Diagrama Foundation hosts REVIJ Project National Seminar in London

02 May 2016

On February 1, Diagrama Foundation held the REVIJ Project national seminar for the UK, in Europe House, London.

The REVIJ project, which concludes later this year, will help provide a shared vision on victim reparation measures in Europe, analysing the accomplishment of the Directive 2012/29/UE of the European Parliament and the Council of Europe regarding respect to rights, support and protection of offence victims.

The project is funded by the European Union Criminal Justice Programme and led by FundaciĆ³n Diagrama (Spain) with partners from several European countries: Association Diagrama (France), Diagrama Foundation (UK), Istituto Don Calabria (Italy), Universidade Catolica Portuguesa do Porto (Portugal) and the International Juvenile Justice Observatory (Belgium).

The seminar brought together findings of the REVIJ Project which compares the victim reparation measures in different European Juvenile Justice Systems.

The event was attended by 35 people (with 4 expert speakers) and included presentations made by the expert speakers and two roundtables where all the participants expressed their views on particular aspects of restorative justice in the field of youth and posed questions to the experts.

The first expert was David McGuire CEO of Diagrama Foundation, explained to delegates more about the work the charity had carried out as part of the Revij Project and within the foundation.

Secondly, Dani Gover, senior policy and public affairs manager for the Restorative Justice Council,  discussed restorative justice in the UK and best practice in the Restorative Justice Council.

John Willet, Strategic Restorative Justice Manager for the Office of the Sussex Police and Crime Commissioner gave best practice examples of restorative justice from Sussex, followed by Jim Rose, non-executive director of the Fostering Foundation, who looked at the human part of the process “The Human Inside – understanding the principles of Restorative Justice and what they mean to us an individuals and societies”.

The final speaker, Professor David O’Mahony, Director of Education, University of Essex School of Law, presented  best practice examples from Northern Ireland on restorative justice.

Delegates were invited to participate in two roundtable discussions of “Restorative Justice for Victims within Youth Justice - best practices and gaps in practice” and the “Psychological effects on victims of crime and best practices interventions in restorative justice”.

Ladia Quijano and Cristian Organero presented the seminar conclusions after a break for networking and informal discussions.

With the conclusions reached, a compendium of good practices will now be produced and directives will be proposed in order to be used by the professionals and the people responsible for formulating public policies.