Sunday, 23 February 2020

A Perfect Storm

So, just as the Telegraph reports on plans by Dominic Cummings to scrap the dysfunctional MoJ - which of course was set up when the Home Office was famously stated to be 'unfit for purpose' - Rob Allen highlights a 'perfect storm' brewing. The question is, who or what government department is going to 'cop' for it? 

Prison Broadly Fails

Not the words of the Howard League or Prison Reform Trust but ex Met Commissioner Bernard Hogan Howe a self-styled “hard-nosed enforcer” who thinks punishment really important. He was speaking in last week’s House of Lords debate on ending automatic halfway release for serious offenders. Despite his widely shared view - in the Lords at least - that there are already far too many prisoners, the Conservative manifesto pledge has been approved by both chambers. And the number of prisoners is likely to get a lot higher over the next ten years.

2,000 new prison places will be needed by 2030 as a result of the Statutory Instrument (SI), approved yesterday in the Commons which will see anyone getting a determinate sentence of seven years or more for a serious sexual or violent offence (carrying a maximum of sentence of life) spending two thirds of their term locked up.

But many more cells will be needed much more quickly if legislation promised for later in the year scraps release at halfway for a wider range of prison sentences. Justice Minister Chris Philp told MP’s the SI is "simply the first step in part of a wider process to make sure that we not only protect the public but respect the rights and concerns of victims”.

Philp had barely got to his feet before one of his colleagues demanded prisoners serve the whole of any sentence imposed. Another wanted even longer than that if they misbehaved inside.

More telling were the powerful contributions made by MPs who expressed the anger and frustration of constituents - and in one case their own family - who affected by serious crimes felt early release meant justice had not been done; not enough punishment, not enough deterrence, not enough protection for victims and the public - not enough time, some said, for rehabilitation.

On the positive side, Philp promised proposals to do more to treat the causes of offending behaviour, particularly drug and alcohol addiction and mental health problems, which are often the cause of high-volume repeat offending. Philp told MPs that “short custodial sentences do not deal effectively with that cohort of offenders”. So David Gauke’s plans to replace them with community orders may still be alive and well in the MoJ. But, while these welcome measures, depending how they are implemented, could reduce the flow of people into prison, they won’t come close to offsetting the impact of larger proportions of longer sentences being served there.

Add in the effects of the 20,000 new police officers - I’ve heard an estimate of a 12-15% growth in prison numbers resulting from better clear up rates - and there’s a perfect storm for HMPPS and the MoJ. A former Chief Justice wondered aloud in the Lords whether even to meet the costs of the initial measures in the SI other parts of the MoJ particularly the courts and legal aid would continue to be denuded to prop up the Prison and Probation Service.

There will at least be a White Paper which will set out the Government’s approach which at best looks like what criminologists used to call bifurcation – more prison at the top end, less at the bottom.

For those of us who want to see less use of prison across the board, there is an urgent need to develop some fresh thinking. Decrying a populist approach and lack of evidence – as Labour and Lib Dem Peers did last week - will not get far.

It is not true – as one MP put it, that there has been “a creeping, pervasive shift away from the victim towards the perpetrator - that the victim is no longer put first, but the perpetrator is.” But penal reform must engage better with the concerns and anxieties of victims - particularly victims of violent and sexual harm - and to develop and promote measures which can address them so much better than incarceration.

The government told Parliament that the White Paper will give an “opportunity to go further and broader” than the measures they were discussing. They are right. If prison broadly fails, we need to legislate for and invest in what broadly succeeds.

Rob Allen

8 comments:

  1. How do they expect this new release system to work when the probation service is haemorrhaging staff?

    The Parole Board are going to be getting more work as will the grubby solicitors 'advocating' for their clients - but already knackered probation staff will have to sit there doing MORE work and then have the pleasure of being bollocked in even MORE oral hearings.





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  2. 7. The Northumbria CRC should provide sufficient private interview space to allow all structured interventions and sensitive discussions to take place confidentially

    Reply: Northumbria CRC does not agree with this recommendation. Over the contract length, it has undertaken retrospective re-design in all of its service user facing buildings. This has included the creation of private interview space in each office. It is satisfied that the current estate provides sufficient private interview space to allow all structured interventions and sensitive discussions to take place confidentially. This continues to be monitored directly with its staffing group and through service user feedback. As the current contracts will terminate in eighteen-months Northumbria CRC will not make any further modifications to its estate over and above regular building maintenance.

    https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/864828/Northumbria_CRC_ActionPlan_FINAL.PDF

    Or...

    1. [HIOW should} Reconsider the ratio of senior case managers to case managers holding cases in the context of findings around the quality of service.

    Reply: Due to operational and affordability reasons the recommendation to reconsider the ratio is not agreed. The ratio of Senior Case Managers to Case Managers (SCM/CM)is based on the operating model and the resulting number of SCMs required to manage SCM cases as defined by iBAT (A case allocation tool)This is sufficient for the number of SCM cases within HIOW.

    4. [HIOW should] Use quality management systems to drive the delivery of high-quality work as defined by HM Inspectorate standards.

    This recommendation is Not Agreed as HIOW CRC believes that the Interserve Quality Management Framework (IQMF) already reflects defined HMIP Standards

    https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/800489/HIOW_CRC_HMIP_Action_Plan.pdf

    Others are available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/probation-inspection-reports
    _________________________________________

    So this is where I don't understand the point of having an Inspectorate paid for by the public purse, only for those who have been inspected (also paid for by the public purse) to (1) deny what the inspectors have found, (2) insist they are *not* in-the wrong &/or (3) refuse to make any changes because the contract terminates in 18 months.

    Fuck the 'service users' - fuck the inspectorate - we'll do what we want - we'll pocket what we want - who will stop us?

    The Perfect Storm feeds itself.

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  3. With legislation to be rushed through today that will see the end of automatic halfway release for some catagory of prisoners, the Times is reporting that an official in the MoJ is expecting the prison estate to run out of places by the end of this year.
    The new legislation is already causing some rumblings in NI.
    There's too much all going on at once, and most of its not about improving the CJS, but to create the illusion that this Government is on the ball when it comes to CJS matters. It's just crowd pleasing, and couldn't be further from the truth.

    https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/terror-sentences-boris-johnson-house-of-lords-a9352051.html%3famp

    'Getafix

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  4. MoJ 2008:

    More than 500,000 crimes a year are committed by serial offenders who have just been freed from jail or sentenced to a community punishment.

    MoJ 2011:

    More than 180,000 convicted offenders went on to commit a combined 510,000 offences within a year, according to the first detailed official figures revealing the scale of reoffending in England and Wales.

    Jeremy Wright, Oct 2013:

    It is disappointing Napo have voted to strike - we have well-established contingency arrangements to deal with any potential action.

    More than 600,000 offences were committed last year by those who had broken the law before, despite spending £4 billion a year on prisons and probation.

    The public deserves better and we are committed to introducing our important reforms, which were widely consulted on.

    Russell Webster 2019:

    MoJ stats for the year to June 2017 reveal that adult reoffending rates are rising.


    ONS: In 2018/19 the number of overall crime offences in the United Kingdom reached approximately 6.3 million, an increase of around 430 thousand offences when compared with 2017/18. Although crime figures were slightly higher in the early 2000s, they were far lower in 2013/14, when just 4.4 million crimes were recorded in the UK.

    https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/crimeandjustice/bulletins/crimeinenglandandwales/yearendingmarch2019

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    Replies
    1. Seems its not only justice that's been turned upside in the last decade, but a new report confirms what we knew, i.e. the quality & provision of healthcare has been decimated too. Wonder who was at the helm since 2010? How & why are they in power now?

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    2. https://www.independent.co.uk/independentpremium/uk-news/nhs-health-life-expectancy-austerity-marmot-inequality-report-a9355631.html

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    3. Link to 2010 report:

      https://www.parliament.uk/documents/fair-society-healthy-lives-full-report.pdf

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    4. Link to '10 years on' report:

      http://www.instituteofhealthequity.org/resources-reports/marmot-review-10-years-on/marmot-review-10-years-on-full-report.pdf

      Delete