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<p>The Government recognises that the decline in the number of rape and serious sexual
offences being charged and prosecuted in England and Wales is a cause for significant
concern. <br>As such an end-to-end review of the criminal justice response to rape
and serious sexual offences was commissioned in March 2019 by the National Criminal
Justice Board (CJB). A sub-group of the CJB made up of experts and operational partners
from across the criminal justice system is driving forward the review</p><p>To answer
your questions in turn:<br>a) The review has established a Stakeholder Reference Group,
which is made up of victim organisations, and is consulted to ensure the review considers
the victim experience of the whole criminal justice system. The review team has met
with this group three times, in May 2019, February 2020 and April 2020. Members of
the Group have also been engaged by the Review team separately to discuss specific
elements of the review. <br>b) The review has commissioned a Literature Review of
research currently in the public domain that studies the end to end progression of
rape cases in England and Wales, including findings relevant to the role of juries
and courts<br>c) Five expert interviews were undertaken with barristers as part of
a wider suite of qualitative and quantitative work which included 23 focus groups
and in-depth interviews and 691 surveys with police officers, specialist victims support
services including Independent Sexual Violence Advisers (ISVAs), barristers, HMCTS
and CPS prosecutors.</p>
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