Tuesday 2 September 2014

Omnishambles Update 67

First off, Jonathan Gray of the Open Knowledge Foundation writing in the Guardian makes it plain that probation is heading into a knowledge black hole:- 
Secret government contracts stop citizens knowing if outsourcing works
The past few months have seen a significant backlash against government outsourcing and the privatisation of public services. A series of high profile controversies around outsourcing giants such as Atos, G4S and Serco have shaken the public’s faith in politicians’ claims that privatisation gives citizens a better deal.
While its advocates continue to argue that outsourcing leads to increased competition, greater efficiency, reduced costs and better public services, citizens are currently deprived of the evidence that they’d need to be able to evaluate whether or not this is true for particular contracts.
Unfortunately it is very difficult to know what actually happens with a public contract unless you are the contractor or the budget holder as the paper trail of documents surrounding most outsourced projects are shrouded in secrecy. While we may know basic details about the total budget and who the contractor is, the public cannot usually access more detailed data about bidding, cost and performance – information that is needed in order to tell whether or not it was money well spent or a job was done well.
Freedom of information rules that apply to public sector bodies do not apply to private providers of public services – leaving citizens in the dark. That’s why we are calling on governments around the world to give citizens the information they need to hold contractors to account. The Stop Secret Contracts initiative asks governments to open up information around public contracts so that citizens can see how public money is spent and what it buys for them.
We think that public bodies and private contractors should be mandated to disclose essential information about public contracts, including the full texts of contracts, bid documents and information about contract formation and performance evaluation. At the moment we’re supporting local campaigns around Berlin’s new airport (so far three years overdue and six times more expensive than planned) and a major new infrastructure programme in Brazil.
Contrary to decades of political support for privatisation, an increasing number of researchers and campaigners are arguing that outsourcing does not give citizens the better deal that its proponents said it would. The recent crisis of confidence in government outsourcing has fuelled widespread calls for renationalisation and a revival of public ownership of essential public services and infrastructure – including health, utilities and transport systems. Recent polls suggest that moves to renationalise are supported by the majority of the British public and Labour are debating whether to renationalise the railways ahead of the 2015 general election.
Meanwhile, public sector bodies continue to heavily depend on bringing in private contractors to deliver public services. If recent reports are anything to go by there is little sign to suggest that the general trend towards government outsourcing (which has doubled under the current government) is slowing down.
Increasing transparency around public contracts would enable greater accountability around how public services are being delivered to citizens. And not just in relation to big contracts and services in headlines and political speeches, but across the whole gamut of government funded goods and services for citizens.
The current government has been keen to increase transparency around the spending and performance of cash-strapped public services, urging citizens to “join the hunt for government savings”. But they have been much slower to take measures to extend transparency to private companies in receipt of public money.
Opening up more information about government contracts is an essential step towards a broader, evidence-based public debate about the future of Britain’s public services. Until these asymmetries in information are addressed, all the public have to go on are politicians’ promises.
As TR marches on, even HM Inspectorate of Probation has noticed that the Service is descending into a fog where accurate information is getting ever more difficult to obtain:-
In March 2014 the Secretary of State asked HMI Probation to investigate whether, as a consequence of the proposed Transforming Rehabilitation (TR) changes, the workload of staff in Probation Trusts had increased during the period leading to the TR go live date of 01 June 2014. This has been achieved by conducting a desk-top inspection of the caseloads being managed by Probation Trusts in February 2014, in comparison with those held twelve months ago in April 2013, and an examination of Human Resources data held by Trusts and the National Offender Management Service (NOMS) relating to posts and vacancies.
Information requests were made to the National Offender Management Service Performance and Analysis Group (NOMS PAG). Whilst staff were helpful they were also under considerable pressure to deliver significant change and it was sometimes not clear who owned or was responsible for which information. It was also clear that the quality of the data supplied by Probation Trusts to NOMS PAG was variable, limiting the reliability of centrally collated data.

Certainly there is a need to focus on developing the quality of human resources data to support future work. For example, the data concerning the number of staff in post and average caseloads was not particularly refined. It could not be broken down by different types of operational post. Furthermore we were unable to clarify vacancy levels in Trusts. That reality significantly limited our ability to draw conclusions related to workload. Specifically we were unable to deduce from the information supplied how many of the staff vacancies were Senior Practitioners (SP’s), Probation Officers (PO’s) or Probation Service Officers (PSO’s) rather than support functions, like administration staff or managers.
As we have indicated in this report, it is important to note that in the absence of sufficient relevant data it has not been possible to evaluate the impact of vacancies and temporary staff on caseloads, or to examine whether Trust’s as a result were disproportionately experiencing changes in individual caseload numbers. But when taken as a whole increases in workloads were minor and were not statistically significant.
To all this we can add the politicians usual desire to bend statistics in order to support some argument or other. In trying to support the idea that the prison system was not in crisis, Chris Grayling recently suggested that the increase in population had been unexpected and as a result of a sudden influx of convicted historic sex offenders. 

However, this notion was forensically demolished by the BBC Radio 4 'More or Less' programme last week. Their analysis clearly pointed the finger at a steady rise in sentence length, coupled with a dramatic fall in prisoner releases as being the main drivers of the current spike in prisoner numbers. Contrary to what Chris Grayling would have us believe, the present crisis is entirely predictable and the direct result of his policies. Catch the relevant clip on i-player here. 

Of course the situation is likely to get a whole lot worse if the government finally go ahead and decide to increase the sentencing powers of magistrates, as reported recently in the Times:-
The prime minister has promised to double the sentencing powers of magistrates from 6 to 12 months by the end of this parliament. It would mean more than 10,000 extra cases being tried by magistrates rather than the crown court, and would save up to £40 million a year. It comes as new figures show the numbers of magistrates in post at their lowest for years — 20,000 in England and Wales — because of falling workloads.
Rather than saving £40 million, it's widely believed that allowing the lower court to impose 12 months custodial sentences rather than the present six month maximum will result in a further significant increase in the prison population, thus just shifting costs to another part of the Justice budget. Tweeting on the subject, Francis Crook of the Howard League is clear on the matter:-
The last thing the government should do is allow magistrates to send people to prison for up to a year, would fill prisons.
Finally, lets mention Serco again. Here's their CEO talking to thisismoney in the Daily Mail:- 
'I’ll mend hurt Serco,' vows boss Rupert Soames 
Serco boss Rupert Soames vowed to rehabilitate the ‘traumatised’ outsourcing firm after raiding former employer Aggreko for a finance chief. The group slumped to a pre-tax loss of £7.3million in the first half, compared to a profit of £106 million last year.

Soames said he hoped bringing in Angus Cockburn, who served alongside him at the temporary power company, would turn the firm’s fortunes around. He and Cockburn, who replaces Serco veteran Andrew Jenner, were an ‘odd couple’, said Soames. But he promised they could boost Serco by steering clear of contracts that don’t offer good returns. ‘Serco’s like me, good at running other people’s affairs and then you get home and find that the papers for the cattle vaccinations are unsigned,’ said Soames, who is Winston Churchill’s grandson.

‘We’ve got quite a lot of contracts that lose money. If we stop doing that, it’ll be pretty helpful,’ he added. Serco’s profitability has been hammered by setbacks including lower contract volumes for Australia’s immigration service.
"steering clear of contracts that don’t offer good returns." Sounds like probation and very good advice to me. 

30 comments:

  1. "Chris Grayling recently suggested that the increase in population had been unexpected and as a result of a sudden influx of convicted historic sex offenders."

    The man is beyond words... he may know thousands of historic sex offenders, but they ain't being convicted or jailed.

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    1. The 'More or Less' programme really is worth listening to, as it shows that out of that 700 increase only about 80 are 'extra' sentences, with the rest being due to the ever-lengthening sentences introduced by this populist, evidence-free shambles of a government - and as such, an entirely predictable increase.

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  2. Begins to look like that nice Tory boy Grayling just keeps getting things wrong - how does that happen to someone so well educated and having had such a good start in life...he really should know the difference between truth and lies...but then so should all of his senior civil servants, NOMS, advisors, consultants and yup, senior probation management. THE TRUTH WILL OUT be warned.

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  3. Do not miss You & Yours, R4, today.

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    1. I missed it :) what happened?

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  4. Soames is just another fatcat bully who exploits the privilege he enjoys purely by accident of birth. Much like the present Cabinet.

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  5. If magistrates are given 12 months powers of imprisonment I shall be exceptionally surprised if it increases the number actually imprisoned, in comparison to Crown Court judges.

    As I am sure most Probation Officers know, magistrates' benches are generally very reluctant to use custody - though that may apply less to the paid District Judges (MC) .

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  6. In Northumbria CRC we are 'assisting' in a workload measurement tool. For the next 4 weeks we have to time how long every task in the day takes, including lunch and breaks. We have been assured that this is not a time sheet, so one wonders why lunch and breaks are included. The cynical side of me thinks that this could be used against us post share sale, given it will be easy to differentiate between PO and PSO work from the data collected. Whilst it is supposedly anonymised, it won't take a genius to determine if it's PO or PSO work, given Delius numbers are to be included in any timed work with offenders. To my surprise NAPO have endorsed it! I completely agree a workload formula tool is needed, but why do breaks and lunch need to be in this and surely it can't be properly anonymised if Delius numbers are included. On the subject of Northumbria CRC, we have a new name for the staff magazine "Northumbria Crack" I kid you not! I had to check the calendar to make sure it wasn't April Fools!

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    1. I am crying tears of laughter at that magazine title! Whoever thought that up needs a slap.

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    2. The most rediculous aspect of the current Northumbria Work load activity is that its being done at a time when the new supervision framework introduced post split has not been fully implemented and is therefore a complete waste of time and will no doubt require another such exercise in a few months time.

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  7. Then it is up to Northumbria colleagues to make sure everything IS recorded including the time taken to actually record workload data- you would be surprised how many tasks get missed off. It is imperative that the unions ensure that all tasks are represented on the recording tool. Also to be aware of the bias some colleagues will have to look more efficient than others, this under recording...I kid you not it will happen.

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    1. I would be concerned about having to record lunch breaks, for unless everyone puts down what they are contractually entitled to (ie in this area it is one hour), you are likely to see the eventual erosion of breaks brought about by those who choose not to take them (and thereby skew the data on 'efficiency'). I always take my lunch break ( away from my desk) just as I only work my hours and don't clock up TOIL. It's not about being holier than thou - I just stick to my contract and in doing so do not create an unrealistic expectation about what I can do whilst at the same time preserving my sanity. In fact, the more I think about colleagues being asked to assist with this WMT exercise the more worried I am becoming for all our futures.
      Deb

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    2. We have completed time sheets for several years in our former trust 30 mins for lunch is all people take. Lots of staff work over and above their hours and staff in nap appear demoralised,crc appears to be a better option at present. If only vr was a real option appears to be targeted at corporate staff only. It's an incredibly sad state of affairs and at the end of the day it increases the risk to the general public. Chris grayling et al forget they are also members of the public in their ivory towers. Sad,sad,sad.

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  8. Being not very IT literate this format is amazingly difficult d frustrating and secretive doesn't anybody just bloody say who they are! My name is Mick Gough and I resigned as an SPO because I was not prepared to tell lies. My email address is mickgoughemail@aol.com if anyone wants to contact me

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    1. Welcome aboard Mick! - everyone's far too scared to reveal their true identity I'm afraid.

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    2. Not me Jim before or after resigning! Bullying is offending behaviour and I won't accept it. I accept that not everyone can resign as I did but after 40 years in Probation I reckoned I'd earned the right. Even so I had always planned to retire at 65 nt resign at 61

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    3. I have also resigned as an SPO but have taken up another job at the same age as you Mick.Will email you.

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    4. Bullying is probably too strong a word for it but senior management coercion is alive and well in Manchester but then again, listening to their 'Connect' blogs everything in the garden is rosy-there's no delusion like management delusion...

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    5. I work in Madchester, and believe me nothing in the garden is rosy, in the city our cases have still not been reallocate from CRC to NPS. Its horrible beyond words, and I heard that the chief continues to tell lies about how its just teething problems and so on. Half the service is agency staff and only a handful of people applied for the NPS vacancies, and I heard from a man in the pub that in one office all the CRC staff are off sick, doesn't sound too rosy to me. ITS A MONUMENTAL MELT DOWN ONLY MANAGEMENT DON'T WANT TO ADMIT IT TO SAVE THEIR OWN REPUTATIONS.

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    6. Mick .. Well done you for standing up for your principles.

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  9. Workload weightings seem to have been doing the rounds in probation for years and it never leads to improvments. It is a cousin of Benchmarking and we all know that mischief. Napo supports it because it's supposed to set limits on workloads and protect H&S. In my experience it has never worked. It is time and motion whatever lying managemet say. Subvert it, inflate it, dont be enslaved by it. And as it has achieved nothing positive in over a decade, Napo should disown it.

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  10. Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted.

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  11. word is from derby today that Bidders are announced october and signing contracts next year february 2015 but this depends on so much.

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  12. VIA TWITTER from a person whose Tweets are "Protected" : -

    " Holloway and Brixton first to undergo change. Probation service officers have to leave Brixton by December 1 2014"

    https://twitter.com/offenderex/status/506825226903384064

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  13. we've lost 5 SPOs over the past year plus 2 x ACO - it has to be said these had all hit 60 but TR put the final nail in the coffin. A recent SPO has resigned in protest at TR and their poor view of our current management.

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  14. Sometimes you can't complain... as has been said,
    "Just because no-one complains, that doesn't mean every parachute opens perfectly... "

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    1. And the light at the end of the tunnel, is the front of an oncoming train...

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  15. AND Harry's tagging prediction! : -

    http://www.napo2.org.uk/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=811

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  16. What is this about probation officers having to leave London prisons?

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  17. I am an ACO and have just resigned also.I placed a dead kipper in the office of each one of my seniors behind each radiator cos they are all arselickers and I cannot be doing with them!!

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