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Victims of crime and specialist RASSO units will be better supported thanks to funding allocated to the CPS from the Budget, confirms the Solicitor General.

The CPS will receive £49 million to support victims of crime and transform the services they provide to the public.

Funding will mean additional staff in CPS’s specialist Rape and Serious Sexual Offence units and further staff to support the ongoing victim transformation programme.

This funding will be a boost in the Government’s pledge to halve violence against women and girls in the next decade, a key element of the wider mission to deliver the safer streets mission.

Further funding will be made available to develop the CPS’s use of new technology to increase productivity, efficiency, and quality in its services. 

Additional funding for CPS is being made available after the government recognised the CPS has been under increasing pressure from the wider criminal justice system, including court backlogs and capacity pressures in our prisons.

The Solicitor General Sarah Sackman KC MP said:

Tackling crime, supporting victims, and strengthening public confidence in the criminal justice system are priorities for me as Solicitor General.

I know that prosecutors will play a vital role in our ambitious missions to halve violence against women and girls in a decade, deliver swifter justice for victims, and double down on knife crime as we make our streets safer for everyone.

That’s why I welcome this budget, which is not only fixing the foundations of our economy, but is focused on rebuilding trust in the criminal justice system too.

Director of Public Prosecutions Stephen Parkinson said:

I am pleased with the increase in our funding, which will help us begin to tackle the significant challenges we face and build on our work to make the public safer.

This investment will help us to achieve better outcomes, particularly in cases involving rape and serious sexual offence and domestic abuse, while supporting us to improve the experience of victims in the justice system. It will also support investment in technology to help us increase productivity and efficiency.

It is imperative that we work together with our criminal justice partners to build public confidence, and this investment in the CPS will be an important first step to do that.

The Budget provides funding for the Law Officers’ Department, which the Attorney General Lord Hermer KC and Solicitor General Sarah Sackman KC MP superintend, which includes CPS, provides total funding of £1.1bn in 2025-26.

This is equivalent to an annual real terms increase of 7.5% over this financial year and the next.