Pick of the Week 39

Powerful stuff! Well done to the anonymous PO who put in this submission. I do feel for them on a personal level and can relate to much of their experiences. I hope that after their period of grieving they are able to put their talents and experience to good use. There is life after CRC or NPS for that matter and additional opportunities for this individual given that they are also a qualified social worker. YOS for example. It is just so incredibly wrong that it has come to this and I hope that exposing the truth will make a difference.

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Well said. I spent 38 years in the Probation Service, starting in what was then Community Service and leaving in August 2014 when I had been an SPO for 10 years. I decided to get another job as I did not want to work for the French caterers who had predictably got the contract and EVR would only go to a few. The cost was huge, both emotionally and financial but I felt I had to take some control after some many attempts to just make me, along with my colleagues, pawns on the chess board.

I do not envy that SPO in the London CRC having to impose the rubbish that is coming from the centre. A crisis or phone call will rapidly derail the 30 min rule. It is all designed to stop offering a service to the client and the public at large. The destruction of the Probation Service will be examined by business graduates in years to come as an example of how not to do things.

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That's a pretty good submission. As well as the obvious anger it reads with honesty and passion. There can be no doubt that the state destroyed a valuable public service, and in doing so screwed over both those that work in it, and those that use its services.

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Took the money and ran what about staying and making the stand with the few against the corrupt and power?

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What are you talking about?! Very judgemental comment. It is virtually impossible to stay in many CRC's if you disagree with the corruption and speak out. You would end up being disciplined or sacked for misconduct and would struggle to work again. Better to leave and work for a reputable service.

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For the record I only took the salary I was owed. Some of us did not get any of the spoils- out of principle, in my case.

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Not really those who scurried for anything else taking their Voluntary severance made it easy for the employer. It then in turn weakened everyone else who was left but hey who cares as long as number 1 is ok right. Sympathy for the voluntary leavers is a waste save it for the sufferers stuck in CRCs and the incredible aggressive NPS. Many stated on here make them sack you then EVR would apply but too many back watchers scurrying for what was left. No I do not care for the cowardly and lack of solidarity. You wrong about getting the sack that is what the leavers were too afraid to argue about their jobs.

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Okay, we've rehearsed that approach many times on here. I still disagree. Do you apply that thinking to those who felt they could not or would not work for a privatised company and who, after exhausting all avenues to remain in the public sector, chose to leave? Were they "cowardly?" How about those who were suffering from ill health (incl stress, depression) as a direct consequence of the bullying, lies & game-playing by the privateers? Were they "back watchers scurrying for what was left?"

The people directly responsible for the hell probation staff & service users are having to endure are NOT your ex-colleagues. Responsibility sits squarely on the shoulders of Grayling, Spurr & those who enabled TR & split the Service - including the privateers, collaborators & the financiers who wet their pants at the thought of easy money through yet another Government contract "with an average value of £20 million to £25 million over the 10-year duration", and the ex-Chiefs who prepared the ground for privatisation then left everyone in the shit whilst they took off with handsome payouts of up to more than ten times the size of any severance payment.

The unions also have to take some responsibility for the weak & bizarrely worded NNC agreement that allowed the privateers a gaping loophole through which they drove their voluntary severance limousine. The trajectory of NOMS has always been away from Probation, more so under the Tories e.g. there isn't an explict ministerial role for Probation post-Gyimah. Rory Stewart describes himself as Minister for Prisons, even though Probation is one of his responsibilities alongside prisons.

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Post TR and the new order is agency worker lead. I am very conflicted about this (I am not an agency worker) It would be interesting to get some more views about this. I can see there are positives and negatives for the agency staff but what about CRC? Is it really a good idea to staff teams with people on short contracts who are doing compressed hours and travelling long distances, who never really get to know service users or their patch because they move on within 6 months so no real investment. Probably tick all the boxes re targets but what about service users?

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The NHS have a big problem with agency staff too. Not because they don't do good work, but they cost more, and moving frequently to different placements can't imbue any great sense of belonging or create a sense of commitment to any one place.

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Amongst all the questions that will be raised about Carillion and their relationship with the government and public services, I hope corporate confidentiality is high on the list. If you're paid to deliver public services then the public deserve transparency.

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Carillion tried to bid on probation work. Questions have to be asked if any of the CRCs are in the same position.

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This is what I have suspected for a long time now. Don't forget that Working Links were bought up by a bigger company Aurelius because they were in dire financial difficulty and this was allowed by MoJ and they tried to suppress the details.

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Agreed. In the vein of Carillion, public funds & venal Tories, the failing CRCs are a far more pressing issue with wider implications than the Warboys distraction. Gauke has a tough gig ahead of him, courtesy Grayling.

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Gauke does have a tough gig ahead but I don't think he knows this, just as the rest of his predecessors have not known. They all seem oblivious to the issues or decide to take on one issue in isolation from all the others, only to drop it when something else comes along. They seem to me like small children. Or else they just don't care. Their focus is elsewhere. Something else matters more to them, their own power perhaps? That is why throwing all the reasoned arguments and logic at them, all the proof that things are going pear-shaped under their management and rule has not so far been enough to sway any of them. Stick your head in the sand and it will all go away. And, so far, it has. Why? How? What else needs to happen to change their thick sculls and hides? Is Gauke any different? Would he have gotten where he is today if he were? Their own power and image is everything to that lot. We do need reasoned arguments, but we need something else in addition and fast.

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Back to London CRC, they are reckless with their staff. They seem to want to throw everything at them, all at once. Is this to see who or how many they can get rid of through sheer threatening behaviour, bullying? There may still be staff left after that first shaking of the tree who MTC Novo don't want to keep. These will need to be ousted by slightly more convoluted and time consuming methods such as performance testing/capability, sickness procedures, disciplinary procedures. But hey, if these are applied forcefully, employing all the usual methods of undermining the subjects and disregarding proper procedure, then this project should not take too long. An MTC Novo-wide coordinated effort across the board should ensure that the already barely functioning local union branch will not be able to provide the necessary individualised assistance required to save the day for any of their members. Easy peasy. And then what after that?

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After that you get Sodexo. Their 2015 clearances have left an ominous silence, save for a temporary whimper about Wimpy-style booths. The Message? Brutalising your workforce gets results, as does riding roughshod over any namby-pamby workplace legislation. MTCNovo are just getting started...

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Please please please let Interserve follow Carillion.....

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It could happen, they are certainly strapped for cash and another layer of middle managers due to be culled (UPW). Beginning of the end I feel - we're not making a profit and Interserve should hand the keys back.

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Astonishing to hear Lidington on Sky News express sadness at the impact of Carillion's demise upon "the Board". I'm assuming he meant the accountants & chancers who not only mismanaged the company but who paid themselves lottery jackpot salaries & bonuses AND changed the company's constitution in 2016 to make clawing back the cash bonuses to senior execs almost impossible? Unless he got confused & meant the Parole Board?

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It's not just Carillion is it? Whilst this is a disaster and I am sorry for all those concerned - service users, workers, supply lines etc, what I want to know is what will the government do about the process of privatisation full stop? Who monitors the performance of these private companies? Does anyone remember the process of contract compliance introduced by Labour-controlled local authorities in the 80s? It worked brilliantly then. We need it now!

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The Carillion collapse is huge, and will have a domino effect globally for some time to come. It's devastating for thousands of employees who've rinsed their credit cards and bank accounts to pay for Christmas and are expecting their first pay cheque of the year at the end of the month. But I would argue that it's even bigger than what we saw being discussed on the TV all day yesterday, and the government know it. It's considered disastrous enough to hold a COBRA meeting last night.

It's not just the big departments of government that have contracts with Carillion, it should be remembered that many local councils also have contracts with Carillion also. Birmingham for example use Carillion to manage their Christmas light displays. The collapse of Carillion saw all the other big outsourcing companies making gains on the stock market yesterday. With Carillion gone competition is reduced, and the likelihood of G4s, Interserve, Serco etc getting outsourced contracts has increased. 

There must be investigations, and serious ones too. There should also be an investigation into Graylings activities. He's already been summoned to the Public Accounts Committee over Virgin and Stagecoach, and questions were raised yesterday about why he gave Carillion huge contracts knowing they had just issued their 3rd profit warning, and announced they were about to default on their debts. Grayling was well aware of Carillions woes, and far from trying to assist them, he took the opportunity to exploit the situation.

Carillion needed contracts to convince their lenders there was money in the pipeline. Grayling knew they'd agree to any terms just so long as they could get a contract of any sort to take back to creditors. So I'd like to see just what terms and conditions Carillion had to agree to to get the HS2 contract? Grayling just wouldn't have missed the opportunity to exploit them. Shitbags like Grayling, in the end, are always found wanting. I hope this time it's his time.

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I think the above has hit a nail squarely on the head when he highlights the likely MO of Grayling doing deals. Bully, chancer, spiv - but always with someone else's money. JSC & PAC ought to be forensically combing the indecently rushed CRC contracts for his trademark hidden clauses which were probably never formally approved, just added 'on instinct', e.g. the termination penalties to effectively prevent the contracts being undone should the election have had a different outcome.

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The claim of being misled on TR contracts has already been called. It needs to be picked up and examined. If the Rt Honourable Minister is not screaming for a public apology for such an accusation then perhaps there's a bit of truth in it.

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On the one hand government spokesman saying that taxpayers will not pick up the cost of this. On the other hand all privateers who took over CRCs were given additional millions of pounds out of public purse to prop them up. What exactly did they do with this money? I see no evidence of it being spent on staff or service users. I suspect it all went to shareholders. It's our money!

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I don't know if Carillion will be a watershed, but it will cast a long shadow over the use of the private sector conglomerates delivering public services. We know private companies make excessive use of 'commercial confidentiality' until they have to go begging for bailouts. The bubble that private is best has now been burst and when the CRCs are questioned by the JSC they won't quite have the mystique they previously enjoyed. Maybe the political ground is shifting towards more public sector provision, because it carries less risk to the public finances. Whatever, I don't think it will be business as usual...

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Just my personal opinion, but I think some of the others will have already sent their begging letters, pointing out the tight profit margins they operate under, the continual struggle they face to pay creditors, it's challenging times for the outsourcing industry as the sad demise of Carillion demonstrates, we need a few more bob just to make sure we're running a stable ship. Thankyou very much Mr. Minister.

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Bankrupted Carillion = broken Tory policies of financing public services through privatised dealings. Therefore CRC time to go as the public sector should and will demand its safety and support services back. Which by the way are cheaper better more efficient and effective watch words CRCs use but clearly don't deliver as these get in the way of the wheel barrows of cash they are syphoning out the back door.

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The MoJ have serious questions to answer about their contracts with Carillion after Sam Gymah told parliament twice last year that Carillion were not performing as they should be with prison maintenance contracts. Still paid them millions though.

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Just met up with an old PO friend who told me about the farcical CRC operations in her area, so farcical we laughed despairingly. Some more humour then from the military:

'CarillionAmey want to reassure all military personnel that there will be no impact on services to your housing following the collapse of parent company 'Carillion.' 'CarillionAmey will still be late for every task, providing a shoddy standard of work using substandard materials whilst charging the sort of rate that private defence contractors expect in Iraq and Afghanistan.'

The trouble is this humour reflects a truth. For example, the basic premise of an outsourced payroll company is focused expertise that makes the correct payments, on time, to the right people. When it repeatedly does not happen they deserve at the very least some jokes at their expense. Problem is I still haven't found the humour in my depleted bank balance as yet.

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My prediction - Spurr ain't going to show tomorrow. He'll bring a note (from his mum or the Archbishop or Jesus) & retire gracefully to a place of untouchable safety before the voluminous pile of shit he's been nurturing finally hits the fan which is about to be plugged in & switched to turbo-boost. Heaton, Permanent Sec & skilled senior serpent, will undoubtedly direct everyone to the door where they can find the empty desks of HMPPS operational staff & whichever Justice Minister signed off on it.

For example, Working Links fell into the same trap as Carillion by overstretching, becoming insolvent and were bought up by a German asset-stripping fund, Aurelius. When such a scenario was raised by PAC chair it was made explicit by Spurr, Romeo & Brennan that NO CRC could sell on a contract - or be sold - without permission of the SoS (golden shareholder) and the MoJ. Who approved the hush-hush sale to Aurelius? Where is the public money going? Dino & co have been thwarted in their attempts to follow the money, so perhaps PAC could enlighten us?

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So does this mean Working Links have been illegally acquired by Aurelius? I have read Dino's Parliamentary submission recently which raises this issue in some depth. There has been no explanation or transparency from the MoJ how the asset strippers Aurelias came to own the Working Links company and MoJ contracts to deliver justice services. Has this been processed covertly? We are aware of the catalogue of scandalous, corrupt cabinet ministers being removed recently, so nothing would surprise me. Will uncovering the truth be down to the diligent and tenacious pursuit of it, by individuals such as the likes of Dino et all. How long will the MoJ remain silent while dirty deeds prevail? Aurelias and it's like will leave when the carcass is dry but no doubt they take staff the pensions to pay Directors bonuses.

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Question is.....Carillion were allowed to bid for TR contracts, what would happen now if they'd have got one? What have the MoJ got planned if one of the privateers running probation services goes tits up? Or they just want to pull out? What's the plan?

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Surely any decent journalist worth their salt can follow the snail trail from employment to justice and now transport and find a common denominator. Yes it is Tory ideology that is now unravelling but chief ideologue who has left fingerprints all over this lies with one man. I understand that backbench Tories nickname him Macavity the mystery cat..... nowhere to be seen.

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1. Excellent contribution from hostel worker
2. Interserve shares dropped by 15% this morning, but a slight rally to 9% drop just now...
3. Additional info from Carillion suggests this collapse had been long anticipated & Carillion were effectively trying to play chicken with govt over rescue package.
4. Its been suggested Grayling gave contracts to Carillion as part of this game of chance. Wonder if that was linked to Carillion's generous funding for May's leadership bid? Or the GE?

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Again it's heartbreaking to hear dedicated staff speak of being betrayed by organisations we've worked years for - working in hostels you are the first point of contact for the high risk offenders who reside there as our guest speaker stated, especially at weekends when there are no other services available. Apart from the abhorrent way hostel staff have been treated I feel for the residents of those hostels who due to their offences will be required to remain till their PO states otherwise - what effective work will be completed in order to attempt to reduce someones risk in the community if the staff they employ have no skills no expertise and are paid in washers!! - will this have a knock on effect to prison releases if the Parole Board have no faith in where an offender is to be released to?!

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Approved premises are already under strain, they are getting by on use of many many sessional workers and a small core of permanent and dedicated workers. The situation is far from ideal. I would caution the Government against facilitating further Private predation and profit in Approved Premises on the basis that the system is already strained. I also predict a flight of experience and professionalism if this were to happen which inevitably will lead to grave consequences. The outsourcing revolution has gone too far and as we are witnessing the costs of putting the house back in order is both complex and costly.

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I read with interest in today's Independent an article relating to Carillions collapse, but focusing on the not very often spoke about the "Social Value Act." I'm sure the privatised probation services flies in the face of that act as many local services that used to interact with probation no longer do.

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Enabling Environments certification is just an income generator for the Royal College of Psychiatrists - sold to Probation by snake oil sales folk. Numerous staff hours spent by staff compiling 'scrapbooks' of 'evidence' and information noticeboards to show the EE assessors.

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Another missed opportunity by the opposition to hold the government to account during PMQ’s over this fiasco. I like Corbyn the person, but he’s no leader. Missed too many open goals. You want him in your team but not playing up front. The country’s journalists are the one acting as the opposition at present. This sort of thing should be rattling the government. But they are not bothered.

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I think the Parole Board have to some degree already lost faith in AP's. As a PO at a recent oral hearing I was given quite a bit of grief for recommending an AP asking what they could do for the prisoner? I was at a loss really. The rot set in when they took away the Programmes and groups which used to be a feature of an AP. I recall a time when you had a menu of activities you could pick for your case. Long gone. For many years AP's have just been holding pens where the only thing monitored is sleeping patterns.The SU gets up, goes out and then comes back for curfew. I say this as someone who does relief. It's not the staffs fault, they are very dedicated. It's the ideology of cost cutting weasels in Government.

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AND THERE YOU HAVE IT. At timecode 15:01:25, Spurr describes the 'new idea' that isn't yet working and for which HMPPS are giving away taxpayer money hand-over-fist. It was...

"...to give responsibility to an organisation that works with these people in custody, and once they've left custody, who can marshall support from other services, who could work innovatively with those other service groups in order to support these individuals, and that was one of the main aims of the reform programme..." I can't type what I want to say next...

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When talking about Warboys' case Caroline Flint proves she hasn't a single firing neuron, despite her new glasses - but Spurr can't articulate what the situation is either. I doubt anyone would be able to make any sense of their unhappy exchange. AND THEN the Chair starts saying that HMPPS should provide the CRCs with enough money to get their ICT up & running!

Let's be clear - the privateers bid to run the contracts because it was a licence to print money. All they had to prove was that they had £Hundreds-of-Millions of financial backing - but NOT cash in their hand (see Carillion). They paid £1 for each CRC they bought, they inherited all of the CRC assets, they were given £80M to pay off staff in order to cut their overheads (although they pocketed most of it for themselves), then they were given even more £M's because they were crying about reduced throughput. Surely they should sort out their OWN ICT ffs!?

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Excellent challenge to Spurr by Shabana Mahmood about the alleged 'unforeseen' issues; Spurr's clearly irritated - almost angry - reaction is (I paraphrase): "OK, so we got it a bit wrong, but we didn't project the volumes for the bidders AND the figures were there in the databank for the bidders to see and they didn't get it right either! So we're not to blame. They are!" In my head: You got it so very badly wrong, dickhead. That's why you're handing out new contracts and more cash.

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Spurr - "blah, blah, complexity, blah, volatility, blah, first generation contract, blah, complexities, volume changes, blah..."Shabana Mahmood: "So, Mr Heaton, Mr Spurr - is this even the right kind of model that we should be considering for this kind of service given that when it goes wrong...and it does go wrong, often..."

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Flint has now started to fire those neurons & gets stuck into Spurr...Spurr (by now, riled as fuck): "The Doncaster pilot & the Peterboro pilot were different mechanisms completely, they didn't involve the statutory requirement for the under 12 month group, um, the decision was taken to go to scale on addressing the group of under 12 month offenders and the way to do that was to use the community model rather than the prison model, and that's why we proceeded with the TR reforms"

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Multi-disciplinary IOM's have been effectively dismantled by TR; but now, suddenly, the CRCs are being financially disadvantaged in the metrics by the anomaly of persistent & prolific offenders - "something we'll have to address when we adjust the contracts!"

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Under a CarilIion shadow, I thought Heaton and Spurr had a decent enough grilling by the PAC. There was a defining moment when Spurr - in light of all the claims about the innovations that the private companies would bring to probation – was asked to name just three innovations that have marked the rehabilitation revolution. He waffled in response, citing partnership working, mentoring and other commonsense practices that were core probation practices pre-TR. It was plain to all present that there has been no innovation – unless you include cost-cutting, office closures and degraded working arrangements in open-plan settings and dodgy venues.

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Interserve has signed a £12 million contract with the Ministry of Justice to run six employment workshops at HMP Berwyn, a large new prison in Wrexham for five years. Okay, so what are people going to get if they spend £200,000 a month to run employment workshops in one prison? Sounds like it must be state-of-the-art rocket science staffed by University Professors. Shall we assume 24 staff? HMPPS have already told PAC that staffing costs are the majority of rehabilitation services' fixed costs - let's assume 70%, so the 24 staff will be costing £5,000+ a month each - with about £60,000 a month for other costs. Not a bad set-up they must have at HMP Berwyn OR......a shitload of taxpayer money is disappearing into shareholder & execs pockets.

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Michael Spurr says that the £342 million paid additionally to the CRC's is windfall money simply being ploughed back into the contract. This is not even being "economic with the truth" as it is downright dishonest. If the CRC's are looking at such vast shortfalls on expected profits, as they themselves have admitted, how can there be a windfall of millions of pounds? 

There has been no cost savings as the MoJ had to pay out millions for not getting the computer systems ready to "talk to" the CRC systems on time and money has been wasted on associated projects such as monitoring the contracts (fat lot of good that is doing) and on attempting to make some headway (none so far) on Through the Gate. Spurr, like Grayling and others are not strangers to the truth - they have never even been introduced! How do we get rid of such meddlesome "priests"?

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Back in 2011/12 there was quite a focus on mutuals, and some funding for schemes were made available. Unfortunately, the neolibral desire to detach the state from anything public won through and the way to achieve that aim was to instead to focus on wholesale privatisation. I think the appetite for mutuals maybe returning now.

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Just another distraction. Mutuals may have been viable as an alternative to Trusts, but now they've sampled the 'power of power' the concept will be corrupted by the greed of egocentric vultures who have shown how willing they are to sell out their staff for handsome reward. I certainly agree the Trusts were the ideological precursor to TR, creating 42 discrete fiefdoms with 42 'chiefs' to seduce, divide & rule. For the most part they played right into the hands of the ideologues - and yes, the ideology came before Grayling & even before the coalition govt. It was a Blue Labour initiative tee'd up by the legislation snuck in by the arrogant closet capitalists in 2006/7; the very same legislation that Grayling seized upon to impose TR.

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Yes that is the honest summing up of where all this started and goes back to. Often gets lost in the even more awful implementations that followed. Absolutely why many people have realised the neoliberal so-called left agenda was in fact a wolf in sheep's clothing, and why it must stop, sooner rather than later. That is why we need a proper Labour left wing, and the party needs to defeat the dangerous Torys, (and the right of the left!) There lies some hope in the sort of values many of us want for a more human and tolerant society - which includes management of offenders, and effective rehabilitation strategies - because carry on like we are and it'll end up with the everyone death penalty, and people having their hands chopped off for shoplifting. But then we all get what we ...vote for.

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Leading up to the last election Michael Gove said that the public were fed up of experts and armchair philosophers. Well, this is a good example of that sort of rubbish. The Titanic of Probation is sinking and these two are worrying about what the orchestra is playing! What have either of these two characters contributed to the fight to preserve any sort of service? What ability do they have to influence the political agenda on Probation? What do they think they can achieve by posting this sort of stuff on Facebook? Honestly! Please grow up.

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I know it's "on probation blog" but, is probation really in any worse a state then the NHS, prisons, schools, social care, manufacturing or retail? Probation is one part of a very broken society and economic system. Understandably everyone focuses on the parts that affect them the most. But capitalism doesn't work for 95% of the population because they haven't any capital. At least not enough capital to compete on a fair plying field.

Are mutuals the answer? They're certainly better then the profit first corporations that are swallowing everything up, and not just for probation but across the social spectrum. But the real answer is the election of a government with a social ethos. People and profit can live side by side quite happily if it's not an exploitative relationship. Society functions best when the people that belong to it have some stake in it, so mutuals and cooperatives are a step in the right direction, but we need a leap. We need a change of government.

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Raho and Rogers the Rolls Royce of the union voice? A lot of reading which is really a view on the ideology without much else. Boring as it was the highlight for me was the old blue eyes brown eyes socially constructed and artificially adopted by NPS we are the new elite, my manager confirmed this. Why are we so confident, because we are the remaining public service. The rest CRC sold off as not so important. It's a poor indication the trade Union senior management engage in these musings. They should be busy in real challenges and defence of the memberships who pay their salaries. 

There should be no defence to setting public services into mutual our work going is where they are opening the door to all comers not professional PO. It illustrates further the wrong direction from this pair. They have an accord the pathway they walk is more of the same error because they agree alternative models should be state funded than wholly public sector ownership. This is enough of a reason not to support these two washed ups trying to ride two horses. Why, what sales pitch is being hawked here? The calamitous departure from national collective bargaining was orchestrated by Rolls and Royce as a pair weakening local and national structures. They have damaged the standing of the Union they are supposed to strengthen. What is going here? It is well known National collective bargaining was our unifying force. Where does this stuff come from anyway? Should it not be on behalf of NAPO and published on the NAPO site?

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Funny, I never saw the probation trusts as progressive or especially devolved as they were all too busy aping each other to show who was the leanest by cutting away as many conditions of service as possible - always with the assurance they were protecting jobs. So not a role model in my view.

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Raho and Rogers were not in anyway responsible for the end of national collective bargaining, that was never sustainable after the split. Napo did well prior to the split to get the Probation Trusts around the table and even then there were some who would rather not have been there. They observed what had already happened and anticipated the direction of travel, rather than covering this up or minimising this as some might have done. The NPS were the first to walk away and when the owners started to walk, the only option was to negotiate local collective bargaining with the CRCs and national with the NPS. Remember NPS and CRC employers found it a waste of time and served notice to quit. 

NAPO did not have the strength and the MoJ did not have the political will (Spurr?) to sustain it. Do you seriously think that the MoJ would have given two hoots if Napo had threatened industrial action over this? Do you think the public would have given a toss about it? The MoJ knew that the bids included job cuts and other nasty surprises and that is why they were and are top secret. Do you seriously think that Grayling or Spurr would have gone out of their way to empower unions to force private companies into any sort of legally binding agreement to bargain with them collectively if they weren't forced to? To think otherwise would be naive. 

Napo is fortunate that at least some of those involved are awake and know when a battle is lost. Had membership been increasing dramatically and there was a grass roots groundswell of probation staff demanding that the employers go back to the table, then perhaps one or two of them might have thought twice, but what you find with the probation employers is that they all loathe each other almost as much as they loathe probation staff and finding innovative ways to stick it to us is the only thing they have in common.

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In the media, reports about conditions at Liverpool prison focus on drones, drugs, squalor and various aspects of prisoners' safety – a third of prisoners reported feeling unsafe at the time of the inspection. The report puts some focus on prisoner-staff relations – it found that almost a half of prisoners feel victimised by staff. This includes verbal abuse and assaults by staff. There's also evidence of unofficial punishments being meted out by staff who have a tendency to wear balaclavas when unwarranted by the situation at hand.