 adult survivors of rape have been raped more than once. While data also shows that almost a third (31%) of adults abused as children experience sexual assault in later life.
Possessing or Publishing Strangulation in Porn to be Criminalised (Nov 2025)
Online pornography showing strangulation or suffocation is to be made illegal, the government announced in November 2025.
The amendment to the Crime and Policing Bill, currently going through Parliament, was made after such depictions on mainstream porn sites were helping to normalise the act among young people.
The amendment will criminalise possessing or publishing depictions of strangulation or suffocation in porn, with responsibilities put on tech platforms to proactively detect and remove this material or face enforcement action.
Survivors of image-based sexual abuse will also now have up to six times longer to report what happened to them. Those who take or share an intimate image without consent can now be prosecuted up to three years after the offence was committed; a positive move for survivors.
Andrea Simon, Director of the End Violence Against Women Coalition said:
‘There is no such thing as safe strangulation; women cannot consent to the long-term harm it can cause, including impaired cognitive functioning and memory. Its widespread portrayal in porn is fuelling dangerous behaviours, particularly among young people.
‘This is a vital step towards recognising the role violent pornography plays in shaping attitudes to women and regulating an industry which promotes and profits from violence against women. The UK’s flagship Online Safety Act must now be updated to ensure online platforms are made to remove this content.’
Parents who sexually abuse any child to automatically lose parental rights (October 2025)
On 20 October an amendment was made to the Victims and Courts Bill to restrict parental rights of convicted abusers.
Currently, parental rights are ‘absolute’ in law and can only be managed through a court order. This means that if a father is convicted and imprisoned for sexual offences against children, there is nothing preventing him from having contact with his own children or having a say over their life.
There are two key amendments:
- Parents convicted of serious sexual offences against any child, not just their own, will now be “automatically deprived” of their parental rights.
- A perpetrator’s parental responsibility will now be restricted in cases where they have been convicted and sentenced for a rape that resulted in the birth of a child.
These amendments will help to close a gap in the law which for too long has allowed child sex offenders to retain rights over their own children, including those born following a rape they perpetrated.
Free transcripts of judges sentencing remarks made available (May 2025)
Following a one-year pilot, it was announced in May 2025 that Judges’ sentencing remarks in murder and rape cases would continue to be made available to victims and survivors free of charge. This was widened to encompass all cases heard at Crown Court from January 2026.
Sentence hearings can be a distressing and retraumatising experience. With the possibility of encountering their perpetrator or their friends and family, victims and survivors of sexual offences often don’t feel able to attend these hearings. For those who do attend, heightened anxiety can often mean that key information is not heard or remembered.
Free transcripts of judge’s sentencing remarks provide an opportunity for survivors to read in full what was said by the judge as they passed sentence. It also helps then to digest this at a time that is suitable to them, with support as needed.
Rape Crisis England and Wales, are urging the government to go further and make the trial transcripts also freely available. This is particularly important where survivors are unable to attend and, in many cases, actively encouraged not to attend the entirety of the trials. Read more on the Rape Crisis England and Wales website.
Justice ministry announce new reforms for child sexual abuse victims/survivors (Feb 2025)
The Ministry of Justice announced new reforms to support victims and survivors of child sexual abuse. These include:
- Axing the three-year limit for compensation claims
- Shifting the burden of proof from survivors to defendants
- Amending the Law of Apologies to encourage employers to apologise to people wronged by their employees.
These measures came in response to the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA), with the aim to make it easier for survivors to receive an apology and pursue claims in the civil court.
Amelia Handy, Head of Policy and Public Affairs at Rape Crisis England and Wales said:
Many survivors of child sexual abuse don’t feel able to tell someone what happened to them until later in life and are often dealing with the trauma of their experiences way into adulthood, so imposed deadlines on receiving compensation are unrealistic and punitive. The axing of the three-year limit is a very positive and welcomed step which will enable survivors to know they can come forward when they are ready to do so.
Go to the RCEW website to read their full press release.
