Tuesday 13 October 2015

Penal Reforms 3

So, having allowed Grayling to smash the probation service to pieces, almost certainly now beyond repair, the Tories feel it would be a good time to reform prison (save some money). Here's Ian Birrel writing in the Independent:- 

Could the Tories' decade in power really be defined by prison reform?

Shortly after the Conservatives won their unexpected victory in the general election, I asked a Downing Street aide what he thought would be the key legacy of the Government. His two-word answer surprised me: “Prison reform.” The source added that both the Prime Minister and his new Justice Secretary were determined to sort out a flawed system that locked up so many people and yet failed to stop them reoffending.

Now David Cameron has placed this cause at the centre of his agenda, with a passionate section of his party conference speech lamenting a prison system that is clearly not working. Cynics might see this as a steak of liberalism designed to capture the centre-ground as Labour lurches far to the left. Yet few can disagree with his assertion that prison is not working when half of criminals reoffend within a year of release. Or when the Prime Minister pointed out core problems that lead people into crime, such as abuse, addiction and mental health concerns, go unchallenged while inmates are in costly state care.

What a welcome contrast this makes to the usual tired and blinkered language of the right on crime and punishment. It was, after all, Mr Cameron’s mentor and predecessor Michael Howard, who insisted that prison works despite so much evidence to the contrary. Then there was Edwina Currie waving handcuffs at an earlier Tory party conference, demanding a crackdown on prisoners. Or Sir John Major, a man who should have known better, saying: “Society needs to condemn a little more and understand a little less.” Not that Labour has been much better, terrified of seeming soft.

Yet prison reform is a conservative cause, as the right in America has discovered in moves that detoxified the criminal justice debate so dramatically. After all, those on the libertarian right are usually sceptical about the state, while fiscal conservatives should be wary about £2bn annual public spending on such a flawed system. Social conservatives talk about the centrality of the family, yet prison disrupts families with devastating consequences. Then there is the religious right, which professes faith in redemption.

I have just filmed a Panorama programme for the BBC that examines how ultra-conservative Republicans in Texas – traditionally home to the toughest penal policies in the democratic world – have shifted away from locking people up towards investing in rehabilitation and evidence-based probation. The state’s huge incarceration rate has dropped significantly, while it has closed nine of its 14 young offender units. It is moving money into curbing problems of addiction, broken families and post-traumatic stress that drive so much crime. One result is that property offences are falling much faster in Texas than the national average.

Michael Gove, the Justice Secretary, joined me for a few days. He was impressed by courts that specialise in specific issues such as drugs or domestic violence, offering a holistic approach to curbing criminality. One judge in a Dallas court dealing with people whose lives were wrecked by crack cocaine and crystal meth compared it with parenting: setting boundaries and offering positive support to criminals traditionally seen as menaces to society. It is tough love, backed by long sentences for failure. We even met hardened gangsters among the reformed crooks rehabilitated into society.

In his own party conference speech, Gove talked about prisoners not for ever being defined by their mistakes – brave words before a Tory audience. Now he plans to roll out specialist courts in Britain, offering a third way between prison and the community sentences so distrusted by voters. I sense that after his combative approach to education, he wants to work with the cautious judiciary and bruised probation services to achieve reform. And like the politicians in Texas, Gove will start with low-level offences so as not to alarm the public that serious criminals are avoiding jail.

It would be good to hope that such sensible moves are accompanied by an end to the mania for making new laws that helps to choke the prison system (along with the sex offenders who now make up one in eight inmates). England and Wales lock up more people than any other nation in Western Europe. Yet, with luck, this is the moment when austerity and falling crime provide political cover for a long-overdue jolt to the criminal justice debate, tilting the balance away from the self-harming stance of “prison works” towards innovative efforts to reform the destructive behaviour behind so much crime.

This is what happened in Texas eight years ago, then spread across America – including ultra-Republican states such as Alabama, Georgia and Mississippi. It also happened in the Netherlands, which used to match our imprisonment rates but then realised that putting fewer people in jail meant more money freed up for effective community-based punishments.

As the Republican behind the Texan reforms told me, society should differentiate between criminals who are inherently bad and those that we are mad at for their disruptive activities – then work out how to reform the latter.

This is not being soft on crime. The easy option is to chuck crooks in jail so that they can lie around watching television and exchanging tactics rather than forcing them to confront their alcoholism, drug addiction, abusive behaviour or poor eduction. It is about being smart on crime. And for the Conservatives, it is about getting it right on crime at last.

--oo00oo--

The extraordinary thing is that Gove praised Grayling at the Conservative Party conference and yet it's his predecessor's actions that will see prison numbers continue to rise as a result of recalls under the barmy plan to supervise every under 12 month prisoner, irrespective of need, together with non-payment of the appalling new Court Tax. Anyway, we've seen the film and here are some comments from Facebook:- 

Has anyone just seen Panorama on BB1? Michael Gove spent time in a Texan Court house with a Judge who believes rehabilitation rather than custody is the answer to the revolving door problem. Rehabilitation is what the Probation Service has been doing for the last 100 years, but Mr. Grayling thought it better to put this rehabilitation in the hands of the private sector where profit is more important than the lives of probation staff and offenders alike. WHAT A JOKE!!!

******
So irritated as the strong UK evidence that lower rates of imprisonment and more focus on rehabilitation works best has been staring politicians in the face for decades. It's all been about courting votes through being tough on crime. Pray that the enormous further cuts MOJ faces encourages them to cut prison number rather than continuing to decimate other parts of the CJ system.


******
This government wants rehabilitation on the cheap. Biggest problem facing most of our revolving door / PSS lot is lack of accommodation. What has this government ever done to support social housing? Plus the benefit system is purely designed to grind people down. Sanctioned unrelentingly at every turn. Investing in offenders so they can change their lives around costs money and a motivated professional personnel. If your staff are worried about job cuts - the results are going to be really poor. What a mess. Is Gove better than Grayling?


*******
I watched too. He wants to stop wasting tax payers money wandering around the world and look at what probation has done and continues to do - at home!!

--oo00oo--

Meanwhile, whilst the privatised CRCs continue to use ill-prepared and often poorly supervised volunteers to fill gaps in service provision created by experienced staff exiting in droves, the NPS decides to unilaterally ditch the lot of them:-

"I regret to inform you that we are no longer able to work with NPS Service users anymore and with immediate effect cases should be handed back over to their Offender Managers for next appointments, I realise that this was a planned eventual outcome so this comes earlier than planned but this is the way forward we must adopt, If you are unsure if the cases you are working with are NPS or CRC give me a call and I can establish this for you.
Volunteer Coordinator"

How professional is this? As with the outrageous shafting and splitting when the TR omnishambles was first introduced, clients are yet again passed around like parcels from one supervisor to another, irrespective of the relationship that's taken in some cases years to develop between them. Not only unprofessional, completely uncaring and counter to all the evidence that tells us it's the relationship between supervisor and client that is the most significant factor in being able to assist rehabilitation. 

Make no mistake, what we are witnessing is the effect of the takeover of probation at NOMS by our often crass, narrow-minded and blinkered prison service colleagues. It's precisely this group who will be the greatest problem Gove will face in trying to reform the prison service, and many of them are now running probation in the field, both private and public.  

31 comments:

  1. re yday's blog, I was drawn to respond to a cutting comment to Jim, at 810 today (the 2nd last comment) complaining about Andrew and felt drawn to respond, at 9 35 today. I don't want to cause a war on words but I do feel some of these comments, including some others earlier yday, are unnecessarily cruel and also damaging to the previously respected image of probation. Surely we can rise above the troll effect?

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    1. Get over yourself ML. No one on this blog has been cruel to anyone else. No one person on this blog has damaged the image of probation. The fact your bringing attention to comments made previously suggests you want to continue difference of opinion on this blog. If someone writes something that is offensive, Jim will remove it. If you read something you don't like then ignore it or challenge it with facts like you did yesterday. I personally think AH is knowledgeable of the service and shares interesting articles. However his frequent off topic posts can be annoying and sometimes appear to be michivious by him knowing he will have that effect on people?

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    2. to 1042 - thank you for responding to my 9 47 post, but to clarify, I only 'brought attention' to my previous comment because I had replied only an hour earlier, to the last comment, also posted this morning, both just prior to Jim adding a new blog, and I was aware that many people may not bother looking at the last comments on earlier blogs.

      It's good to be mischievous sometimes.....

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    3. ML not it is not good to be mischievous tell that to your offenders do you ? 10 :43 Excellent post my respect to you.

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    4. mmm I'm a bit mischievous- insist on referring to myself as a Probation Officer and refuse to refer to those I supervise as 'offenders', (esp MY offenders..) ML I know exactly what you mean..the mischievous ones can prick the pompous ones bubbles sometimes..;-)

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  2. It's really not that difficult. Yet for some reason our entire system makes it horrendously difficult for anyone to go straight. Logically if you make it easier for people to go straight than to commit crime they will go straight because humans always take the path of least resistance. The more difficult you make it to go straight the more likely some

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  3. http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/oct/13/saudi-prisons-contract-gove-and-hammond-clash-over-deal

    Full credit to Michael Gove for taking a principled stand.

    I agree with ML @9.47. The vitriol directed at Andrew is the stuff of cyberbullying. It's unpleasant and hurtful stuff. So remember Andrew, the majority here condemn it.

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    1. The UK foreign secretary, Philip Hammond, has accused the justice secretary, Michael Gove, of naivety over his demand that a controversial £5.9m prisons deal with Saudi Arabia be scrapped, it has been reported.

      The issue of British officials providing a “training-needs analysis” for the Saudi penal system was brought to public attention by Jeremy Corbyn at the Labour party conference last month. The Labour leader called on the Ministry of Justice to drop its bid for a contract, citing the case of pro-democracy protester, Ali Mohammed al-Nimr, who was sentenced to crucifixion when he was 17.

      The bid for a prisons deal was put in by Just Solutions International (JSI), the commercial arm of the MoJ that was set up by the last justice secretary, Chris Grayling. Though Gove recently announced that he was closing down JSI, he said the prisons deal would go ahead because it would not be in the wider interests of the British government to withdraw at such a late stage.

      But according to the Times, Gove wanted to pull out of the deal, saying the British government should not be assisting a regime that uses beheadings, stoning, crucifixions and lashings as forms of punishment. When the justice secretary sent a memo detailing the moral case for pulling out of the agreement, Hammond accused him of naivety, warning that cancellation would not be in the national interest as it would make Britain appear an untrustworthy ally.

      “There was a robust exchange of views,” a Whitehall source told the paper. “The Ministry of Justice had human rights concerns; the Foreign Office felt this would have far bigger ramifications.”

      The row between the senior ministers was so serious that it was even raised at a meeting of the National Security Council. Gove’s demand was agreed by his predecessor and won the support of the business secretary, Sajid Javid, but in the end the prime minister insisted the deal should go ahead. The decision has come under renewed criticism from campaigners and is facing a legal challenge from the Gulf Centre for Human Rights.

      More than 175 people have been executed in Saudi Arabia in the past year, according to Amnesty International – more, it is claimed, than by Islamic State. The death penalty applies to crimes including murder, rape, adultery, apostasy and witchcraft, and the rate of state killings is increasing.

      The prisons minister, Andrew Selous, told MPs last month in a written answer that the National Offender Management Service (Noms) would not pursue any new projects with international partners through JSI. But he added that one project led by Noms through the commercial venture is sufficiently far advanced that the government decided withdrawing at such a late stage would be “detrimental to Her Majesty’s government’s wider interests”.

      Selous said that JSI had submitted an initial bid to Saudi Arabia in August last year, followed by a final bid in April through an executive agency of the Saudi finance ministry. “Noms’s bid was signed off through the Foreign and Commonwealth Office overseas security and justice assistance process, and was supported by UK Trade and Investment and the British embassy in Riyadh,” he said. “Noms will therefore honour this outstanding bid.”

      The dispute comes after recently leaked diplomatic cables revealed that Britain conducted secret vote-trading deals with Saudi Arabia to ensure both states were elected to the UN human rights council in 2013. The elevation of the Saudi kingdom to one of the UN’s most influential bodies prompted fresh international criticism of its human rights record.

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    2. Victory for Gove. Breaking news that Cameron has cancelled Saudi contract.

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    3. EXTRACTS FROM PRESS REPORT via Yahoo

      " London (AFP) - Britain on Tuesday abandoned a bid to provide training to Saudi Arabia's penal system and raised the case of a 74-year-old Briton facing a flogging, following an outcry over human rights in the kingdom.

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      The Sun -- Britain's most widely read newspaper -- carried the story on its front page.

      It said that despite having served his sentence, Andree was still in jail as Saudi officials wait to carry out the flogging.

      The grandfather of seven, who has already survived cancer, has lived in Saudi Arabia for 25 years, working in the oil industry.

      http://news.yahoo.com/britain-withdraws-bid-saudi-penal-system-contract-000801902.html

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      To get anything fixed By the UK Government first get front page support from The Sun newspaper - seems the moral of the story!

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  4. I'm sorry Andrew if my unhappiness at some of your posts being off topic. I won't do it again and will be more patient in the future.

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  5. Couldn't agree more with today's headline blog, JB. With the simple swing of an axe probation has been beheaded, rehabilitation has been "transformed" and NOMS have acquired a new "customer facing" role. Any and all reference to "probation" will be removed in this rebranding exercise. CRCs have already done this, with NPS eventually being relaunched as, perhaps, the NRS (national rehabilitation service) - but always with its "executive" link to NOMS. It will be prescriptive, didactic & inflexible. It will be an unmitigated disaster.

    But by the time all this speculative claptrap comes to pass, however, the current NOMS crew will have had gongs pinned to their puffed up chests & slipped out the back door with gilt edged pensions & non-executive directorships of the privatised rehabilitation companies, seats on the Boards of great British institutions & faux academic honours. There'll be no roughing it in the Dordognes, it will be the London set for them; town house & an Aston in the City, country house with a few acres & a Range Rover for the weekends, opera, ballet, concerts, Michelin stars for dinner, fine wine... It was never, ever going to be anything but.

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    1. What is even more irksome is the fact that the NOMS "elite" will have no understanding of the cultural privelege they'll have access to. It will be just another badge to pin on their breast, not an experience to bathe oneself in & cherish. And the price? "Bring me the freshly severed head of Probation."

      Sad to say that the collateral damage will be evident fairly soon - when the work of those who never felt the need to posture is no longer being undertaken; when no-one goes the extra mile; when experience & knowledge has been swept away. There's a real shitstorm brewing as more & more clients are being labelled, dumped, abandoned & sidelined.

      So, while NOMS congratulate themselves on their Grand Design, someone is going to get seriously hurt.

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  6. Hatton we need your view on this. Don't be shy. This blog needs you. Please blog :)

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  7. Martin Bullivant13 October 2015 at 17:19

    Right. Enough is enough. My name is Martin Bullivant and I am an ex PO from Hampshire and Jersey. I do not think Andrew Hatton needs me to defend him, I have never met the man but I am not prepared to stay silent whilst anonymous trolls throw rocks at someone. Anonymous 13 October 2015 at 16:43 makes a comment that is typical and representative of a recently emerging trend involving shots being taken at an ex-colleague. I am bored already, frankly.This blog is a place for responsible professional debate not childish playground level taunting.
    Well, anonymous trolls, I am putting my name to this. What's yours?
    Jim, by all means delete this comment if you don't feel it is appropriate (it is, after all, your blog, and I will raise no objection) but as a PO I spent my time doing what you all still do-confronting unacceptable behaviour. In my view this taunting is bullying behaviour, and hence unacceptable.
    Andrew-apologies in advance if you would prefer to deal with this yourself, but I am, as you may have gathered, unimpressed by your critics.

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    1. Thanks Martin - it is up to JB - what we all say speaks for itself.

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    2. I am not sure what JB can do. I am sure if there was a troll deterrent to hand he would have used it.

      He does delete some of this nonsense retrospectively and sometimes he vets in advance, which can slow down the flow of exchanges. If someone wants to be disruptive it's difficult to control. The troll/s loves this attention – which is their reward. As the saying goes, Never wrestle with a pig. You both get dirty and besides the pig enjoys it.

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  8. Hey 17.19 I was being genuine! That's the problem with social media. Messages don't always come across as they should. It is because of this, I'm leaving this blog.

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    1. Martin Bullivant13 October 2015 at 18:51


      Response accepted. Something that is clear however is the way on 'social media' we become de-personalised. You refer to me as '17:19', even though I gave my name. Twice. I am not seen as 'Martin Bullivant' I am '17:19'.
      Well, '17:23', it does seem a thin reason to leave the blog but I wish you well, whoever you are.

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  9. Purple Futures had a big conference in Liverpool today and they have revealed their plans. Hopefully someone soon will post more details. Role name changes : Senior case manager; Case manager, doesn't appear to be any redundancies, they're doing all they can to find everyone alternative employment even if it's within the wider Interserve community.

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  10. Whisper it softly, but Purple Futures delivered a pretty damn good 3 part proposal for the CRCs under their control. Before I here the cries from Netnipper et al regards private sector and money men, they have produced a well thought out staffing proposal, albeit reduced senior management that does not need to be replicated across 5 areas, but have left the coal face pretty well staffed and well looked after. They have produced a good Q&A Organisational and staffing matters document that is based on the 'real politik' of the future. Their 'organisational design/functions outline is informative and I have to say are managing in a very grown up and thoughtful manner. Very in depth documents delivered to all staff today. I am sure someone will get them onto this blog over the next few days, watch this space!!!

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    1. thanks yvonne

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    2. Thanks Gove/Grayling

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    3. Brilliant news. We are now starting to see the benefits of TR

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    4. What about pay. Is it same number people on current grades ? Only asking

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  11. Probation is dead. Sooner or later it will all be privatised. I hope I am wrong. Maybe it is a sign to quit.

    Mr Tired

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    1. Hang in there, Mr Tired, or alternatively, take a break. The "Service" seems to be shedding staff and then re-hiring them on agency contracts. Jack it in then take an agency post: there are plenty: Pay is ok, terms and conditions are absolute shite. If you are old and tired you;ve probs paid off the mortgage and ousted the kids, so give it a go, the job insecurity, the lack of sick pay, the lack of any workers rights at all needent worry you: in fact the total hideousness of the set up wont be that big a deal. Of course, it could all go badly wrong over he next few months, but that is true of the entire economy. Live for the day

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  12. I hear working links are mentioning redundancies

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    1. There was a Working Links meeting yesterday with their 3 areas
      'best practice session with colleagues across @WalesCRC @bgswcrc @DDCCRC,
      Also SWA1 LDU head in discussions on biometric reporting. Awaiting news on the 'new service design plan'. A euphemism if ever there was one!

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  13. Well clearly other CRCs are beginning to roll out their grand plans now that Sodexo have declared their hand. As always, Blog HQ needs thoughtful colleagues to supply the details so we all know what they're getting up to.

    Thanks in advance,
    Jim

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    1. Jim, PF produced a very in depth set of documents, clearly they could not give out their final operating model by numbers but these documents were very clear that they want to hold onto and hold great value in the PO role as Senior Case Manager (akin to Senior Practitioner), They appear, and I caveat everything I say with a health warning ;in that they are the private sector and may well be wolves in sheep clothes but I can only say what I see. They have gone on record (documented in the papers produced yesterday) that they will honour EVR if thier final numbers dictate. Their reasoning for not declaring thier end game vis a vie numbers which will be Feb /Mar 16 is that they do not want to lose 'experience' and quality staff because they number crunched wrongly. ( See Sodexo in how not to do it). I suspect NAPOs line is cautious on the delivery model, but they would have to say that as NAPO holds a number of SPO and ACO members (suprisingly) who may(?) be vulnerable when they go Pan CRC across 5 areas in repect of Management positions. We may all disagree with TR; I certainly do/did, but the Boards/Trust/advise befriend assit has had its day and clearly we have to develop for the sake of our users,staff,and not forgetting our paymasters , Mr and Mrs J. Public.
      CRC Postcode lotteryseems to prevail here

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