Lucy Jaffé

I bring 30 years’ skill and experience from the non-profit and private sectors. Over the last 13 years, I have been a Director of Why me?: Transforming Lives through Restorative Justice. I built the charity to be a leading UK restorative justice organisation elevating the voices of people with lived experience of restorative justice. My knowledge extends to policy, campaigning, communication, governance, finance, fundraising and staff management. I have championed restorative justice with the UK Minister for Victims, the Ministry of Justice, the Home Office, with National Police bodies and victims groups and have sat on many advisory groups. As a result restorative justice is far better understood and supported by policy-makers and professionals. I am currently a freelance consultant at Jaffeworks.com specialising in supporting restorative justice services, non-profit and corporate organisations to thrive around the world. 

Since being co-opted to the EFRJ Board in June 2023, I have been deeply involved in planning the EFRJ’s organisational strategy for the next 5 years. I have applied myself to the EFRJ fundraising and finance planning, working closely with the Secretariat and Board members to take a strategic approach to financing the organisation’s activities and diversifying income streams. I am proposing a fundraising plan and policy to the Board meeting in May 2024, which will lay the foundations for the years ahead.  My involvement with the EFRJ working group on Violent Extremism, Hate Crime and Polarisation since 2019 demonstrates my commitment to deepening and extending restorative knowledge, practice and policy in this important area. 

We need organisations like the European Forum on Restorative Justice to challenge dominant punitive orthodoxies so that people and communities can fulfil their potential. I want to strengthen the EFRJ’s impact and expand its influence in the next four years because I believe that the Forum has a critical role to play in embedding restorative justice in policy, for professionals and in practice. 

Each EFRJ member’s engagement with restorative justice and practice is so precious and needs recognition, support and valuing. Across criminal justice, education, universities, communities and workplaces, there are significant but isolated pieces of work taking place. EFRJ shines a light on this good practice and connects people. The purpose of the EFRJ is to ensure our membership is greater than the sum of our parts. Together, we form a movement. Together we can change the hearts and minds of politicians, professionals and institutions to embrace restorative approaches and invest in them. 

By 2028 the EFRJ will have developed and have: 

• clear implementation and monitoring plans for 2025-2029 strategy; 
• embedded anti-racist and pro-gender polices and practice leading to more diverse representation;
• enabled accessible multi-lingual participation to all services and activities;
• actively address and audit climate change impact through all our activities;
• 3 new international partnerships to develop global reach practice of restorative justice;
• increased membership of both individual and organisational members;
• strengthened membership to connect and share knowledge through 2 international bi-annual conferences, working groups and cross-sector and cross-country events;
• diversified income so that the EU Operating Grant = 50% of income (currently 85%);
• increased size of Secretariat to support above activities.

Over the last year, it has been a privilege to work with fellow Board members and with the talented and dedicated Secretariat, headed up by Edit Törzs since my co-option. I will be taking an active role in supporting the 2024 Conference, in particular through a second ’Time to talk’ session. I will also be representing the EFRJ at the Victim Support Europe 2024 conference, with a particular interest in elevating restorative justice and engaging hate crime organisations. 

I am committed to tackling discrimination of all kinds and have experience and determination to make a change in this aspect of EFRJ. The EFRJ is not representative of all European communities and has much to gain from tackling this issue. This will require an active commitment by the Board to introducing anti-racist policies and practice, a continued investment in the development of gender policies, for us to prioritise the collective challenge of multi-lingual communication, and the embedding of anti-discrimination into every aspect of our work. 

I offer the following skills and energy to you: 

• Campaigning and communication skills to elevate restorative justice to national and international levels. 
• Determination to make the EFRJ more diverse and representative of communities and countries 
• Ambition to make EFRJ financial robust and less dependent on one source of funding 
• Skills in finance and fundraising to support the Executive team to diversify income streams 
• Multi-year experience of supporting several network organisations at Board level
• Experience being the CEO of a highly successful restorative justice NGO over 13 years 
• Ability to address conflict and build long-lasting structures to support effective working

I have known Lucy Jaffé over many years and I hold her personally and professionally in very high regard. I take great pleasure in proposing her to be a candidate in the elections to the EFRJ Board. 

Lucy Jaffé recently moved on from being Director of Why me?, a non-government organisation which, although quite small, has a big vision and has earned a reputation for excellent, cutting edge restorative justice practices and for the effective promotion of restorative justice throughout the UK. This been due to Lucy’s dynamic leadership and her ability to get the best out of her staff. 

I believe that the European Forum for Restorative Justice can benefit from Lucy’s knowledge of restorative justice and her management and leadership skills. She certainly fits the Forum’s preferred profile. 

She has managed a very successful NGO which specialises in engaging victims of serious crime in restorative processes and developing innovative restorative justice approaches which reach out to those who are not adequately catered for my mainstream restorative justice provision. These include LGBTQ+ people, people with English as an additional language and most recently interfaith hate crime. 

At a very difficult time for the NGO sector, Lucy has proved to be an effective networker and fundraiser. Why me? Has been very creative and skilful in the use of social media to market its services and to promote restorative justice. Lucy participates within the British parliament at Westminster in a prestigious committee which works to develop a positive policy climate for restorative justice. She is a native English speaker and an effective communicator who speaks with enthusiasm, energy and clarity. I would encourage members to give Lucy their votes. 

Tim Chapman 
 

I am honoured to support Lucy Jaffé's candidacy to continue for another four years as EFRJ Board member. In the last year when she was co-opted to replace Tim Chapman, Lucy has been an active Board member, a team worker and a great representative of the EFRJ and I believe she should continue for a further 4 years given her previous involvement and experience in this role. 

Lucy Jaffé, on the other hand, has a wealth of experience running one of the leading restorative justice organisations in the UK, has a deep understanding of the social and political impact of restorative justice, has close links and contacts with other public and private organisations in the UK and elsewhere in Europe with a large EFRJ membership and can contribute on key issues such as funding, policy impact and networking. Besides, she speaks English and French and some German, very important languages in Europe and beyond to represent the EFRJ.

Personally, I met her working together as members of the EFRJ Working Group on Violent Extremism and I can say that she has a deep knowledge of restorative practices in serious crimes and settings such as prison or juvenile and community settings and she was and remains a wonderful colleague and friend.