Publications
Our Annual Reports, Strategic Plans and Consultation Responses
Publications
#BreakTheCycle
Nexus Publications: Reports, Strategies, Plans and Responses
Browse through a collection of our latest reports, plans, responses and research.
If you’re interested in learning more about a specific topic related to sexual abuse and abusive relationships, check out our blog posts. If videos are more your thing, we have a collection of videos you can browse too.
Strategic Plans
Here you can find our current and past Strategic Plans. Our current Strategic Plan covers the period from 1st April 2023 to 31st March 2026. This Strategy will guide the work of Nexus over the next three years, and represents our vision and commitment to empowering people, supporting recovery from sexual abuse and abusive relationships, breaking the cycle of sexual abuse and abusive relationships, informing policy and practice, influencing society, and being fit for purpose.
Select the Strategic Plan you’d like to view by clicking on the relevant item below.
Consultation Responses
Responding to relevant consultations is one of the ways we inform policy and practice and make sure the eradication of sexual abuse and abusive relationships is a political priority.
Select the response you would like to view by clicking on the relevant item below.
Public Prosecution Service Consultation on Policy for Prosecuting Cases of Stalking
As a charity that supports people impacted by abusive relationships, we welcome the opportunity to provide our expertise on the proposed Public Prosecution Services’s Policy for Prosecuting Cases of Stalking. The decision to pursue legal action is oftentimes a re-traumatising experience for victims as they navigate a criminal justice system that is not trauma informed nor victim centred. We believe that there is much work to be done to reform the criminal justice system, part of which is complete transparency within the judicial and prosecutorial process.
Department of Health’s Equality Impact Assessment on the 2024-25 Budget
As the leading organisation within Northern Ireland supporting individuals impacted by sexual abuse and abusive relationships, our mission is to enable positive change for those impacted by sexual abuse and abusive relationships through supporting, informing, and influencing society. As a charity that receives funding support from the Department of Health, we welcome the opportunity to respond to the Department’s Equality Impact Assessment (EQIA) on the 2024/25 Northern Ireland Budget.
Ofcom Protecting Children from Harms Online Consultation
As providers of Relationship and Sexuality Education as well as a therapeutic intervention service for young people impacted by sexual abuse and abusive relationships, Nexus welcomes this robust, well-evidenced volume of proposals from Ofcom to strengthen protections and accountability measures for online services. As society continues to spend large quantities of time online or on social media, we strongly believe it is the responsibility of service providers, government, and strategic stakeholders to protect our children and young people from harms online. The comments, suggestions, and questions in our response are based on our expertise and experience supporting children, young people, and their families and carers through therapeutic interventions across Northern Ireland.
Voluntary and Community Sector Infrastructure Support Policy Framework Consultation
As a charity that relies on government funding, external grants, donations and the work of volunteers, Nexus welcomes this comprehensive review of Northern Ireland’s Volunteer and Community Sector. Our organisation strongly believes in the work of the sector and the contributions from volunteers, advocates, and leaders in the community. We value the support and input from our volunteers, community partners, and fellow charity organisations that work across Northern Ireland, and we believe that the network of groups of experts and service users is a vital forum for discussing new projects, evaluating current work, and progressing awareness and support. Therefore, Nexus welcomes the opportunity to share our knowledge and learning through this Consultation exercise.
Independent Review of Children’s Social Care Services Consultation
As providers of therapeutic intervention for children and young people impacted by sexual abuse and abusive relationships, Nexus welcomes this comprehensive review of Northern Ireland’s Children’s Services. Our organisation strongly believes in progressing best practise for the holistic care of children and young people, including system restructuring and evaluation in order to provide support for children, young people, and their families and support systems. Therefore, Nexus welcomes the opportunity to share our knowledge and learning through this Consultation exercise.
Relationships and Sexuality Education (RSE) Consultation
As providers of Relationship and Sexuality Education as well as a therapeutic intervention service for people impacted by sexual abuse and abusive relationships, Nexus welcomes these measures to mandate comprehensive, continuous, and fact-based RSE in all schools. Our organisation strongly believes, based on our work, research, and external evidence, that educating and supporting our children and young people is key to promoting healthy relationships in all areas of life.
In our response we emphasised the importance of mandating fact-based, scientific, and comprehensive relationship and sexuality education alongside a robust monitoring and evaluation process to support continuous learning for all students across Northern Ireland, regardless of the school they attend. We also highlighted the fact that a lot of our young people are left unsupported, disappointed, and disadvantaged by the current state of RSE in schools.
By providing a fully comprehensive programme we increase the potential that every young person is confident in their ability to engage in healthy and consensual relationships and intimacy, to support and advocate for themselves and their peers and friends, and to challenge abusive behaviours. Nexus looks forward to further stakeholder engagement and participating in informing, supporting, and raising awareness of healthy relationships.
Ending Violence Against Women and Girls in Northern Ireland – Government Strategic Framework Consultation
We at Nexus welcome the Draft Strategic Framework to End Violence Against Women and Girls, in Northern Ireland. Currently Northern Ireland is the only jurisdiction within the UK and Ireland without a strategic framework and operational plan to end violence against women and girls despite the high prevalence rates reported. Therefore, we recognise the commitment of the Northern Ireland Executive in mandating its development.
Nexus is proud to have played a role in shaping the Draft Strategy and Foundational Action Plan as part of the co-design team. This opportunity allowed us to amplify the voices of our service users and contribute our professional expertise to help craft the framework’s ambitions and key priorities. Ending all forms of gender-based violence is a key priority for Nexus as the cultural, legal, economic and political drivers that contribute to it also enable the perpetuation of sexual abuse and abusive relationships. We recognise that eliminating these drivers requires a whole societal approach, meaning we can all play our part.
Draft Domestic and Sexual Abuse Strategy 2023-30
We welcome the opportunity to respond to the Department of Health and Justice Draft Domestic and Sexual Abuse Strategy for 2023-2030. This Draft Strategy has been developed following a Call for Views on a Domestic and Sexual Abuse Strategy and a Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy, which ran from January to March 2022, these gathered information and recommendations from a range of public sector organisations, frontline services, individuals, and other stakeholder engagement groups.
Annual Reports
Our Annual Reports provide a summary of organisational operations for each financial year. The previous financial year’s report is usually published in December of each year. The 2022/23 report will therefore be due for publication in December 2023.
Select the report you’d like to view by clicking on the relevant image or text.
Other Publications
From time to time, we may commission or participate in publications outside of our usual reporting methods. When we do, they’re uploaded to our website and available for anyone to view.
Select the report you’d like to view by clicking below.
Keeping your information safe
Nexus needs to keep information to enable us to offer counselling, training, volunteer opportunities and fundraising. Some of the information we keep is of a sensitive nature, especially information on our clients. To ensure that information is kept safe and only used in a proper manner we have updated our polices, procedures and produced a comprehensive privacy notice to ensure that we comply with GDPR.
Legal information
Nexus is registered with the Information Commissioners Office (Reg. No. Z3266690) are we are legally obliged to look after your information.
Northern Ireland Rape Crisis Association trading as Nexus is a registered charity in Northern Ireland. NIC102558
NEXUS is recognised by the HMRC as a charity XN46002
It is a company called Northern Ireland Rape Crisis Association, Company Registration No. NI 21120
Registered Office is 59 Malone Road, Belfast, BT9 6SA
BACP Accredited Service. BACP Ref No. 101852
Registered with the Fundraising Regulator
