Cambridge Rape Crisis Centre

Who we are

Cambridge Rape Crisis Centre was set up as a confidential helpline in 1982 by a small group of local women. It was a response to a growing awareness of male sexual violence against women and girls, and the need to provide a safe space.

The centre gave many women their first chance to talk openly about their experiences of rape, sexual assault, childhood sexual abuse and other forms of violence. It also meant they could support each other in their recovery and healing.

Today, more than 40 years later, we have expanded to become a specialist sexual violence organisation delivering a range of support services each year to over a thousand people across Cambridgeshire who are survivors of rape, sexual abuse and sexual violence.

Our culture and values

We fundamentally believe women and girls.

The principles of being confidential, non-directional (letting survivors make their own choices) and non-judgemental underpin all our services. We believe that survivors are experts in their own healing.

CRCC is a feminist organisation. Feminism informs the organisation’s ethos, activities and the way our services are delivered. CRCC believes:

- Sexual violence is a cause and consequence of gender inequality
- The threat of sexual violence is a way of controlling women

As a feminist organisation, CRCC also:

- Believes women and girls.
- Provides a women-only space.
- Actively challenges myths and victim-blaming throughout our work.
- Collectivises the experiences of individual women and girls to help women and girls understand their own experiences of sexual violence.

Feminism informs CRCC’s practice in challenging and changing the social acceptance of sexual violence.

The work of CRCC is also underpinned by a strong set of values:

Equality – we are committed to equality and inclusivity, and oppose discrimination in everything we do. This comes out of an awareness that women experience disadvantage and discrimination because of their gender, class, ethnicity, disability status, religion and age; amongst other factors.

Respect – we treat all survivors as individuals and provide a non-judgemental service, whilst recognising women and girls’ survival strategies and treating women and girls with dignity.

Transparency – we provide open and transparent services that validate survivors’ feelings, dispel myths around sexual violence and empower and enable survivors.

Choice – we work in partnership with other agencies to offer women and girls a choice around the services they access and how they access them.

Quality – we strive to provide a safe and effective service that is of high quality and professional at all times.

Our vision is that all women and girls should be free from the fear and impacts of sexual violence and abuse.

Our aims are to:

- provide specialist support to women and girls who have experienced or are experiencing rape, childhood sexual abuse or any form of sexual violence;
- secure high quality sexual violence services for women and girls who have experienced sexual violence;
- raise awareness of sexual violence, its prevalence and effects;
- build our collective expertise to improve services and policies for the benefit of survivors;
- press for change and promote the importance and need for appropriate, high-quality and specialised support for survivors;
- end rape and sexual violence.

Equality, diversity and inclusion policy

Cambridge Rape Crisis Centre (CRCC) recognises that many people in our society experience discrimination or lack of opportunity for a variety of characteristics identified as protected characteristics under the Equality Act 2010.

CRCC aims to be an employer and service provider that actively promotes equality of opportunity and freedom from direct and associative discrimination and we make every effort to relate to all people in a respectful and equal manner in the belief that all individuals should be treated on the basis of individual merit and without prejudice.

We believe everyone deserves to be treated with dignity and respect and are committed to making our organisation and the services we provide as inclusive as possible.

We will always continue to do everything we can to make all clients, staff and volunteers feel welcome, safe and supported.

We acknowledge that we still have some way to go before we are fully inclusive and that our clients, staff and organisation as a whole are not yet representative of our community. We are committed to changing this throughout our organisation, at all levels, by continuing to welcome individuals with protected characteristics as clients, staff and volunteers and ensuring our staff and volunteers receive regular training around supporting and working with individuals with protected characteristics.

You can read more about our commitment to being an inclusive organisation in our Equality Diversity and Inclusion Policy, which can be found on our website.