Community Cashback - a new scheme which gives local people a say in how £4million of recovered criminal assets should be spent in their communities.
The 'Have Your Say' period is over now for the London region and the successful projects are listed here.
Click here to see the projects SLF has supported.
Want to know who actually benefits from funds donated to SLF? Click here to read the stories of some of the beneficiaries of the projects we support.
POCA
What is it?
The Proceeds of Crime Act 2002: an Act of Parliament which gives police officers and staff powers to identify and remove assets obtained from a criminal lifestyle.
The Act in full can be found here on the website of The Office of Public Sector Information.
A simple guide to the Act on The Guardian website can be found here.
The Serious and Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) has been responsible for this activity since 2008.
Payback
What is it?
Operation Payback is a law enforcement initiative by officers from the MPS, HM Revenue & Customs, City of London Police and British Transport Police. The aim is to strip London’s criminals of their cash and assets in a major joint operation using powers under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2000 to claim back criminal cash and proceeds that fund illegal lifestyles and support crime in the capital.
What's it got to do with Safer London Foundation?
Since 2007, SLF has received an annual donation of £500,000 of POCA funds from the MPS / MPA/ as a major contribution to our grant making programme. This means that we take money confiscated from criminals in London and put it back into crime reduction and prevention projects, often into the same kinds of communities that the money came from in the first place.
This can mean that money made from drug dealing, and other associated criminal activity, in a particular local area is put to use funding projects in the same area. These could be projects providing positive role models to young people who might otherwise be drawn in by the lifestyle of drug dealers and gang members.
SLF is the only charity in London working to put this money back where it's needed most: the communities most effected by crime.