Latest From Napo 10

The long silence from Napo has finally been broken. There's been nothing from Ian Lawrence since his last blog on 13th January, but this e-mail was sent today by Chair Tom Rendon to all members:-

Dear All

The MoJ has a relentless PR strategy which exists to pretend everything is on time, on budget, and that all staff resistance is futile.  It’s a load of nonsense but, understandably, it does sometimes get under your skin.  Here’s a few myth busters that will should raise morale:

Slippage to timetable
The MoJ is contorting itself to pretend this is not a delay.  Remember when the staff split would be done and dusted in August 2013, the shares sold in April 2014?  Now it looks like a struggle to get this done by the end of the year.  There is still no credible person out there who believes the government can privatise before the next election.  A civil servant recently said the “extension” in the timetable was in recognition of the fabulous work the Trusts were doing.  I nearly burst out laughing. 

Grievances and Appeals
The MoJ is publicly saying that the unions have agreed to the staff split process.  This is categorically untrue.  It is still the subject of a dispute and such a dogs dinner that post-split, some Trusts have found they have left either the CRC or the NPS without enough staff.  Branch Chairs have been given a questionnaire to fill in about the whole process which will provide us with essential evidence of where things have gone wrong.  If you’re unhappy with how you have been treated, you must register a grievance to protect yourself.  Put in your appeal.  Branches who have been denied the information on which to base an appeal have registered disputes.  We should not be expected to help smooth over such a chaotic and discriminatory process.  Feedback from members is that equality issues are causing a panic- as well they should because there was no proper impact assessment.  My grievance hearing is on the 11th Feb 2014.

The Probation Institute
The MoJ has given £90,000 to help the start-up of the Institute and that is the beginning and end of their involvement.  The money was very welcome but I am increasingly frustrated when they say they are “working closely” on the development of it.  That is not true because the first principle and practice of the Institute is that it is independent.  The Minister understands this but those directly below him wheel out the Institute as a defence against criticisms of privatisation which irritatingly conflates the two.  Subject to ongoing support from our National Executive Committee, Napo has been involved in developing the Institute with Unison, the Probation Association and the Probation Chiefs Association.  It has the involvement of academics with a strong commitment to Probation.  Look out for the next edition of Napo News.  

The CRCs will be hotbeds of creativity and innovation
Seriously?  The splitting of the service is creating a mushrooming bureaucracy that will eat into the budgets of the CRC and NPS.  Medium risk cases often dip in and out of high risk situations and in reality will sit in between the two new organisations.  At the moment you can manage those situations without the case being a fully blown high risk one.  It’s fairly normal practice.  After the split, you will have to fill out a lengthy referral form, get your line manager to countersign it, hand it over to your colleague in the NPS, they review it, get their line manager to sign it and then they might advise you do an RMP within 15 days or offer a new appointment.  This is absurd and we calculate it will take about 3 hours of form filling- more so if the clients, practitioners, administrators and managers are locked in an endless cycle of referral and re-referral.  When challenged, the Minister was visibly spooked by it and the director of one of the prime bidders we spoke to turned grey.

You’re safe in the NPS
The Minister has described the NPS as having the “top offender managers”.  Aside from the shocking crassness of this statement the intent is clear: to divide and rule the staff.  If we let this happen then we let each other down.  The NPS looks like no walk in the park.  The amount of pre-court administrative work is bizarre as the allocation tool to assign cases to NPS or CRC will take 45 mins alone. Professional freedoms don’t really exist in the Civil Service in the way they do in the current Probation Service.  We ask constantly about conflicts of interest but the MoJ simply glazes over.  It is difficult to imagine a practitioner acting on behalf of the Secretary of State.

The MoJ is putting a tremendous amount of effort into pretending that everything is going swimmingly.  It isn’t.  Of course, while we will always do the best for our clients we don’t have to accept what’s happening.  Keep raising issues where they occur and make sure you use formal processes if they apply to you.  We do not accept the staff split and we are continuing to pressure the government to have a proper pilot of the new structure within the public sector.  If that means that they can’t flog it off then so be it.  The politically motivated timetable for privatisation is a disgrace and, for public safety and the decent treatment of staff and clients, it can and should be slowed down.  Check out Ian’s blog on the Napo website and the Campaign Bulletins for more information and how you can contribute to the campaign.

Best wishes and don’t lose hope,

Tom

The following has recently been sent to Greater London Napo members from their Chair Pat Waterman:-

TO NAPO MEMBERS 

Wishing and Hoping 

I was advised earlier in the week that your employers hoped to complete the sifting process by the end of this month. So I am guessing that by now most of you will have been informed as to whether you have been allocated to the NPS or the CRC. 

Here are some things I would like you all to remember: 

• The staff transfer process was never agreed with the trade unions. It was devised by the MOJ and LPT made the  decision to implement it.
• The MOJ devised the criteria by which your assignment was determined. LPT only adapted it in certain cases to meet local circumstances e.g. where there were roles that did not fit into the MOJ’s blueprint.
• Assignments have been done on an “objective” basis. Beware of thinking that they have been done on the basis of an assessment of the work you have done over the course of your career.
• The MOJ previously  claimed that the NPS would be staffed by “top” offender managers. I wrote and told them how disrespectful this was.
• Beware of thinking that the NPS is “better” (whatever that means) than the CRC. There are pros and cons to both organisations. An assignment to the NPS is  not a “golden ticket”.
• CRC’s will stay in public ownership until they are sold. See below for what you can do to try and ensure that never happens. I also advise you to look at the list of potential bidders now that SERCO and G4S are out of the bidding. It does not look to me like there are that many buyers interested in London. That is a good thing.
• NAPO is against the service being split

So how does it feel to be “sifted and sorted” and got ready FOR SALE? 
Are your feelings and concerns for the future allayed by the reassurances of your Chief Executive in her latest blog that the organisation now has more time to get everything in order? 

If not, here is what you can do:

• Register a grievance against your employers for doing this to you.

There is still time. 

I have only just done mine and I attach it for your information and (hopefully) inspiration. 

For those of you who wonder what is the point of registering a grievance here is the answer: 

• Any potential buyers will be provided with information about grievances to help them decide if they want to submit a bid. By registering a grievance, and showing  that the workers are disgruntled, you could be helping to make us a less attractive proposition to any future buyers. That would be a good thing.

So please keep those grievances coming. We will do all we can to help you with them 

Continue with the industrial action. Work only your contracted hours. 
This will become especially important as you are asked to do additional tasks to test out new ways of working while still being asked to conduct “business as usual”. 

Pat Waterman 
Chair 
Greater London Branch