The Hokey Cokey Internet

Last week saw publication of HMI Probation's latest report and this is how Russell Webster summarised the findings regarding the CRC:-

  

Manchester probation struggling to implement new model

Overall, inspectors found the quality of the Cheshire and Greater Manchester’s CRC’s work was mixed. The CRC (owned by Purple Futures) is applying the same innovative way of working in each of the five CRCs it owns, based on solid research into what makes people turn away from crime. Despite this, leaders were finding it hard to embed in practice. Public protection work was not good enough because policies and procedures, though commendable, were not being applied consistently enough by frontline staff to protect actual or potential victims from the risk of harm.

Sickness absence rates were high in the CRC and individual caseloads had been large in the months before the inspection. This led to cases moving from one Responsible Officer to another, making it difficult to keep hold of the meaningful relationships so central to good rehabilitative work and reducing reoffending. Extra staff had recently been recruited, which should improve the quality of work and staff morale.

The CRC was delivering impressive services for women, supported by additional funding from the Police and Crime Commissioner.

In common with other regions, the NPS had experienced less change and was more settled. Staff morale was relatively high and good core work to protect the public was carried out, though there was more to do on delivering rehabilitation work consistently.

Inspectors made recommendations which included the NPS accessing the range of accredited and non-accredited programmes and services on offer from the CRC to reduce reoffending, and the CRC providing all staff, and especially new staff, with regular supervision and training. The CRC should also improve the effectiveness of the management of unpaid work.

The main inspectors’ findings of the work of the CRC were:

• The CRC had not made a sufficient contribution to protecting those at risk of harm. Public protection policies and procedures were robust but they were not being applied consistently, and so the impact of the work to protect actual and potential victims was limited.
• The CRC was not sufficiently effective in delivering interventions to reduce reoffending. Progress in the delivery of interventions to support desistance had been made in too few of the cases. The quality of the work and its impact was not consistent. Assessments had largely been carried out well but planning for work to support desistance was weaker.
• The CRC was generally effective in supporting service users to abide by their sentence. The frequency, quality, enforcement and the number of appointments offered was generally good and consequently, service users usually complied.

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I currently work within CGM (owned by Interserve Justice/Purple Futures!). I was somewhat surprised at some of the content of the recent HMIP inspectorate report - it was rather weighted towards the views/opinions of senior management (oh quelle suprise I hear you shout) - apparently allocations between NPS and CRC is going well (couldn't be further from the truth) not sure if this is due to the PSC's (Professional Service Centres) who deal with allocations and enforcement - the powers that be told us that these centre's would free front line staff up to work more effectively with offenders. 

What happens here is that staff spend more time chasing up enforcement requests - breaches unable to be completed due to the poor quality of letters or letter not even being issued - UPW contacts not being updated with staff not having any idea if someone has actually attended (at the start of the new year they had a massive backlog of hours to be inputted). 10 day initial OASys are supposed to be inputted by the PSC's however staff end up chasing these up which results in staff being left with very little time to complete (like 10 days isn't bad enough).

We have IM's (formally SPO's) who have no formal Probation officer training/qualification (no longer required to be a manager) - they are now more like business performance managers who have to look after health and safety, estates management and imprest (that was always going to work NOT) they have no idea what they're doing so it's little wonder they're struggling to embed the interchange model!

Managers are constantly banging on about meeting targets and service delivery targets otherwise we'll loose money (back to being our fault again). We are constantly battling with the hokey cokey internet (one minute your in the next your out - may also have something to do with staff being in charge of setting up IT systems that have absolutely no experience or skills in doing so).

We have so many new staff that through no fault of their own been dropped from a great height into roles with no case management (some of these staff have been displaced from their previous roles when the initial changes took place - admin and UPW). There is a feeling of total despair from most staff, the environment is that of a dangerous one and yes we are not protecting the public but this is not down to damn hard work from front line staff, but that we are constantly hindered by rubbish systems and procedures. I could go on forever and as you can guess I missed the memo requesting I collect my rose tinted glasses.

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And that's just the start of it. I too was disappointed at the report it certainly does not reflect the reality. Staff morale non existent, high case loads and sickness, staff leaving at some frightening rates. Those that are left behind can't cope and CGM are struggling to recruit especially PO's, no one wants to work for them. And this situation does not seem to be getting better, they have no answers to the mess and are flapping about like fish out of water. CGM needs to be handed back to the gov before anything serious happens either to the public or the staff.