Friday 10 November 2017

Folly of PSR Demise

One of the most astonishing aspects of the situation probation currently finds itself in is the almost complete demise of the Pre Sentence Report. This used to be regarded as an absolutely key element in ensuring effective sentencing and in forming the sound foundations for any chance of successful rehabilitation, but it's been almost completely side-lined. Here's Rob Allen highlighting the folly of dispensing with such an obviously essential probation task:-  

Rush to Judgement

“In order for courts to make greater use of probation, they must know about what non- custodial sentences entail and have confidence that it will provide an adequate level of supervision”. That’s one of my conclusions in a review of a newly formed Probation system in Eastern Europe from earlier this year. Little did I think that it’s something that may now need saying about England and Wales.

Last week a London magistrate told an event on community sentences that she and her colleagues knew virtually nothing about what such sentences entail. This week the Deputy Chair of the Magistrates Association admitted that the demands of speedy justice increasingly mean that JPs have inadequate information about the people they sentence. A senior CRC manager put it more bluntly to inspectors in a report published today: “The push towards same-day sentencing has been devastating. It’s all about getting a report and offender ‘done on the day’, not about getting the right outcome.”

The West Mercia inspection report paints a highly dysfunctional picture. Only half of eligible and suitable offenders get sentenced to programmes most likely to reduce their re-offending. Some of those the courts do require to participate are ineligible or unsuitable. While the courts seem to rush to judgment when sentencing, cases returned to court because of a breach, face waits of up to six weeks at magistrates’ courts and three months at the Crown Court.

In years gone by courts would happily adjourn a case for three weeks to obtain a comprehensive social inquiry report to assist their decision-making. Admittedly, some of the contents may have been surplus to requirements - one research study I remember found a report on a 50 year old man opening “Brian was a fat and placid baby”. But there’s now simply not enough in the way of core information. Justice Secretary David Lidington has been struck by the fact that less than one per cent of all requirements started under a community or suspended sentence order are Mental Health requirements. Someone needs to tell him that even where such interventions may be available, the time needed to make the arrangements often isn’t. In West Mercia inspectors found that “the proportion of court reports produced on the day of sentence in magistrates’ courts had increased from 47% to 75% over the past 18 months. This was still short of the national target, which required a further 15% to be produced either on the day or in a short written format.”

The pressure on reports predates privatisation but the fact that courts do not have direct contact with the Community Rehabilitation Companies (CRC’s) hasn’t helped raise their knowledge about alternatives to prison. All of the liaison goes through the National Probation Service. There’s a reason for that. Now that sentences are supervised by private companies, sentencing decisions have taken on a commercial dimension. The Guide to Judicial Conduct makes it clear that the requirements of a Justice’s office and terms of service place severe restraints upon the permissible scope of his or her involvement with any commercial enterprise.

It’s just one example of the corrosive effect of privatisation. Another may be the way CRC’s charge organisations who benefit from offenders’ unpaid work. In West Mercia “unpaid work staff complained that they were not told where the money went, and so they could not answer when the beneficiaries of the work quite reasonably asked what happened to the charge they paid”. It is not surprising that “this had caused some local public relations difficulties”.

Lidington said this week that “we are now looking at probation with an eye to improving performance and maintaining the confidence of courts and the public alike”. He should look at the courts too. They need to have the time to do their job properly. In a forthcoming report for Transform Justice, I’ll be arguing that there’s plenty of scope for increasing diversion and out of court disposals in minor matters. Among many benefits, it would allow courts to spend the time they need devising the right outcome in more serious cases.


Rob Allen

13 comments:

  1. The best times were when I could write the PST and then work with the person. End to end it was called. It used to work well for a lot of people

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  2. If the MoJ had been more attentive they would have noticed the baby bobbing up & down in the bathwater. Negligent!

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  3. 'Confidence in an adequate level of supervision ', hmm. Unlikely they will get that.

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  4. As usual, Rob's analysis is right on the money. He is also clear that the large scale under-use of written reports happened well before Mr Grayling was even appointed Justice Secretary. Clearly the TR divide has worsened matters considerably. NPS-CRC communications on court reports are still regularly highlighted as inadequate by inspection reports.

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  5. If undertaking asst on child sex offenders in denial today, be aware of the new defence originating in the US - "Mary was a young teen when she married the adult carpenter Joseph, and they had Jesus."

    Puts 'she seduced me' or 'I couldn't fight her off' into perspective!

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    1. Snippet from the HuffPost:

      - He’s clean as a hound’s tooth,” Alabama State Auditor Jim Ziegler said in an interview with The Washington Examiner, before invoking the Bible to defend Moore.

      - “Zachariah and Elizabeth for instance. Zachariah was extremely old to marry Elizabeth and they became the parents of John the Baptist,” Ziegler said. “Also take Joseph and Mary. Mary was a teenager and Joseph was an adult carpenter. They became parents of Jesus.”

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  6. Could a lack of a PSR have serious consequences on post sentence supervision?

    http://m.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/suicide-prisoners-burgon_uk_5a0334f4e4b06ff32c95131d

    'Getafix

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  7. Off piste: flash update from interserve senior management Ian Mullholland.
    The Proffesional Service Centre (PSC) at Fareham which manages the Accredited programmes for all PF contract areas to close by January 2018 with loss of 20 posts. PSC system found to be too fragmented . programme management to be returned back to CRC area control.

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    1. happy christmas from Interserve - UPW will be next as that's a right old mess

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  8. The overlords of Interserve should be absolutely ashamed of themselves putting people into the PSC's in the first instance - like the government they were told that it wouldn't work and why it wouldn't, however those 3 monkeys took over again but oh boy do they know how to speak evil - how long before the poor buggers that were employed at Cunard and Wakefield be out of work whilst the people that introduced them are still patting each other in their backs - really does make you feel who's next in the firing line - like thugs aren't bad enough working for them.

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    1. * things - or maybe I was right first time with " thugs "

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    2. This and with redundancies for IT and HR staff in Manchester, better watch out for that firing line. TRcrash is happening, what will Ian Mullholland email us next week, hopefully that he is handing his notice in because none of it is working, or better still he is being made redundant.

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  9. Redundancies up to 40% stated HR and IT at SWM CRC, any more wheels coming off elsewhere?

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