The Drive Partnership is a partnership between Respect, Safelives and Social Finance.
- Respect: a membership organisation leading the development of safe and effective work with perpetrators, male victims, and young people using violence in their close relationships.
- Safelives: is a UK wide charity dedicated to ending Domestic Abuse for good, working with other organisations across the UK, to transform response to domestic abuse.
- Social Finance: a not-for-profit organisation that partners with Government, the social sector and the financial community to find new ways of tackling social problems.
The partnership came together in 2015, with a shared ambition to change the way statutory and voluntary agencies respond to high-harm, high risk perpetrators of domestic violence and abuse.
Today, the Partnership is still working together to transform the national response to perpetrators of domestic abuse, with the Drive partners providing ongoing governance and leadership.
The Drive Project is the partnership flagship intervention working with those causing harm in their relationships to prevent abusive behaviour and protect Victims and Survivors.
Any service users have been assessed as posing high risk and/ or high harm level of domestic abuse to the people that they are in intimate or family relationships with. Services users often have multiple needs are resistant to change.
The Drive Project provides for an intensive case management approach to perpetrators, which challenges them to change, whilst working with partner agencies such as the Police and Social Service.
To date the Drive Project has worked with over 6,949 high risk perpetrators, helping to reduce the risk that they pose to 7,775 adult victim-survivors and 14,196 child victim -survivors, making them safer.
An evaluation of the Project, undertaken in its first phase of delivery concluded that:
- Reduction in abuse: service users reduce committing domestic violence offences of physical by 82%, sexual abuse by 88%, harassment and stalking by 75% and jealous and controlling behaviours reduced by 73%.
- Reduction of risk: Independent Domestic Violence Advocates (IDVAs) reported the risk to the victim reduced either moderately or significantly in 82% of cases.
- Reduction in repeat and serial perpetrator cases heard at MARAC: MARAC (Multi Agency Risk Assessment Conference) date showed that Drive helped to reduce high-risk perpetration, including by serial and repeat perpetrators, with these appearing less often at a MARAC than the control group, with statistically significant difference that was sustained for a year after a case was closed.
- Reduction in Police involvement: Police date shows 30% reduction in the number of criminal Domestic Violence and Abuse incidents for Drive service users in 6 months after intervention.
The Drive Project states:
- ‘The primary aim of the Drive Project is always to make victims and survivors safer. We do this by disrupting abuse and challenging those who are causing harm to change.’
If you or any one you know if being subjected to domestic abuse, please contact the Domestic Violence and Abuse Department (DVAD) for expert advice as to what protective measures are available, either by clicking on the links, or by telephoning Johnson Astills on 0116 255 4855.
