The Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole MARAC sits once every week on a Thursday.

Agencies represented at MARAC include:

• Police
• Children's and Adults services
• health
• mental health
• probation
• housing
• drug and alcohol service
• specialist domestic violence service providers such as refuges and outreach projects

The MARAC is victim focused and information is shared on victims at the highest risk of harm.

The flowcharts on page 4 of the MARAC toolkit shows the stages in the MARAC process.

The goal of the MARAC is to:

• share information between professionals to increase the safety, health and wellbeing of victims and their children
• decide whether the perpetrator is a significant risk to any individual or the general community
• design a risk management plan that provides professional support to all those at risk, and that reduces the risk of harm
• reduce repeat victimisation
• improve agency accountability
• improve support for staff involved in high-risk domestic violence cases

While the MARAC is where information is shared and discussed between professionals, the responsibility to take appropriate action rests with the individual agencies involved.

Where a person has been identified as high risk, they will be assigned a Domestic Abuse Advisor (DAA). The DAA will represent the victim at the MARAC if the victim chooses to engage with the DAA.