Pick of the Week 34

You are right, Working Links are running CRC's in name only but leaving a skeleton staff post cuts to deliver the impossible. Any problem and they ask middle managers to sort it. However there are only a handful left and they are covering 2+ office bases as well as frequently supervising riskier cases because so few PO's left. UPW is a shambles since they got rid of UPW case managers and gave all standalone UPW cases to OM's. This offender was possibly unfit to do UPW from the outset, but the whole assessment process is compromised from beginning to end. Rushed through court by NPS with often just an oral report, rushed through induction and straight onto UPW without full consideration of risks to self or public.It is an almighty fuck up and the sooner someone with with some guts steps in and ends it the better. Working Links? You have got to be joking.

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Unfortunately, the state CRCs find themselves in, understaffed, excessive workloads, piss poor working conditions, unable to offer support to clients, stressed and angry, was all so predictable by just looking at the history and working practices of the companies that were awarded TR contracts. Previous behaviour is the best indicator of future behaviour? If companies have a repeat 'record' of fraud, stripping assets and staff numbers, mismanagement and poor service delivery in every other contract they've been paid to deliver, then they're just going to do the same with the next contract they're given.

NAPO, UNITED, UNISON, whoever, need a united drive to get these corrupt greedy companies away from feeding from the treasury coffers under the guise of delivering public services. They don't deliver. They feed off the tax payer at greater cost then the publicly owned model. It shouldn't be individual fights. The same problems are rife throughout the public sector, transport, NHS, prisons etc, all face the same issues. Taking back the public sector from privateer pirates requires a united public sector approach, not individual battles.

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I must be missing something: 50% of the jobs have gone and yet the praises of the SW are still being sung. At what point do some posters come out of denial and accept that all the hyperbolic talk of a brave fight has achieved zero? With a dose of realism, you can see that the SW is simply the best-looking horse in the glue factory!

As the probation service is not struggling to recruit new staff, the likelihood is that wages will continue their real terms fall and it will remain a female dominated workforce. Probation has no industrial muscle, so it's no surprise that the employers can manage the docile workforce as they wish. The unions ask for talks – they are ignored. They beg Spurr to make their case for a pay increase – he says he's spent all the money on the prison service.

On Working Links, the union leadership looks to members for directions on 'next steps', as though the union was an agony aunt. The unions well know that the only possibility of forcing the intransigent WL to rethink is through a credible threat of strike action. The pragmatic union leadership won't make the arguments for action. They push the onus onto a membership which is fractured, passive, atomised and therefore too weak to make a difference to anything.

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Having read many posts on this truly helpful blog, and having been a NAPO member for over 15 years, and having enjoyed and been proud for the most part of being associated with the Probation Service, I have come to the conclusion that as staff, being experienced, dedicated and knowledgeable on what works and equally what doesn’t, we are no longer listened to, considered or valued. We work for a faceless breed of pen pushers, pushing through a tick box, computer driven, target led framework that fails the service users, public and staff alike. And no one in charge cares.

Simply put, unless we all stand together, including every member, and use the financial and legal services of NAPO and Unison combined, to muster a movement of our own, we may as well just roll over and be done because nothing we have done so far has stemmed the tide of destruction of our once respected Probation. My question is this; what if anything can be done, on ground level and also by the unions?

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Who are the 'adversaries'? Of course senior managers read the blog. Private companies will also task someone with searching Internet and media for any publicity, positive or negative. They hate this blog because it allows staff and members of the public to post confidentially. It is the only place we can do that. I don't personally believe there is a problem with posting union related info on here and welcome open debate. I feel very much like the person who posted above. I have tried to do what I can to raise issues and flag up failings but ultimately all that is left for me is to find another job and bid farewell to being a PO. 

So that is what I am going to do. Perhaps eventually when the staffing situation reaches crisis point (is it not there already?) something will be done. The unions are only as strong as its' members. If you are a member please be a member in more than name. it is not just there to fight for you, you must also fight for each member and the union as a whole. I would like to see NAPO taking legal action through the courts. The time is right!

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There was no evidence in the run-up to TR and in the years since, that anything can be done to improve workplace conditions or achieve fairer pay. Some individuals, through promotions and other opportunities, may achieve job satisfaction and adequate remuneration, but the majority of the frontline workforce will continue to experience increasing demands, less control, while wages lag behind inflation. For the majority, therefore, it will require great imagination to feel valued.

Nothing will change for the better until the balance of workplace power shifts. And it will only shift if it's forced to. This requires solidarity amongst the workers and determined leadership by the unions. Most members of unions are inactive and show no interest in collective action. They can't even be bothered to vote in union elections – only 1 in 5 voted for the current General Secretary and even fewer for the current chairs. Despite all the travails of TR and real terms decline in wages, the wider membership remains in slumber. Maybe they sleep contentedly, are able to adjust to austerity and feel grateful to be in employment – and not in the gig economy. Their passivity is one of the wonders of TR, as the TR impact risk assessment did flag up worries about worker unrest.

There is no workplace counterforce to the writ of the bosses. Nothing is ever up for meaningful negotiation because you cannot negotiate from weakness, no matter how much you cry foul. The probation unions are weak and they know – as do the employers – that there is no mandate, no clamour from the wider workforce for confrontation. On the one hand, probation staff talk about challenging bad behaviour, but not when it's coming from their own employers. Since TR things have steadily worsened on many fronts and there is nothing to indicate that this downward trend will change any time soon. I don't really think we need worry, melodramatically, about others reading this blog. The only union strategy I see is one of trying to survive on a declining membership.

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Perhaps first come to terms that the union isn't going to do it for you and that some of your colleagues are part of the problem. If the good POs leave then they will be replaced by other inexperienced people, also part of the problem. Much as you may not agree, how about joining forces (via media) with those that use the 'service'. One way that's quite effective is to 'out' the more /greedy/corrupt CRCs in the press. And just keep outing them. In the end it will be so embarrassing to keep these CRCs in business they will have to withdraw their contracts. Get outing. The people to assist you in that endeavour are the service users.

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Worm is turning in my team. Ever since I got there, it's been a low on Union members, with a not unfamiliar "what did they ever do for us" mumble. Definitely a hint of "enough is enough" doing the rounds there, and talk of the need to join up. If any of us have the energy to fish out the form and the bank mandate: I have never seen a group of people so uniformly exhausted and stressed-out with the height of the split and sell-off.

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I recently went to a staff forum involving probation officers from different areas. The sentiment in the room wouldn't probably surprise most readers, but may come as news to those working for the MoJ or E3 or those who are so removed from practice. What was expressed broadly followed the following:

a) We WANT to do good work, but the service has lost sight of what "good means" in terms of evidenced based reduction of re-offending/desistance
b) We WANT to do assessments that are meaningful, but OASYS doesn't allow for this - if we need a 10 page PIT tool to explain what needs to go in each section, something is amiss
c) We can and DO want to record information - but not in 10 different places

So if you want HETE data, risk registers, NSI breach and recall stats, ARMS assessments and SARA, then stop making us duplicate the same information in 3 different places, as we have data fatigue. The final comments were - get rid of OASYS, get rid of Delius, get rid of data, get rid of stupid systems like mappa meganexus, SOP, Equip - bring in an assessment system that actually makes sense, bring in evidence to support and underpin the work we are doing.

So what can we do to bring about change? - collectively refuse to complete Delius risk registers, personal information/equality info and HETE data - can we not write a collective letter that we submit to managers essentially stating "we are no longer completing any of this as it means nothing and we are focusing on the core elements of our job instead"?

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I'm surprised that more comments have not been generated by the man who asked to be imprisoned in his attempt to be housed; fortunately for him, his plan worked,  for many it does not. Probation services, including the governmental wing in the form of NPS, completely ignore service user's housing needs as an integral element to preventing re-offending. Time and again I've seen service users committing offences which would not have occurred had housing been available or living in inappropriate or dubious circumstances, within a sentence plan which pontificates their avoidance of "anti social peers". 

We pay lip service to "risk management" but are more than happy to accept potentially risky situations when housing is unavailable. We seem more than happy to pay for prison, as in the case for this man, and not housing. I've seen ACO's authorise a few weeks payment in a B&B for the most risky/serious offenders, but would never consider paying an equivalent amount of money for a deposit, thus providing a long term solution. The NPS has no housing strategy. NPS probation officers have the stress piled on them by service users, managers and AP staff to "do something about this person's housing situation", and AP's are more than happy to apply their arbitrary 3 month deadline on the more tricky service users (the ones who don't pay their service charge or who rack up the odd warning letter for coming home 13 minutes late for curfew) in preference of the "easier to manage", even though the former are more in need. The situation is despicable people, please respond I need to know I'm not alone here!

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You can gauge the appetite to change things by the level of union membership and the degree of activism. Our case is undermined by whingers who moan instead of getting off their arses. Collusion, infighting, apathy, and a defeatist attitude. Loach is right. Join a union, get active, and refuse to take any crap, especially from the privateers.

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Very engaging and I get the point we need to reflect on this state of affairs. It is incredibly upsetting to read about murders in prisons and young people so afraid in custody as to be in a state of being permanently terrified. However did we ‘the people’ allow this to happen?! I would argue it was forced upon us all.

Yes in an ideal world we will all be part of a union and call the shots. Unfortunately, the only successful union these days really lies in transport. Having worked on the railways I have observed that’s because it’s completely ingrained in the culture and when it comes to transport a strike is a very powerful weapon indeed. If someone is unfairly dismissed on the railways they stand together and the whole bloody lot go on strike in support. In public services people stick their head down and think “I hope that doesn’t happen to me”. 

The union culture is not ingrained in public services in the way it once was. Too many have been let down too many times that when the time came no one had any faith that there was sufficient bottle to fight. Unfortunately in Probation, the crucial moment has passed (for now). What happened was and is a disgrace and the failures and should haves have been well documented on this blog.

I am convinced change is on its way and that ‘we the people’ want change, but I think we are all asking and trying to discover as a nation is ‘where does the power lie’? Is it our government, is it corporations, is it the EU? These are the issues that need to be worked out for real change to happen and it will take time, but we will get there. Yes we must use this time to mobilise, keep our powder dry and wait for the next opportunity to make changes to support the most vulnerable in our society.

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As a service user, I for one would welcome a strike against the CRCs. It would give us all a break.

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So Hood is another one who has moved across from public to private sector. I want to know how much he gets paid. He complains about 'noise' but gives no detail. We don't know if the probation inspectorate are noisy buggers. The unions aren't noisy and don't even get a mention. It's all surreal: an in-house magazine called Connect – which is the very thing they don't want to do. Hood tells staff to tell him what they think – he will then decide whether he's hearing noise or music.

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Being chipper and talking upbeat is the usual tool of the confidence trickster, who's real focus is really concentrated on getting as much money from the customer as they can for that dodgy car. When people realise they've been sold a croc, the chipper upbeat salesman will just move on to another pitch, and they'll be replaced by another smiling upbeat and chipper salesman.

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If they'd get their heads out of each others arseholes for just one minute they'd realise it's not "external noise" but the sound of reasoned argument. Still, nice to note the nod to this blog; seems like its giving someone a headache. Good job, JB.

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It's all good in the hood! It was only March this year that things were so bad (claimed) that MTCnovo was talking about walking out on their contract. It was only last month that bad practice and underhand methods of securing payment were being discussed in the media. All's good in the hood is terminology I'd personally associate with gang culture, crime and gangsters! Perhaps it is appropriate use of language for privateers too?

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Just a few points:
1 " collaborative work spaces": is Harrow CRC relocating to Barnet thereby creating the need for Harrow service users to travel for miles to probation appointments part of this deliberate policy?
2: "Putting the service user at the centre of what we do" - see above.
3: what is the definition of the "high calibrate staff" which MTCnovo want to look after and develop? Recent developments in the hood would suggest that these do not include part time workers, older ones, those needing assistive technology and possibly even some who would make distracting noises. Resonate with anyone?
4: "performance shared for all to see". Yes, but profits shared for all to see? No.

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Surely they mean carpe omnia – seize everything, They are profit-driven and one of their key objectives is to take money out of their business to reward investors. All their talk about being committed to improvements is predicated on mercenary motives. If they broke even they would be regarded as failures. Hood has to show a profit and to do that he will happily 'sweat the assets', stagnate pay and cut the workforce. But as he visits the offices, he wants all this forgotten. He says don't be shy about talking to him, but perhaps he confuses shyness with loathing. Why would anyone being screwed down in a CRC wish to spend time being hoodwinked. As for noise, the fool should realise it's sonic warfare and he'd better get used to it!

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Has Working Links reached 'end state' yet? The term WL's hatched for their post apocalypse vision when everything is renewed and comes to order, the chosen ones rise from the earth etc? Just wondering when the chosen ones are coming back in BGSW CRC/Devon and Cornwall? So far WL have managed to push numerous staff post 40% cuts to hand in their notice and the letters must be arriving thick and fast from what I hear. 

However, no sign of any replacements with these new malleable super-staff they were hoping for. Only a sorry job offer for a peripatetic PSO for Somerset which = some poor sod driving around in their car wrecking their engine and covering whichever office has the biggest crisis at the time. Staff are already being moved around with multiple office bases so perhaps all new staff will have to meet these criteria. Just when you thought WL's couldn't get any more for less, they manage to extract more. No doubt Ian Lawrence will have more to say on this having conducted his 'real picture' tour of the Wild West yesterday. Look forward to reading all about it and no doubt the job applications will be flooding in for that new post.

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"Transform Justice will enhance the system through promoting change – by generating research and evidence to show how the system works and how it could be improved..."

Whilst recognising the need for serious research, NOTHING CHANGES & the pontificating continues. Probation staff are drowning (CRC & NPS) yet folk are still lining up to get recognition and/or payment for describing the water. The water is deep, wet, cold & shitty.

'Less is More' was the blindly optimistic (or callously calculating?) management mantra in Trusts as the TR axe split the Probation Service asunder. It was also very popular in Sodexo CRCs when they directed staff towards the Exit Door, as if they thought it would explain their refusal to pay EVR whilst offering the greatly reduced severance package. So, with 45% staff cuts on average, and 54% in Northumbria, those CRCs should be overflowing with 'more'.

It will take more than a change of government to shake out the entrenched attitudes which have driven & embraced the changes of the last few years. It needs a new generation of strong, active compassionate politicians who are not in the thrall of money & power for personal gain; who abhor bullying; and who truly value the society and the world in which they live.

There is an element of such generosity of thinking enshrined in this blog whereby most posters use 'anonymous' or a pseudonym. Amongst the angst & anger there are many very positive observations & ideas for which there is no personal recognition or gain beyond the value of sharing in the hope of contributing to improvement. Using Sodexo & Working Links as a benchmark, I can't see those who have been handed power & £Millions of public money very willing to share, can you?