Thursday 18 December 2014

MoJ Gives Two-Fingered Salute

16 December 2014

Dear Mr Guilfoyle,

TRANSFORMING REHABILITATION

Thank you for your email of 30 October to Simon Hughes, Minister for Justice and Civil Liberties, regarding the Government’s Transforming Rehabilitation Reforms, and your invitation for him to attend a meeting of Greater London Napo. I have been asked to reply on behalf of the department.

As you know, the Government is introducing fundamental reforms to tackle the problem of persistent reoffending which blights our communities. It may be helpful if I began by reiterating the rationale and context for the changes we are making to the probation service. Over recent years former Probation Trusts improved their performance. While this is a tribute to the hard work of Probation staff at all levels, it is widely agreed that we need to improve provision of services and support for those who reoffend the most – who are the offenders released from prison following sentences of less than 12 months.

As in every other part of Government, we are faced with the challenge of trying to do better for less. We can either impose further cuts on the structures we have, risking increases in reoffending and leaving short sentence offenders without support after release, or we can reform the system so that it provides more effective rehabilitation at a better value to the taxpayer. We want to do this in a way that is sustainable for the future and we are committed to reinvesting most of the savings we make in order to support supervision for short sentence offenders. We can only do that if we bring in the best of the public, voluntary and private sectors to work with offenders in order to reduce their reoffending rates.

As you may be aware, on 19 September last year we launched the competition to find the future owners of the Community Rehabilitation Companies which will deliver rehabilitation services in England and Wales for low and medium risk offenders. On 5 December 2014, contracts were awarded to the successful bidders for the 21 Community Rehabilitation Companies. You will also be aware that transition to the new probation structures took place on 1 June 2014 and the National Probation Service and 21 Community Rehabilitation Companies are now live and supervising offenders within the new structures. The 21 Community Rehabilitation Companies remain in public ownership until the transition process is completed.

The item on the ‘Today’ programme to which you referred in your email implied that our reforms were rushed, untested, unpiloted, and are putting the public at risk. That is not the case. Public protection remains a key priority, and our crucial reforms to probation are being rolled-out in a sensible way, with testing at every stage. Thorough, externally assured business-and-systems-readiness testing was conducted to review key activities that had to be completed prior to transition on 1 June. Evidence from the testing demonstrated that the business was ready to make the transition. We have also conducted testing at each stage as we moved towards contract award.

During the ‘Today’ programme item, the Minister also referred to the fact that we have been piloting a number of different approaches to Payment by Results (PbR) across Government and have gained valuable learning from these. At HMP Peterborough, for example, the short sentenced offenders who received through-the-gate support on release - as part of an innovative PbR Social Impact Bond pilot - are less likely to reoffend than those outside the scheme. A second PbR pilot operating out of HMP Doncaster has also shown marked falls in reoffending. The lessons we have drawn from implementing our pilots, together with the experience of other departments in using Payment by Results, have informed the design and commission of robust contracts which drive the right behaviours and generate value for money.

Finally, I would like to thank you for your invitation to the Minister to attend a meeting
of Greater London Napo. Can I suggest that if Napo Greater London branch would
like to discuss these reforms and their concerns further they approach the London
Community Rehabilitation Company. 

Best wishes,

Stephen Hubbard
Transforming Rehabilitation Programme

36 comments:

  1. What a load of bollocks

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  2. it's only 8.40am and reading this has just screwed up my day. As soon as I possibly can i'm out of probation

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  3. Once upon a time in the land of the MoJ - the deluded and bombastic ruled without any thought for others, and contrived to make everything they did an attack on ordinary people. So successful were they, they began to devour each other, in their race to the top of the greasy pole and when they had all but gone, the world became a better place, and the ordinary people, of all ages and albeit poor and demoralized laughed as they went to work, making the world a better place.

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  4. "It may be helpful if I began by reiterating the rationale and context for the changes we are making to the probation service."

    No. It isn't helpful in the slightest. Stop padding out these meaningless responses with the same old trite drivel, which everyone - even you, Stephen Hubbard - knows is bollocks.

    And while you're at it, you can leave off with the mealy-mouthed 'tributes' to the hard work of Probation staff. You'll never know the true value of the goodwill that you have chucked away.

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  5. Here in derby crc recieved email saying contracts signed despite dangers and unreadiness. So begins mcjustice

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  6. Probation Officer18 December 2014 at 10:45

    The last paragraph really killed it. The MoJ is now confirming it doesn't give a sh*t about probation.

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  7. The train is inches away from impact and the signs are not good.

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  8. Have any other areas others than Derby signed Crc contracts?

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    1. All the contracts have been signed by current CRC management on the 8th the preferred bidders signed this week & Grayling is due to sign today!

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    2. #FailingGrayling signed off DTV area today

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  9. Dear Mr Hubbard

    Having just read and digested the content of your reply to Mr Guilfoyle I am afraid I have only been able to reach one conclusion. That it is one pile of cynical, patronising, nauseating shite.

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  10. what undiscovered planet are this mob sitting on?

    Lies, lies, rhetoric and lies. The crew at MoJ are dropping so many bollocks, it's a wonder they are not all talking in falsetto.

    'it may be helpful if I reiterate the rationale' - er... no it won't

    'while this is a tribute to all the hardworking Probation staff' - does this include the dead, the suicidal, the seriously depressed and the exhausted? You must be so proud of your officers... . You really haven't got a clue, or worse - you do have a clue and don't give a sh..t..

    'Public protection remains a priority, and our crucial reforms to Probation are being rolled out in a sensible way, with testing at every stage' - oh, didn't you read what Mr McDowell has said?

    'we can only do this if we bring in the best of public voluntary and private sectors' - yawwwn- I've heard that before somewhere.

    ' "results were rushed, untested, unpiloted and putting the public at risk" -that is not the case' .oh yes it is and you bl...y know it.

    'ROBUST contracts' - dontcha just love that word. Sits nicely with 'STUBBORNLY persistent reoffending rates'

    I could go on, I haven't even mentioned those violent thugs serving under 12 months, but I must go and do something reassuringly normal now, like finishing putting the Christmas decs up, before I am sick ( I am still in recovery from seeing the smug photo of IDS leering in Parliament over the failed effort to get rid of the bedroom tax. What a corrupt load of bastards we have, looking after our welfare.. It's seriously time we saw the rise of the Greens. Do your bit Joanna.







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  11. Heres a must read!!!

    http://www.conservativehome.com/platform/2014/12/chris-grayling-mp-my-plan-to-transform-the-rehabilitation-of-prisoners-and-make-it-work.html

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  12. http://www.conservativehome.com/platform/2014/12/chris-grayling-mp-my-plan-to-transform-the-rehabilitation-of-prisoners-and-make-it-work.html

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  13. Sooooooo depressing I can't talk.

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    1. http://m.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-30528349#sa-ns_mchannel=rss&ns_source=PublicRSS20-sa

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  14. TRANSFORING REHABILITATION: ANNOUNCEMENT OF CONTRACT SIGNATURE

    The TR completion has reached another significant milestone in that I am able to confirm that the contract with Purple Futures to become the new owner of our CRC is being signed today.

    As soon as contracts have been signed, PF is keen to set out to you their vision and plans for introducing new and innovative solutions for rehabilitating offenders I along with our NOMS contract management team, have arranged for PF to meet with members of the SMT on 6th Jan for the first of a series of meetings throughout January. Full staff engagement events will be planned to follow up on the outcomes of those initial discussions.

    I hope that todays announcement will provide further clarity and reassurance as we move towards service transition.

    The transfer of ownership of all the CRCs will take place on 1st Feb along with the transition to the new Services arrangements. The MOJ also intend for the provisions of the ORA to be commenced on this date.

    I will be in touch with you all again before the Christmas break, in the meantime as always you have my appreciation for your on-going hard work.

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    1. What they don't tell you about Peterborough is that the pilot includes foriegn national prisoners who are in most cases deported at the end of there sentence! Also I remember being told, by researchers, during the CP pathfinder that led to ECP (remember that waste of money) that mesuring reoffending rates less than 24 mths after the end of sentence was not statistically sound!

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  15. Peterborough and Doncaster equate to rock and hard place for some arguments against TR. The evidence shows a reduction in reoffending between the experimental and control cohorts. I have not read anything that trashes these limited pilot completely, though we will have to wait to see if the outcomes are reliable enough to be replicated or whether the pilots received disproportionate attention which resources will not permit across the country. But, meanwhile, these outcomes bolster the TR advocates.

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    1. How about the fact that both cost significantly more per prisoner than will be available to CRCs, and the fact that they were voluntary for prisoners and so naturally attracted the most motivated (and probably least likely to re-offend in the first place)? And neither pilot does what CRCs are expected to do.

      Neither provides any significant evidence to justify TR, but Grayling trots them out as often as his £46 line these days.

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    2. I made the point about disproportionate resources and replicating the findings across the country and commentators have pointed out that the pilots were ended too soon. But there was no 'cherry picking'. The subjects were not volunteers. Of course, participation was voluntary in the sense that someone can respond with indifference and for some the service was not even needed. But the level of participation was quite high: by cohort 2, 86% of released prisoners were literally met at the gate, which indicates a fairly good overall engagement.

      https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/325738/peterborough-phase-2-pilot-report.pdf

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    3. All of the new CRC will get less than Serco got to run UPW in London & we know how that ended!

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    4. In the Peterborough pilot the whole cohort was counted - not just those who had engaged - so that seems fair and probably encouraged them to focus on getting good engagement. 86% doing so voluntarily is pretty impressive.

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  16. Purple Futures & Sodexho - welcome - SOLD AS SEEN hahahaha

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  17. Wonder how the new law on coercive & abusive behaviour is being received by noms/moj?

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    1. They probably think what's wrong with that it's how we run our prisons!!

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  18. http://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/dec/18/theresa-may-domestic-abuse-offence-coercive-behaviour

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    1. Coercive behaviour - does telling staff that anyone formally objecting to the TR process, as of 1/4/14, would be deemed to have voluntarily ended their service (as NOMS did) count as coercion?. If, as I believe, it undoubtedly does, Napo and the other unions should launch a symbolic class action on our behalf, just to show up this duplicitous bunch of moral lepers.

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  19. We are utter crisis people. The word on the ground is that there are plenty of changes coming our way. I tsunami of bullshit crap.

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  20. yep, ratings pitting staff against each other, under 12 months no information and supposed to be starting feb, increased reliance on volunteers who dont get paid for working with difficult cases, more tagging and booze tags. more money for managers and staff will continued to get shit on. Lovely.

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    1. We recruited 15 volunteers during last 6 months in my CRC and all but 3 are left, most found work in APs as sessionals, joined NPs as TPOs or found work elsewhere. A lot of time effort resources, staff goodwill has been directed towards volunteers but we cannot retain them, given a choice between paid sessional work with NPS, paid employment volunteering ends, without mych notice, and who can blame them. No way to run any kind of business,

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  21. NOW s the time to take industrial action, The fall in the oil price is about make the markets crash. Derivatives and the bankers will again crash the market ; will the government bail the banks out again yes the will!!!

    Papa

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  22. I'm struggling to get past NAPO not informing the press of the alleged problems with TR. Surely if they were as bad as they say, and posed the claimed risk to the public, NAPO would be within their rights to disclose them regardless of any Court judgement.

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  23. http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/mar/12/lobbying-10-ways-corprations-influence-government Interesting reading, especially 'Neutralise the opposition' and 'control the web'.

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