TR Week Twenty Four 1

The MoJ say there are 'nominated officials' which sounds a bit scary. The MoJ does not regard any complaints or concerns about staffing levels as whistleblowing because they decreed the staff levels. They don't see H&S concerns, they see dissent in the ranks and they want to quash it. The MoJ is no honest broker. People go to the media and MPs because they have no trust or confidence in the authorities. And this stretches from unsafe jails to child sexual abuse.

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I heard today that following the naming of Sodexo as a preferred bidder the CEO went out and got smashed, celebrating her £200,000 bonus for putting in a winning bid - so someone has to pay for her bonus!

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Will newly qualified probation officers have to apply for jobs in the NPS? Surely if not, CRC PO's have been constructively dismissed as there are vacancies in the NPS? What about when companies try to get rid of PO's or reduce wages? I still don't see how the government have been able to treat staff from the same organisations so differently.

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They are not guaranteed employment but its naive to think future recruitment to NPS will give equal credence to CRC POs as those cutting their teeth in the NPS.

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I suppose they can afford to not give newly qualified staff posts, after all they are only paying for one years training which is why they're asking for criminology/community justice/police study degrees. Its outrageous the way they don't open up to PSOs who've done the job for years. People have families and have to bide their time for it to be right for them to apply. I'm probably what you would describe 'long in the tooth' but I've been bringing kids up and now they've left home I'm ready to train, but have been met with dead ends. I've done the job for years and it counts for nothing. 

The whole mess stinks and as for diversity don't make me laugh, I bet the majority of new recruits are from the same ethnic background and all under 30.

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"the whole mess stinks and as for diversity don't make me laugh. I bet the majority of new recruits are from the same ethnic background and all under 30." In our office they're mainly female and have no experience. They are being trained to deliver Programmes 50% of the time.

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Those "Cutting their teeth" in NPS, will surely also need to be seconded or similar into the CRC's in order to gain the experience and to inform reports? Those PSO's wishing to progress, don't give up, I hear there will be another 1000 trainees recruited in Jan 2015.

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Where are the placements and assessors for these new recruits?

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What will happen to the current Partners who work closely with Probation ie Accommodation and ETE? Who will provide those services? Will all unemployed offenders be referred to the Work Programme ie Working Links? Would that be double funding?

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I'm concerned about why MOJ keep peddling the NPS being the rump of the service rubbish. What do they hope to achieve from it? Flattery in the hope that we don't notice something? What if that something is taking the PO role apart bit by bit to make each piece easier to get rid of until there is nothing left?

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Page 20 of the TOM has a colourful flow chart of community orders and suspended sentence orders split between NPS and CRC, which doesn't show OASys featuring in the CRC work at all! 

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That's because they're not obliged to use it.

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We have a Justice Minister and SoS that doesn't give a hoot for professional assessment, so why should we be surprised when we discover that the tools we're given are actually for the wrong job?

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The professionalism of Probation is a closed book to the SoS. He thinks we are a bunch of lefties who don't understand that all these criminals need is a good slap. Dumb, unsophisticated, unintelligent, uninformed.

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Another heavy push on joining the Probation Institute in our CRC team briefing document this week. It says that the senior management team have all signed up, presumably as a way of encouraging the rest of us to do the same...

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I suppose you can hardly blame them as they can say the unions have signed up! I hope the boycott continues.

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A Q&A document from the PI claims that they had 600 members as of October. Not much out of 18,000 Probation staff really, is it?

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What is the point? An organisation to promote good practice in an area where good practice will no longer apply because it is too expensive? Bit like the word 'deluxe' when attached to cheap goods.

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Unfortunately, I am of the opinion that post share sale, membership of the PI will be on a basis of 'conscription' rather then 'subscription'. Private companies eager to demonstrate its 'professionalism' will want to be able to show the world that their entire workforce are all registered members of this professional centre of 'excellence'. It'll be their way of demonstrating the staff they employ are only the best, all of course members of the PI. I think that's a good enough concern for the union to withdraw its support.

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According to its website, 'The Probation Institute will become the ‘go to place’ and leading voice on probation practice and policy.' You'd think it would have something to say about current policy and practice, but not a squeak. I'd say this blog is the 'go to place' and the PI should adopt the three wise monkeys as its logo, or a white elephant!

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The Probation Institute has much in common with TR – they were both imposed by elites, although at least with TR there was a bogus consultation exercise; they attract no popular support; they are indifferent to criticisms: TR thinks it performing well and the PI is 'the go to place'. 

The PI was bankrolled by the TR enthusiasts, and lacking any independence or legitimacy, it looks the other way as the probation service is vandalised. What is the point of an organisation and all it's purported ethics and values if it looks the other way when it knows that the TR model has a highly dubious evidence base, is refusing to disclose risk assessments of potential dangers and is fragmenting an award winning service? Now, wouldn't you think the PI would have something to say? The PI is a hobby horse – a little earner of money and status for the few. What did the PI do to save probation? Nothing – because it's part of the superstructure of TR.

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Computer systems in a mess? Need all your problems solved by a highly performing professional company with a track record in excellence? Here come ATOS!! Couldn't make it up, could you?

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ATOS will no doubt do for information technology what they did for our understanding of sickness and disability. And if they screw up they will just walk away again.

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I'm a PO in a CRC and I know I'm definitely not an officer of the court. However, I'd suggest that we stopped being officers of the court a long time ago, when the higher ups started talking about us providing services to the courts. But quite frankly the courts appear to be making increasingly ludicrous sentences - certainly there has been a definite upward spike in the number going back for revocation as unworkable from my office. This appears to be getting worse following the split between NPS and CRC, with report writers apparently not listening to advice given about cases by their erstwhile colleagues - or, to put it more charitably, not feeling able to act upon that advice.

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I have a feeling that the upper management chain will be the first to feel the cuts, in either NPS or CRC, once the axe starts to swing. For the amount of contact I have with my SPO we may as well be pen-friends!! We have said nothing face to face that we could not do on the telephone. And if I can speak to a manager on the phone, why would I need one in my office? Or one for each office? The same goes for Directors. NOMS/CRC will have their own management structure in place, one that has 'taken the blue pill' and, like a Borg only with more warmth, fully embraces the culture of profit over people.

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We've got that covered in our area - by creating a post that sits nicely between ACO and SPO all ready for the cuts.

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It's all very well having assessment tools but not a lot of point when there is no time to use them. Our CRC has a backlog of initial OASys despite being told they must be completed in 20 days. No-one wants to work like this. I have a constant knot of fear in my stomach waiting for something dreadful to happen, along with being consumed by anger for the way I and others including offenders have been treated. Alongside this is my irritation with the apathy of colleagues who are complicit with TR and making money by writing reports or temping.

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Here here, well said. To add to this is the way we have been made to feel as CRC workers like we chose to be in this position, all that bleating about NPS having a professional status. If ever there was a dumbing down of a profession it applies to all those that were SHAFTED INTO CRC's.

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Mind you, I was told by a CRC admin colleague today that when she recently applied for a post in the NPS the application form asked if she was a member of UKIP! Forgive me, but I thought UKIP was a legitimate political party, so why was the NPS asking? Also during interview she was asked if she had ever refused to carry out an instruction from her Manager. Two good reasons (in my book) not to ever want to be in the NPS, regardless of how bad it is at present in the CRC. (and down here it is reaallllly bad........

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Fully trained & certified (and used to supervise others) in use of all versions of RM2k, SARN, HCR20. Now, as a CRC PO, I'm told by OASys that I'm not authorised to complete such assessments.

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Don't forget there will be a significant number of senior managers who have been accepted for EVR and will be leaving post share sale. I seem to recall the deal was to not work past June 2015? This was a big pot of money and we have not been told how much of it is committed. Personally I am hoping some is left for POs...

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I'm one of those PO's that wouldn't even wait for the ink to dry.

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Until recently there was no known method of saving the completed RSR.

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I'm in a CRC and dislike it when I see comments that are posted about cuts to terms and conditions etc, as it comes across as smug even if that wasn't the intention. There were a few posts to that effect the other day and it was evident that tempers were starting to rise.

But please can we refrain from making comments about NPS colleagues being complacent as well? By all means post the link, but I for one feel the comment is unnecessary. We may not be in quite the same boat any more, but we're all still heading towards that bloody great Grayling-shaped iceberg.

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Who reads OASys assessments anyway? POs aren't even countersigned. Why, as a PSO, am I doing full OASys on relatively minor offences with offence analysis not linked to harm. Why??

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EXACTLY!! If I'm going to see one of my clients, then I don't need to read the OASys, because I wrote the damn thing. If I'm seeing someone else's case, then the pertinent information should be on the Delius(eless) records. If I need a longer term perspective, I'll read the PSR. OASys is just a time-consuming database for measuring targets - and even then only if information is put in in the 'right' way.

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If it's true, as Allars, says, that performance has been maintained and the performance in new processes is improving in line with expectations, then are complaints about chaos and meltdown subjective and unrepresentative?

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It is quite extraordinary that Allars and Payne have issued a document that indicates no fall off in performance. So how have all the practitioners who contribute here got it so wrong? We do the job, we are having to cope in this chaos and now we learn that we are liars too.

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Performance has only been maintained because we change the dates on an OASys if it is out of time. Simple. We've probably got 1000's of these with dates changed. Allars you know this and are full of shit.

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It's a deceit. Performance targets were amended to ensure they were met so no-one could say that TR compromised performance. Sleight of hand, a long standing strategy within the prison service. Count the beans differently and you meet the target. Great way of avoiding having to actually DO anything.

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The Allars piece is incredibly patronising – the cheap rhetoric about being a 'learning service', as though TR was nothing more than a comprehension test, nothing to do with deep unease about the direction of travel and the fact that a JR has been submitted. In effect the Allars note tells you everything about his arrogant mindset. He is a cynical propagandist for the MoJ and his contempt for the workforce is palpable. What a shame the MoJ isn't a learning service, as maybe then it wouldn't waste millions on IT failures, wouldn't be fiddled left, right and centre by Serco and friends; and would actually listen to what criminal justice professionals say about TR. 

Allars knows all this but follows the democratic orders of his ideological boss. I understand these motivations and excuses, but sometimes, surely, conscience must kick in? I remember Spurr at an AGM a couple of years back justifying what he was doing by reference to the democratic mandate of ministers. The fact that he made this reference at all was because he could not stand in front of an audience and say I believe in what I am doing. And it's probably the same with Allars – 'Allars', as Harry Enfield might say: 'Shut up!'

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"Allars knows all this but follows the democratic orders of his ideological boss". Yes, exactly. Shock, horror! He is a civil servant. His job is to implement the policy of the democratically elected government. That is exactly how it should be in a democracy. Like it or not, we have a system in which democratically elected politicians decide on public policy, not professionals (with all their vested interests) who no one elected and who are accountable to no one...

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The number of people that have left the service and the high levels of sick leave throughout the service as well as the documentation being presented by judical review, tell a very different tale. But remember there's no crisis in the prison system either, despite a vast amount of evidence to the contrary.

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They got rid of a number of performance targets recently, no where near as many as we used to have. Can someone confirm?