Tuesday 10 June 2014

Latest From Napo 31

The following email was sent to all Napo members this morning. My normal practice is to try and refrain from passing comment, but I really do feel "Napo has fought tirelessly to defend the service we all love" just a tad over-egging the pudding. 

Now, don't get me wrong, I'm a firm supporter of Napo and would never encourage anyone to cancel their membership. I've been a member right from the the start of my probation career and I'm prepared to overlook the news that some at Chivalry Road want to know my identity, and not because they want to shower me with plaudits. 

I'm a firm believer in Trade Unions and of course Napo has a proud tradition of being a Professional Association in addition, but I am not prepared to remain silent when I see things that are patently wrong and when I'm being spun bollocks. So, Napo HQ, I remain a very firm supporter, but not at any cost and I reserve the right to speak as I find. For example, those press releases are often late. Just thought I'd mention it.    

Dear Napo members,
 
We are conscious that some members will occasionally raise questions about what Napo is doing in its campaigning efforts against TR. This message seeks to summarise the key aspects of our activities. To start with it’s worth remembering that Napo is the biggest of the three Probation Unions and the only one which is a professional association defending probation worker’s rights and defending professional values and practice. Since the onslaught of the Government attacks 18 months ago, Napo has fought tirelessly to defend the service we all love and which we know, works. Here's a quick look at what your union has been doing as part of our ongoing campaign. 
  1. Napo is the only union lobbying at Parliament to stop the share sale and we are winning more and more support by the week.
  2. Napo is the only union to have organised lobbies of Parliament so that members can speak directly to their MP's and Parliamentarians.
  3. Napo is the only Probation Union to sit on the Justice Unions Parliamentary Group.
  4. Napo is the only union to have submitted briefings to the Public Accounts Committee and the Justice Committee.
  5. Napo is the only union that sends weekly bulletins to all MP's, Lords, Welsh Assembly and other stakeholders.
  6. Napo is the only union meeting with the Labour front bench on a regular basis to keep them updated on key issues.
  7. Napo is the only union to have submitted hundreds of Parliamentary Questions, EDMS and back bench debates motions.
  8. Napo is the only union that sends out regular press releases about the TR Omni-shambles.
  9. Napo is the only union that has been regularly interviewed and quoted in the press and radio about TR (the article in the Times today is another example).
  10. Napo members are the only people to have stood up for their beliefs and have twice taken strike action within the last 7 months.
How to find out what’s going on?
 
Members can keep up to date on the TR campaign by reading the General Secretary's blog on the new website, the regular e-mail updates to members, the weekly e-mailed Campaign Bulletins and access every press release, Parliamentary Bulletins and various briefings on the Napo website where you will also find Napo News online. You can also follow us on Twitter: @napo_news @ilawrenceL @taniabassett.
 
Why stopping the share sale is still possible
 
As a result of Napo's tireless efforts from both HQ and Branches, we have had a significant impact on Graylings plans, and have caused greater delay than Grayling would have liked or even imagined. We have raised significant public interest issues in Parliament and elsewhere and continued to pose questions that Ministers and their Civil Servants have been unable to answer, which has brought the whole TR programme into question. Bidders have started to withdraw as a result and the whole tendering process is being exposed as a corrupt sham thanks to Napo’s efforts. Labour and MP’s within other parties have increased their support for us and are forming much stronger policies on justice and the future role of probation as we approach the next general election. Whilst for members it is the most difficult time they have ever faced, it’s vital that we up the ante and keep fighting these reckless reforms that could totally destroy the probation service. We must continue to believe that we can win this fight to stop the probation sell off. Meanwhile, we are actively seeking to work more closely with our sister unions to strengthen the campaign.
 
Ian Lawrence
General Secretary and the Napo Officer Group: Megan Elliot, Yvonne Pattison, Chris Winters, Keith Stokeld.

30 comments:

  1. If NAPO have done all this how come I got SHAFTED into the CRC, and the split is already into its second week.

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  2. I'm confused re the NPS PO chaperoning CRC PO to Oral Hearings....given the Parom 1 will include the Risk Mangement Plan from Oasys..who did that? I did hear some CRC colleagues reluctantly jump with joy, when they learned they would not be doing Oasys anymore.

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    1. Even NPS staff would jump with joy if they did not have to do oasys, it was just probably an initial reaction to a tool that we all find useless and time consuming. Also if we were given the choice of whether we did it or not would be quite different to it being imposed on us under the pretext that we are not capable of managing risk and making assessments when we were doing it before 1/6/204.

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    2. Let CRC shafted PO's have some sort of glory out of this we've been left nothing else.

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    3. Why do people imagine CRC staff won't be doing OASys? Certainly up to the point of 'share sale' they will, and while Bidders aren't obliged to continue it's use 1. it's unlikely they'll wish to be inconsistent with the NPS, and 2. it will take a considerable time to develop an effective alternative in the event that any new owner does decide to go it alone with an alternative risk assessment tool

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    4. We have to refer all our risk reviews back to NPS. Even if we're down grading.

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  3. So fucking effective that NOTHING has changed.

    I'm so wound up tonight I dread to think what I might do.

    Napo, i know you read this Blog. Show me RESULTS. This time next year it will nit just be NPS staff who have no support....it will be Napo as everyone is growing increasingly pissed off.

    As Martin Luther King once said; at the end of the day it will not be the words of your enemies that matter, but the silence of your friends!!!!!

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  4. my SPO just signs all the oasys off - sometimes when I do terminations and reviews I think what a pile of shite I've written!!. Unless its for the HR stuff I think oasys is a complete waste of time & takes us away from the face to face stuff.

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  5. "As a result of Napo's tireless efforts from both HQ and Branches, we have had a significant impact on Graylings plans, and have caused greater delay than Grayling would have liked or even imagined."

    What delay? The split was delayed by 2 months but happened none the less, the deadline for bid submission has been put back by....two.... whole.... weeks. Grayling must be shitting it :/

    Ironically enough if anything is to derail Grayling's plans it's likely to be the bidders not playing ball.

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  6. I have been a member of NAPO since joining the service over 20yrs ago. Napo may have made errors through this campaign but lets remember the following points:
    1.The Jonathon Ledger fiasco and Harry Fletcher's sudden departure, left a vacumn at the centre of the organisation,at a critical juncture when we needed continuity and the type of skills and contacts with the press that someone like Harry had developed over decades. No doubt that this had a massive impact on the organisation's ability to respond to the threats facing us.


    2.That NAPO is a tiny organisation with a membership who have little stomach for industrial action even when their profession and financial futures are threatened.

    3.That we are only one of many organisations who have tried to prevent privitisation of public services ( although we have unlike many very effectively delayed the process and the fights still not over)


    4. That no one organisation certainly no trade union, given current employment laws, can stand up against the might of a government hell bent on destroying the public sector on idealogical grounds. If all workers stood in solidarity across the public sector then maybe but how many probation staff would have supported a call by ,for example, local government services or post office workers to stand in Solidarity with them ? I regret to say I think very few . In fact I have been distressed at the response by some individual probation staff who once allocated to NPS seemed to forget all about solidarity and cross the picket lines staffed by their own colleagues during the last strike.

    Have Napo got things wrong at times of course but are they fighting for us? yes yes yes and my thanks go to them for that.

    I

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    1. You forgot 5. - a national chair who made a play for promotion "spivside" on the very eve of an SGM , tried to get branch chairs to collude with not letting the rank'n'file know what was going, sent an abusive e-mail to the whole membership when it all came out, and finally resigned leaving us leaderless at the worst possible time. I agree with most of your other points tho' but would really like to know whats the story re: H. Fletcher? Why bring him back and then not renew his "consultancy" again? You mske s good point about NAPO still fighting for us, but I think itd now reached the stage where we have to fight to save NAPO!

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    2. NPS staff were not interested cos their jobs were not under threat they continue to work for the public sector, they were made to feel great as they were the "most experienced", all language used inflated their egos making them feel that they were the chosen ones and all that other bullshit. Just for one moment it would be great for the split to be reversed then you will see a fight. They have sold themselves to fancy words and titles secrets act, civil servants, and lost there integrity and ethics, not a word out of them.

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    3. Not true. I'm a CRC PO and some of the people fighting hardest in our area are NPS colleagues. We're all in this together.

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    4. I have fought with everything I have for probation to remain public for the sake of all service users, all colleagues and my community. In my area you could not say NPS assignees didn't fight but CRC did as seems to be asserted above. We saw equal apathy from both "sides" sadly.
      Neither do I feel safe in NPS, you must be joking.....
      NPS PO

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  7. lots of under the surface in-fighting going on. You don't have to be Richard Branson to realise NPS is over-staffed in some areas and now those POs who didn't strike because they got NPS and thought they were home and dry are concerned and rightly so.

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  8. Interestingly,some discrepancies in assignment with RJ staff in NPS in some areas and CRC in others. How will that work after share sale?

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  9. RE: 'what your union has been doing as part of our ongoing campaign'

    1. Parliament votes on party lines. The Coalition government parties hold a majority. TR cannot be stopped via a parliamentary route. We need to take real industrial action. All we have is the withdrawal of our labour. We have to strike

    2. Parliament votes on party lines. The Coalition government parties hold a majority. TR cannot be stopped via a parliamentary route. We need to take real industrial action. All we have is the withdrawal of our labour. We have to strike

    3. Parliament votes on party lines. The Coalition government parties hold a majority. TR cannot be stopped via a parliamentary route. We need to take real industrial action. All we have is the withdrawal of our labour. We have to strike

    4. Parliament votes on party lines. The Coalition government parties hold a majority. TR cannot be stopped via a parliamentary route. We need to take real industrial action. All we have is the withdrawal of our labour. We have to strike

    5. Parliament votes on party lines. The Coalition government parties hold a majority. TR cannot be stopped via a parliamentary route. We need to take real industrial action. All we have is the withdrawal of our labour. We have to strike

    6. Parliament votes on party lines. The Coalition government parties hold a majority. TR cannot be stopped via a parliamentary route. We need to take real industrial action. All we have is the withdrawal of our labour. We have to strike

    7. Parliament votes on party lines. The Coalition government parties hold a majority. TR cannot be stopped via a parliamentary route. We need to take real industrial action. All we have is the withdrawal of our labour. We have to strike

    8. Usually inadequate, and usually late. We need to take real industrial action. All we have is the withdrawal of our labour. We have to strike.

    9. Big woo. We need to take real industrial action. All we have is the withdrawal of our labour. We have to strike.

    10. For a grand total of two and a half days, and in the words of the General secretary 'No, the industrial action ...has not caused the collapse of TR – and it was never claimed that it would do so'. We need to take real industrial action. All we have is the withdrawal of our labour. We have to strike.

    Simon Garden

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    1. Simon, watch this space. There are developments ongoing which may be the turning point for TR. On mobile at the mo', will expand on this tomorrow (hopefully AM).

      Stay tuned!!!

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    2. I'm a little excited, but slightly scared that you're teasing....


      SG

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    3. You were teasing, weren't you ... Just you wait ...

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    4. Turns out they were.

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  10. I'm raw and sore from the shafting by Grayling & co. Reaching a point where some kind of spectacular disruption is called for. General Strike, anyone?

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    1. Yes, Yes, yes , yes ,yes, Strike, Strike Strike.

      But I thought we have already had a spectacular disruption called NDELIUS, I don't think that we could mange that sort of an upheaval with a mass walk out as Grayling seems to have done by a press of a button.

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  11. Energy bills seem to provide an interesting compare and contrast... Costs fall but prices remain outrageously high. Profit regardless of impact. And thats where we'll be with TR in not so many months - profit without conscience.

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    1. The bidders are struggling to see the actual profit ! The TR competition is so badly hurried the bean counters cannot get a firm grip on what is left to be made above costs.

      The fall out of Shaw trust has done us all a good turn indirectly ! The bids are due to close late June and the triage of profit hungry corporations who are looking for immoral profit of the back of crime and victims want, more than the competition is offering. This will drive down the value bids and the cheaper tenders may well win. Apparently Alaska was purchased for a Dollar !

      The decreasing competition means probation could well sell for tuppence and most likely will under this government.

      None of these expectations for contract letting would have got through parliament had they have not been so misled. The Tories have outdone themselves on selling a few puppies in this war, its not over yet !

      In relation to the posters please lets focus our anger on the continued debate where we can make a positive impact. The former chair has gone Napo have made some underestimations this blog has great influence NPS members are allies its the same fight and we need to ensure unity continues.

      Our campaign has to be united and there are many common themes that will keep us together ! Joint workloads dispute for a start the allocations and professional deconstruction and the sham of the redundancy enhanced scheme only available to friends and acquaintances of the centre to approve the applicants. Had it been open properly in line with employment fair practices I guess they could never have dealt with the deluge after this week.

      Anyone should be allowed to apply on a voluntary basis. Any vacancies should be redirected towards those where the reductions are sought instead we are likely to see compulsory redundancies post June 2015 Who actually agreed this situation anyway ?

      Dino

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  12. G'day & fair dinkum to ya possums. Where does a fella have to go to get this fifty kay everyone's chuntering about? Thats a few tinnys of the amber to celebrate the Ashes with - again. Working with convicts during the day? Can I keep my bar job?

    Errr, I think thats enough stereotypical trash for one post.

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    1. From The Times

      Australians and New Zealanders are being targeted to be probation staff looking after offenders on pay of up to almost double the salary paid to officers born in England and Wales.

      The move follows a drop in the number of trained probation officers as a result of Government spending squeeze and a shake-up under which private sector firms and charities will oversee criminals.

      Probation officers leaders said the advert added insult to injury following years in which pay has been frozen and the uncertainties caused by Chris Grayling’s reforms.

      Ian Lawrence, general secretary of the National Association of Probation Officers said: “This is an absolute insult to our members who are held in esteem by the rest of the world for their knowledge and skills”.

      He said if the Government had looked after their staff in the first place by giving them decent pay, the shortfall in officers would not exist.

      “This is just adding insult to injury to a staff group that is going through immense stress trying to deal with Grayling’s madcap so called reforms.”

      Sadiq Khan, shadow justice secretary, described the advert as a “desperate measure” to deal with problems in the probation service.

      The online advert, headed “Are you a Probation Officer from Australia or New Zealand”, outlined the job opportunities available in the probation system which it said was suffering from a scarcity of candidate with experience.

      It offered pay of £27 an hour or the equivalent of about £50,000 a year compared with between an estimated £28,000 -£35,000 for a fully trained UK born probation officer.

      The advert said several probation clients were interested in employing probation officers from Australian and New Zealand on an interim basis.

      “We are running a course in the next three months to place experienced probation officers from outside the UK who have a minimum of two years experience”, the advert by Criminal Justice Skills said.

      The Agency said the offer was open to Australians and New Zealanders currently residing in the UK. It promised to train candidates in the policies and procedures of the probation service and even the electronic system used by officers in England and Wales.

      Latest figures show a drop of almost 150 front line probation staff who oversee offenders between the last quarter of the financial year 2013/4 and the same period a year previously.

      There were 71 fewer probation services officers who handle low risk offenders and 77 fewer probation officers who monitor more serious and dangerous criminals including sex offenders, those convicted of domestic violence and offenders where there are child protection concerns.

      The Australians and New Zealanders are being offered opportunities to fill probation officer vacancies just as Mr Grayling’s major overhaul of overseeing offenders moves towards implementation.

      Thousand of probation officers will remain with a new national service overseeing the most dangerous offenders while the rest transfer to new community rehablilitation(sic) companies operated by the private, voluntary or charitable sectors.

      Probation officers in England and Wales must have two years training whilst their counterparts in New Zealand undergo just six weeks, the National Association of Probation Officers said.

      Labour’s shadow justice secretary said: “This is a desperate measure designed to shore up a probation system in chaos caused by Mr Grayling’s crazy privatisation. Taxpayers are being left with a big bill for his incompetence, and public safety is being put at risk”.

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    2. Here's a start:


      To Whom It May Concern:

      As you may be aware on 1st June 2014 the probation service was split in preparation for part privatisation later this year. Justification for this split was given by the Justice Secretary and MOJ to address the high reoffending figures of those serving a prison sentence of less than 12 months - a cohort for whom the probation service was not funded, or required, to work with. We now understand that the Prisons Minister was reported on Twitter last week as follows: 'new probation aftercare 4 people getting less than 1 year prison sentence won't come in soon'.

      Quite apart from destroying an award winning public service, the split has been imposed on an arbitrary basis, with no evidence that reoffending rates will be reduced. There are many other issues with the split including:

      High risk sex offenders being passed on to Probation Officers who are not used to working with such cases, and prior to any additional training being given, whilst Probation Officers with years of experience managing such cases are being prohibited from working with anyone on the Sex Offenders Register.

      Reports of offenders' addresses being lost from the national database across England and Wales.

      Increased bureaucracy to the extreme across the two services, which is having a negative impact on ability to quickly and effectively manage risk as well as a financial cost and duplication of work.

      ...insert example/s...

      Extremely poor information sharing across the two services leading to a reduction in the effectiveness of the service to protect the public ... insert more examples...

      Despite a national shortage of Qualified Probation Officers, those in the CRC are now being prohibited from writing pre-sentence reports or working with high risk cases whilst at the same time probation staff from outside England and Wales are being targeted for recruitment at a rate of up to almost double the current salary.

      More issues... Morale is low... staff are overworked... etc etc

      As an interested party, we are writing to you to let you know that you are likely to see mistake begin to happen and cracks appearing in what was until very recently an excellent public service. Ultimately there will be an increase in serious further offences etc etc. This could get worse on share sale because... insert examples of how bad it could get... (i.e. offenders with history of rape and violent robberies, mental health issues etc being 'supervised' by a charity with no probation training).

      This can be stopped now... we would ask your support in... insert what we want to happen... including the positives that voluntary and third sector can provide but in a more appropriate context that enables risk to be managed and victims and public protected.

      Yours Sincerely,
      Anonymous

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    3. oops posted in wrong bit of blog!

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  13. have just googled NAPO and first entry is sponsored link by Unison saying join unison today. Sister union? I do not think so.....
    I actually feel furious about unison and the behaviour during this fight, seriously undermined us all when they failed to take strike action. Loads of bluster but imo they do not understand probation and think the nhs is the one worth fighting for. At least napo understands probation...

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