Abstract
This paper reviews Australian laws relating to compensation and financial support for victims and survivors of crime who have a prior history of offending or who have contributed to their injuries whilst committing a crime. The paper compares Australian State and Territory victims compensation and financial support schemes, the Commonwealth Redress Scheme. It also reflects on the similarity between the relevant provisions of the United Kingdom’s criminal injuries compensation scheme and the Commonwealth Redress Scheme. This review brings to light the inconsistent approach to compensation and financial support of victim/survivors across jurisdictions and with the introduction of the Commonwealth Redress Scheme. We conclude all schemes implicitly apply varying degrees of support or sanction depending on a perception of degree of deservedness of the applicant.
Introduction
This paper will consider the issue of whether criminal injuries compensation and/or financial support for persons who suffer injury as a consequence of criminal offences are entitled to compensation where they have:
- Engaged in criminal activities prior to the event the subject of the claim and those activities contribute in some way to the injuries sustained.
- Engaged in criminal activities when they have sustained injuries the subject of a claim; or
- Engaged in criminal activities not directly associated with the event the subject of a claim.
This paper with be divided into five parts. Firstly, the paper will set out a short history of victims of crime compensation and the introduction of laws into Australia as a result of innovations in the UK and the USA. Secondly, it will consider the concept of victim/survivor in the context of compensation and financial assistance and in this section, we consider literature linking between victims and later law-breaking behaviours. Thirdly, the Australian legislative provisions relating to victims/survivors who have been offenders are examined. In the fourth section we consider provisions which disqualify applicants who are committing an offence at the time they are injured and consider the rationale and fairness of those provisions. Fifthly, consideration is given to the recently enacted National Redress Scheme and specific provisions which also considers applicants who have prior convictions when determining each victim’s eligibility for financial assistance.