Thank you for your request for information and I confirm we shall
respond as quickly as possible but not later than 24 July 2010.

Wendy Kassamani
Information Compliance Officer
Brighton & Hove City Council

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Regarding your request for information under the Freedom of Information
Act 2000: Ref: foi/405/10

"The panel, which heard evidence from victims and charities,

estimates 4,235 women and girls aged between 16 and 59 - or more

than 11 a day - were victims of a sexual assault in the city in the

past year."

I would like any/all information you can give me on how this

estimate was arrived at."

Please find set out below the information in response to the above
request:

"There are high levels of under-reporting of sexual offences, both
nationally and locally, and many incidents do not come to the attention of
services. A Home Office Ready Reckoner Tool estimates that there have been
4,235 women and girls aged 16 - 59 who have been the victim of a sexual
assault in Brighton and Hove, in the last year.^[1][^1] In 2008/09 in
Brighton and Hove, Sussex Police recorded 328 sexual offences taking place
in the city.^[2][^2]

The Home Office (November 2009) launched the Ready Reckoner tool to
highlight the estimated Levels of Violence Against Women and Girls in
various areas based on the findings from the British Crime Survey to give
a more realistic picture because of the lack of under reporting . The aim
of the tool is to help commissioners of services from a range of providers
such as health, policing and housing, estimate the need for local services
by estimating levels of violence and therefore also giving and estimate of
the cost of Domestic and Sexual Violence and does this by:

Estimating Levels of Violence Against Women and Girls

The estimated number of victims of domestic abuse and sexual assault are
based on prevalence figures for the chosen region taken from Povey et al
(2009): Homicides, Firearm Offences and Intimate Violence 2007/08
(Supplementary Volume 2 to Crime in England and Wales 2007/08).

The estimated number of victims of stalking is based on prevalence figures
for the chosen region taken from Coleman et al (2007): Homicides, Firearm
Offences and Intimate Violence 2005/06 (Supplementary Volume 1 to Crime in
England and Wales 2005/06).

Where the population figure includes both females and males, the
prevalence rates are multiplied by 0.5, assuming that the population
consists of approximately 50% females.

Survey estimates are always surrounded by a margin of error of plus or
minus a given range. At the 95 per cent confidence level, as used in the
VAWG reckoner, one would expect that there is a one in 20 chance that the
actual number of victims might lie outside the range indicated (actual
estimate +/- Margin of error is indicated within the tool).

The 95% Confidence Interval (margin of error) is calculated by the
standard error (adjusted for the BCS design effect by a standard 1.2 deft
value) multiplied by the a 1.96 (the standard deviations required for the
95% confidence level).

Costs of Domestic and Sexual Violence

Reflecting that the costs of domestic abuse and sexual assault are not
available at regional or local level, the estimate in the VAWG reckoner
are derived by using UK estimates, and assuming that the costs will be
split according to the proportion of the UK population made up by the
population size of the area in question. It does not take into account
differences in costs e.g. of housing between different parts of the
country.

The cost of domestic abuse is calculated using figures from Walby (2004):
The Cost of Domestic Violence, and the cost of sexual assault is
calculated using figures from Jaervinen et al (2008): Hard-Knock Life. The
single figure includes the costs of domestic violence, plus the estimated
cost of sexual violence that does not occur in the context of domestic
violence as these costs are included in the domestic violence figure. The
methodology for calculating the two differs, and so the overall cost
figure should be treated as an estimate only.

The cost figures, which are for 2003/04, have been multiplied by HM
Treasury's GDP deflation multiplier of 1.139 to bring the figure in line
with 2007/08 costs. Other changes in costs have not been accounted for."

Should you have any queries concerning this request please contact me,
remembering to quote the reference number shown above.

If you are not satisfied how your request has been handled, you can
appeal. Please write to:

Freedom of Information Appeals

Brighton & Hove City Council

ICT Room lst Floor

Hove Town Hall

Norton Road

Hove BN3 4AH

[3][email address]

If you are still not satisfied after your complaint has been investigated,
you can escalate your complaint to the Information Commissioners Office.
The contact details are:

The Information Commissioners Office

Wycliffe House

Water Lane

Wilmslow

Cheshire SK9 5AF

Telephone number: 01625 545745

e-mail: [4][email address]

Website: [5]www.dataprotection.gov.uk

If you have any queries regarding this process, please contact me via the
contact details below.

Wendy Kassamani

Information Compliance Officer

Brighton & Hove City Council

Hove Town Hall

Norton Road

Hove, BN3 4AH

Tel: 01273 296636

Re-use of Public Sector Information and Copyright Statement

Where information has been supplied, you are advised that the copyright in
that material is owned by Brighton & Hove City Council and/or its
contractor(s) unless otherwise stated. The supply of documents under the
Freedom of Information Act does not give the recipient an automatic right
to re-use those documents in a way that would infringe copyright, for
example, by making multiple copies, publishing and issuing copies to the
public.

Brief extracts of the material can be reproduced under the "fair dealing"
provisions of the Copyright Design and Patents Act 1998 (S.29 and S.30)
for the purposes of research for non-commercial purposes, private study,
criticism, review and news reporting.

Authorisation to re-use copyright material not owned by Brighton & Hove
City Council and/or its contractor(s) should be sought from the copyright
holders concerned. If you are considering re-using the information
disclosed to you through this request, for any purpose outside of what
could be considered for personal use, then you are required under the
Public Sector Re-use of Information Regulations 2005 to make an
Application for Re-use to the organisation from which you have requested
the information. Applications for Re-Use should be directed to Mr Paul
O'Neill at the address above.

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Please see the response to your query regarding the 'Ready Reckoner"
below.

Wendy Kassamani
Information Compliance Officer
Brighton & Hove City Council

"To do the estimates we used the ready reackoner tool which was publishe
don the home office website, however we have just checked and it is now
not available on the home office website just checked. They are updating
it. The best we can suggest is that he keeps an eye on
http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.u...
ereduction.homeoffice.gov.uk/domesticviolence/domesticviolence072.htm

Not sure whether it will ever reemerge as it was prior to May 2010,
however we definately want it to be published to make sure of accuracy."

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