As we head into week two of 'lockdown' and heavy hints from government that restrictions may even tighten, concerns amongst probation staff being required to see clients face to face remain with 3,041 visits recorded yesterday. An improvement on Saturday, but I notice discussion once again became fractious after I turned the computer off last night so I've decided it will probably be in all our best interests to suspend unmoderated commenting over night from now on.
Everyone is having to deal with this in their own way and at some point I intend to publish some of my own more discursive thoughts, as much for therapy as anything else. In the mean time here's Jonathan Pie's take on things:-
Confederation of European Probation
ReplyDeleteCorona effect
The outbreak of the corona virus has an enormous effect on the work of probation in Europe. Organizations are forced to create new ways of working and to provide additional instructions for staff in managing their work and responsibilities.
In this news item (daily updated) CEP publishes information, measures and protocols on how probation services all over Europe are dealing with the Covid-19 outbreak. Some articles are in national languages, please use online tools to translate them if you wish.
How do the various jurisdictions react?
In Flanders, Belgium, the work in the Houses of Justice goes on, but in an amended way.
In the Ministry of Justice of France, special measures have been taken to keep the situation under control.
The Dutch Probation Service of the Netherlands has undertaken many precautions and actions.
In Turkey the Detention Houses under the Ministry of Justice have put in place new rules and regulations.
https://www.cep-probation.org/covid-19-measures-and-protocols-in-probation/
Some excellent info. Norway seem to be pretty clear:
ReplyDelete- All group activities in connection with community service have been cancelled. The same concerns working groups for all persons who are serving community sentence.
- Individual consultancies with convicted persons will still take place. KDI (Norwegian Directorate for Correctional Services), however, recommends that communication takes place using telephone, or other technical means, such as Skype.
- KDI has tasked probation offices to consider whether the sentence should be interrupted for a period of time.
- where short time of the sentence remains, KDI will ask probation offices to consider letting the execution of sentence expire with limited content, instead of consenting to interruption of the sentence.
- Compulsory attendance of persons released from prison on parole is still in force.
-
The probation offices must ensure that the contact with convicted persons can be maintained by telephone or other technical means, and not by physical appearance at the probation office.
Turkey aren't taking any chances either:
7. With the general letter dated 12/03/2020, in order to ensure that the necessary measures are taken at the highest level in prisons, probation services and staff training centers, the general letters have been sent for disinfection of all vehicles in prisons, common areas, communal vehicles, visitor areas, individual and group work rooms in probation directorates , classrooms, seminar rooms and offices, for giving bleacher and liquid soap to all wards and hand sanitizers in suitable areas in the visiting areas.
10. With the general letter dated 13/03/2020, necessary correspondences were made in terms of the provision of thermal cameras, fever meters, disinfection materials, gloves and masks to the institutions in order to prevent the infectiousness of the coronavirus in prisons.
20.With the general letter dated 19/03/2020, in order to prevent the intensity in the probation directorates, until 04/05/2020, letters on taking measures within the scope of the individual interviews, seminars, group works, signature liabilities, free employment in a public interest and on cancellation of all kinds of meetings with the protection boards are written.
Council of Europe says:
- The basic principle must be to take all possible action to protect the health and safety of all persons deprived of their liberty. Taking such action also contributes to preserving the health and safety of staff
- staff should receive all professional support, health and safety protection as well as training necessary
Dear Jim
ReplyDeleteThank you for your continued work with your blog which is now proving support to all colleagues working from home perhaps in a way never anticipated. Yes the keyboard warriors are out in force but the frustrations expressed are sometimes becoming aggressive and this needs self-checking. If this blog serves as a testament and a resource (journalists, unions, management?) let’s reflect on this and how we are treating each other and showing the qualities of probation.
I have just got off the phone from speaking with my child who was driving home from a night shift as an A & E Doctor. I am fearful for their safety and all of their colleagues as whatever is being said by the government the essential PPE is not fully in place and that is unforgivable. PPE is a range of protective clothing and kit (a lot of which is single use) and if our government is providing this partially so that all hospitals have some, it cannot claim it has been provided until all hospitals have exactly what is required. So if visors, headbands, masks, correct length gloves, suits, aprons etc are not available at point of need when required, patients cannot be treated and we run the risk of more medic deaths. When does the connection between medic deaths and having the correct PPE strike home to this government?
My point is simply that the priority for PPE must be the medics treating up close and personal those of us needing emergency treatment. Today, the government still hasn’t fulfilled this basic duty.
Given this, the PPE for probation staff is a lower priority (remember care homes, police, prisons etc and their greater need) so how should senior management respond? Not by doing nothing or business as usual. If it is unsafe for staff to meet service users face to face then that should be the decision made, it is simple. The doorstep visits appear ill conceived in terms of outing offenders in their community and potentially colleagues doubled up in vehicles so in close contact.
Specimen letters are being sent in the daily NPS Covid briefings to issue to service users explaining why they need to be seen. Why is there not a specimen letter that explains clearly that each person is responsible for their own behaviour not the probation officers and giving them times when they must be available on the phone?
I am writing this having been told by my child that I should expect that they and all medics will become infected. I am fearful beyond words.
Can senior managers please remember targets are an artificial construct that should not dictate safety of staff and service users? This will support NHS too.
PO
09:45
DeleteI agree with you whole heartedly about the aggressive and antagonistic tone of some comments left on the blog of late.
And I echo your well founded concerns about the safety of your child working in a hospital during this crisis.
My sister is frantic with worry about her child working as a doctor in a hospital.
The very nature of the work requires close contact with other throughout the day. Social distancing is an impossibility, and as such the need for proper protection is paramount.
My sisters child also works a long way away from the family home, and renting in the region is astronomical. As a consequence my neice house shares with 5 other professional people, and the concern of bringing the infection home from her work is of grave concern.
They're all very sensible and limit any contact to the bare minimum between each other by staying in their own rooms, but still the concern is very real.
There isn't anything that can be said to reduce your concerns about the current situation, but I for one thank your child (and all the other people's children) that are risking their own safety in an attempt to save the lives of others.
That they are struggling to do so with such limited access to proper protection is a shame on our Government.
Your concerns are well founded, but remember to feel very proud about what your child is doing at this time of national crisis aswell.
'Getafix
Language is a new narrative here
Delete" from speaking with my child " What appears to be a doctor and a mature capable decision maker. It is misleading to describe them as a child. I am now going to savaged by the language and tone police but lets get the balance right OK ? Fear anxiety worry are all legitimate my child is emotive and just as poor. It detracts from the issues when we all must realise the Government narrative is too late for NHS staff protections because of budget cuts in 10 years. Too late to act they wasted 8 weeks. Too late to resolve ventilators needed. Too late to follow their own advice half the cabinet infected. Under reporting the true figures of the death rates. the failure to tell the truth on who this C19 infects and its cycle in the human body. They have a lot to answer to later so lets get the issues lined up.
To be frank you raising the issue of language has done a brilliant job of detracting from the main issues you go on to highlight.
DeleteOH Jim B Police and critique are ok for me but come on on stating MY CHILD is just narrative for emotional nonsense. If anything spoiling the above poster who may have had a point to make but is manipulative be honest. In my view at least this is a place for all to contribute, lets not pretend it should be owned by the patronising well intended and a professional discussion group secular to those who rely on the freedom to read and post some pretty truthful facts of what we see hear and experience by the disastrous leaderships we endure. Warts and all surely ?
Delete'Police will ignore some crimes as officers fall victim to coronavirus'
ReplyDeletePolice will cut services, drop investigations and scale back their response to crime as forces hit different “tipping points” in the coronavirus crisis.
A “graduated withdrawal of service plan” details how officers will be redeployed to critical activities such as 999 calls and serious crime if forces reach black status — the most severe level of interruption to ordinary services — in which they cannot deliver ordinary tasks, according to documents seen by The Times.
It is understood that at least one regional force has already reached red status, the second most severe level, in which most officers are redeployed to “immediate, priority incidents”.
If sickness rates rise to 20 or 30 per cent next month, sources said that forces would begin to withdraw from a wide range of activities, including responding to low-level crime such as theft, affray and cannabis dealing.
The withdrawal plan, which applies to the 43 forces in England and Wales, details a series of “tipping points” in which forces move through five statuses. Blue marks business as usual but as sickness rates or demand increase they move to green, amber, red and then black — a severe situation in which the force can no longer provide “essential critical activities”.
A senior source said: “If you get to black, the force basically can’t function. You will either have to call in the army or request aid from other police forces. It’s edge-of-the-cliff stuff. I fear we will reach black in certain parts of this country, which is unprecedented.
“It is possible arrests won’t be made. A suspect’s journey through the custody suite involves 12 different people. If a police force is on its knees they won’t be able to make those arrests.”
Get real the police ignore everything most of the time these days unless its a revenue maker. Speeding traps in abundance and motorways that triggers fast changing speed limits.
DeleteStubborn & unsafe Command & Control policies can only serve to escalate the spread of the virus.
ReplyDeleteAs far as it is reported, in the US there are now 140,000+ known cases & 2,500 deaths.
That many known cases in the UK would = 8,400 deaths, based on the current mortality rate ~6%.
Unless HMPPS/MoJ wind in their necks, stop their petty intransigence & smell the coffee - call it what you will - there are going to be some grim statistics in the 2021 HMPPS Annual Report.
Maybe by posting the information on this blog makes the petulant HMPPS/NPS just dig their heels in even deeper? If so, mea culpa. But I cannot let their crass behaviour go unchallenged.
From Ian Acheson:-
ReplyDeleteNo Justice Secretary, least of all a Conservative one, wants to be in a position where they must authorise the early release of jailed criminals. Robert Buckland has not ruled out doing so, but is apparently resistant to throwing open the prison gates as a way of easing the threat from coronavirus.
Concerns about public reaction and confidence are completely understandable in this context. They are also misplaced.
Some form of executive release is not only rational, it will become inevitable as the virus overwhelms the capacity of staff to safely contain sickness and risk. There is a small and closing window of opportunity to act now to create the headroom necessary to allow the prison service to keep its corporate head above the waves and keep us all safe.
Put simply, the service cannot take “robust action” to isolate prisoners and manage a restive population with front line staff sickness levels as they are now.
Ten days ago, the troubled new Welsh super-prison HMP Berwyn had 75 staff off sick an self-isolating with suspected coronavirus. This was a prison already described by judges and inspectors as “in crisis” last November due to problems with drugs and violence. I’m not sure if I would take the Ministry of Justice’s “well established” plans to deal with this entirely unprecedented crisis to the bank right now. According to the House of Commons Justice Select Committee, the whole prison system was already in “an appalling state of crisis” in October last year, well before anyone had heard of Covid-19.
Berwyn is just one of a growing number of prisons where the virus is now present or suspected, scything staff numbers and causing huge anxiety for them, their families and the prisoners they are supposed to be looking after. Last Wednesday it was revealed that four prison officers had tested positive for the virus in four separate establishments. A further 19 offenders had tested positive for Covid-19 in 10 jails. Parliament has been told that that 10% of available prison staff – around 3,500 – were at home self-isolating last week.
It’s extraordinarily difficult to practise meaningful social distancing and even adequate hygiene in prisons, especially our often squalid, overcrowded local prisons, with their huge churn of potentially infected individuals. In HMP Wandsworth, one of our most overcrowded local prisons, throughput means on average 50 prisoners a week enter the facility and 100 are discharged – not counting those allocated to other prisons or the daily interactions of 360 staff. Imagine Wandsworth was a village of 1,877 with this amount of movement in ‘lockdown’ and you start to see the scale of the problem.
The prison system has three urgent and inter-related challenges – isolating sick prisoners, maintaining order and security, and protecting staff. There will be no way to maintain them all without the release of a significant number of prisoners. This has definite implications for public confidence in the justice system but these are overplayed and secondary to the breakdown of order that is just around the corner if prisons fall over because there are not enough staff to guarantee ‘life services.’
Moreover, some form of executive release – probably an extended ‘house arrest’ early release scheme for prisoners coming to the end of their sentence – was on the cards even without the arrival of coronavirus. Ministers were looking at modelling for an extension of the scheme, known as Home Detention Curfew, because the rising numbers in custody threatened to exceed operational capacity. In January we were only a large jail’s capacity away from the prison service going ‘bust’ and having to use police cells.
It’s worth remember that the majority of Britain’s prisoners do not present much danger to the public. According to the Prison Reform Trust, of the 59,000 people handed a jail sentence in 2018, 69% had committed a non-violent offence and 46% were sentenced to six months or less. This is decent mathematics for the current extraordinary situation. Instead of contemplating the repurposing of existing accommodation as prisons and spreading staff ever more thinly, Robert Buckland should be announcing carefully controlled and managed early release of non-violent prisoners, pregnant women and those over 70 to create some breathing space for a frightened and harried workforce, shorn of experienced colleagues and doing their best in dreadful circumstances.
DeleteAs for managing prisoners after release, a reserve of retired probation staff could be sought (without much bureaucracy, please) to provide additional community supervision and assurance for these offenders and keep them safe. This would allow the consolidation of the prison estate to ease the perils pf overcrowding and focus on maintaining decent regimes and security everywhere else, including some of our remote prisons that hold convicted terrorists and other extremely dangerous offenders.
Emptying out a medium-sized prison worth of space would also allow the creation of a secure isolation, care and treatment centre for prisoners who have tested positive for Covid19 and who are currently held in isolation in what may soon be untenable locations and numbers. Focusing on one site would allow healthcare and logistical resources to be concentrated and provide for vital additional protection and testing for staff.
Prisons are only properly staffed for a small number of escorted absences during any working day. They also have disproportionate numbers of people in them with compromised immune systems and long-term health problems. The prospect of large numbers of seriously ill prisoners filling brutally stretched NHS resources countrywide and the collapse of regimes as escorting staff are tied up and exposed in hospitals is absolutely real and very close.
Releasing a significant number of low risk, non-violent prisoners back to their homes with electronic monitoring, curfews and community supervision is now the humane and pragmatic thing to do. It also protects our hidden emergency front line service – the uniformed prison officers and Governors who are doing such an amazing job in holding the line. But they can’t be asked or expected to survive without further help.
Prisoners perceive themselves – probably accurately – to be at the back of the queue when it comes to public sympathy and resources. This coupled with helplessness, poor communications and struggling staff is a potent combination for widespread disorder. Other factors complicate this fiendishly difficult conundrum. The supply of drugs has likely dried up as the restrictions lock down prisons and prisoners. But that won’t dampen demand or the violence that goes with a buoyant drugs economy.
Prisoners are allowed out to exercise, but what happens if they refuse to be locked back up again because they can’t or won’t trust authority to keep them back in their cells safely? Opportunists abound in prisons, even in the worst of times, but they are now joined by large numbers of scared prisoners with legitimate anxieties and grievances.
We have seen this already in violent and deadly protests from Italy to Colombia. From Iran to Iowa, prison authorities are putting pragmatism before politics. Almost all prison commentators I know, including those I wouldn’t usually trust to tell me what time it is, concur. It’s time to carefully open the prison gates before the hinges come off.
Ian Acheson
https://capx.co/prisoner-release-is-the-best-way-to-avert-a-covid-catastrophe-in-our-jails/
Buckland dosen't have to be seen as soft or damaging the CJS by releasing prisoners at this time.
DeleteThere are plenty who could be tagged and given an open ended ROTL with an instruction that comply with all conditions of licence and your time on ROTL will count against your sentence. Fail to comply and and non of the time spent on ROTL will count against your sentence.
I'm sure the spin doctors wouldn't have a hard time convincing the public that releasing prisoners on a temporary basis is for their good and wellbeing, not about the prisoners being released.
My instinct is that most prisoners would return to custody when instructed to do so.
I'd be hesitant to use sobriety tags however, using those would likely increase the number of people failing to return.
I'd also give an assurance to anyone being released temporarily that they would not be drug tested for at least 28 days upon their return. Again, the fear of testing positive upon return is likely to increase the failure rate of prisoners being told to return.
Is confidence in the CJS really more important then the health of the nation as this particular time?
'Getafix
"Is confidence in the CJS really more important then the health of the nation as this particular time?"
DeleteBig jowly nodding bulldog says "Oh Yes, yes, yes."
: )
Was there much confidence in the CJS before Covid19?
DeleteBig jowly bulldog covers everyone in strings of saliva as he shakes his head: "No, no, no no, no."
Deletehttps://www.businessinsider.com/novel-coronavirus-covid-19-symptoms-day-by-day-2020-3
ReplyDeletehttps://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/30/coronavirus-uk-spread-shows-early-signs-of-slowing-key-adviser
DeleteThe spread of coronavirus in the UK is showing early signs of slowing, according to Prof Neil Ferguson, a key epidemiologist advising the government.
DeleteFerguson, whose modelling informed the government’s decision to impose a lockdown, said the data was showing signs that social distancing measures were beginning to work, although it has not yet had an effect on the number of daily reported deaths.
He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “In the UK, we can see some early signs of slowing in some indicators. Less so in deaths because deaths are lagged by long time from when the measures come into force.
“But we look at the numbers of new hospital admissions today, for instance, that does seem to be slowing down a little bit now. It’s not yet plateaued as the numbers are increasing each day but the rate of that increase has slowed. We see similar patterns in a number of European countries.”
Ferguson also said that “maybe a third, maybe 40%” of people do not get any symptoms but there was no evidence to back up claims that the vast majority of people are asymptomatic.
He said it appeared that 3-5% of people in central London could have been infected, but the figure may be higher in hotspots, while the figure for the country at large is more likely to be 2-3%.
Ferguson said the next crucial step was the antibody test that can tell whether people have already had the virus and is in the “final stages of validation”, with hopes that it could be operational within days.
Ferguson’s assessment provides some hope that the lockdown could work, but he acknowledged testing would need to be ramped up.
Helen Whately, a health minister, told the same programme that the government was hugely increasing testing, including of NHS staff.
However, she acknowledged that still only 7,000 people were tested on Sunday, despite the Cabinet Office minister, Michael Gove, and the health secretary, Matt Hancock, claiming the level is now at 10,000 tests a day. Whately said that was the new “capacity” but it had not yet been reached.
The government announced in early March it would be testing 10,000 people a day, before increasing that target to 25,000. However, it has taken weeks to get the tests and laboratories ready for 10,000 tests, meaning many NHS workers are just starting to get tested.
Whately also declined to speculate on when the UK’s lockdown may end, after Jenny Harries, the deputy chief medical officer, said on Sunday that restrictions could last three to six months.
BBC website:-
ReplyDeleteNorthern Ireland has become the first country in the UK to order the early release of prisoners due to the virus. Up to 200 inmates nearing the end of their sentences will be let out. The Scottish government is considering similar measures, while in England and Wales a range of options, including early release and the transfer of prisoners to other sites, is being explored.
It is bizarre that early release or postponing admittance to prison after sentence is taking so long to happen. Early release has happened before in England & Wales - so long ago - I do not recall any detail - possibly around 1984 when Leon Brittan was Home secretary and he covered up the early releases by leading the same announcement with news about new restrictions on parole eligibility for prisoners serving 5 years or more for drug or violent or sexual offences (at the time I was working on parole applications of two men serving about 8 or 9 years both seemed likely to be released but as the decison had not been taken - the applications stopped dead).
DeleteI do hope that early releases are not conditional on tagging or face to face supervison unless their is real good reasoning for tagging or supervision now, as that still puts all sorts of people at increased risk.
The situation is horrendous, I have immense admiration for folk struggling with decisions about how to respond on top of doing a demanding job that requires almost constant vigilance at the best of times.
Napo Feedback on EDM for OMU (prisons) 30/3/20
ReplyDeleteSTOP PRESS – as we prepared to send this to members we have had some communication from HMPPS Senior Leaders which may assist in clarifying these points. We will update members as soon as we can but be assured in the meantime that we are raising these points at the highest level.
Despite many attempts to get hold of an early version of this EDM in order that we could feed in member views the unions were not given this until several hours after it had been formally issued. This is disappointing as we have been fielding and collating many concerns from members about their circumstances working in prisons. While there will be many different and specific issues for members in different establishments we have distilled this to four broad areas of concern which we first raised with HMPPS senior leaders on Tuesday 24 March. Below is the feedback we have today sent to HMPPS Senior Leaders about the EDM reiterating the issues that need to be addressed as a matter of urgency.
Feedback sent to HMPPS Senior Leaders on 30 March.
The first and most obvious point is that the title is confusing, there are OMUs in the community as well as in custody and we need to ensure they are differentiated.
There are many and varied queries that our members have been seeking clarity on and these are not addressed by the document. We need urgent clarity on these points (which we have been raising since 24 March) so that we can advise members who are becoming increasingly distressed.
Most OMUs have small office / workspaces so social distancing is impossible – they feel they should be following the advice that other NPS staff have been given to work at home wherever possible. While the EDM advises work at home there is conflicting guidance to have staff in the prison OMU and we have seen incidences of staff who have NPS laptops being told by their SPO they can work at home but then being contacted directly by the Prison Governor to order them to come into the prison to work. We need unambiguous guidance including reference to the decision making process being via NPS not the prison for NPS staff.
Where staff are working in the prison here is a need for guidance and possibly PPE relating to key/lock use as there is much more requirement to touch handles/locks/door surfaces in prisons as doors and gates are locked and unlocked multiple times by a large number of staff.
Some staff have been told that OMU staff must remain in work as they (OMU staff) will be required to assist the rest of the prison in their roles. There is evidence of this in a circular that has been provided by Ian Lawrence. This is particularly concerning as NPS staff are not trained in the same way as prison staff and their skills and expertise are desperately needed for probation right now.
Some staff have been told they will be redeployed to community teams or APs but not when and they are querying how decisions will be made on redeployment and what support they will be given to adjust to an unfamiliar role and environment.
Some staff working in prisons have been there some years so also unfamiliar with processes and procedures. There is no guidance as to how many staff should remain in the prison OMU and how decisions will be made about who should remain and who should be redeployed and where.
Katie Lomas Ian Lawrence
National Chair General Secretary
Boom. Ian comes out swinging. His Napo has the MOJ on the ropes. This is despite this blog juicing up his opposition. I'm happy. My money well spent on Napo. We are winning! Jim, now time to consolidate. Hand your power to Napo now and then we can win this battle
ReplyDeleteJim, she/he has a point.
Delete17.31 and 17.36 are on shaky ground. Jim - moronic outbreak alert
ReplyDeletePlease do not denigrate anybody.
DeletePeople can have a different view 17.38. I certainly feel satisfied in how NAPO are handling this monumental crisis
ReplyDeleteWell to be honest I thought Anon 17:31 was being somewhat ironic, but no matter, people do indeed have different views and many have never liked this blog. As long as reasoned debate and discussion continues, all views can be accommodated, although I must give a word of warning - I'm not at all sure how I'd regard the appearance of pandemic deniers.
DeleteI cannot say Napo handle anything well and on this C19 they have been too late and not done what was required rally members to take immediate Health and safety action for protections. It read to me that most of the Napo response was first published on JB Blog then adopted by NAPO a bit late but they now realise this is a work change event for the duration. I have never believed they are very good as a campaigning union or a much else these days but they are greatly reduced in membership and I wonder what could they have achieved they remained at full strength. As long as they are now getting some dialogue to protect us that is a good thing but they have to toughen up as the NPS claims it has the union agreement to the EDM.
DeleteI was wondering why 17:31 was posting on this blog and not Ian Lawerences blog.
DeleteThen I realised Ian Lawerence hasn't published a post since August last year.
I guess 17:31 if they want to be kept abreast of what's going on in probation has to visit this blog as Ian seems to have not much to say.
https://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-total-of-55-prisoners-test-positive-for-covid-19-in-uk-11965930
ReplyDeleteA total of 55 prisoners have now tested positive for coronavirus in the UK, the Ministry of Justice has said. The inmates are housed across 21 prisons. In addition, 18 prison staff and four prison escort staff have tested positive.
DeleteThe total number of cases has doubled since the last update on Friday, when 27 prisoners were confirmed to have tested positive. In its daily update, the MoJ said it had temporarily paused the usual regime in prisons so it could implement the government's measures to encourage the public to stay at home, protect the NHS and save lives.
"This is to ensure prisons are complying with social distancing rules and to protect staff and prisoners," it added. It said the government had moved quickly to keep prisoners in touch with their family members during the coronavirus crisis - providing 900 secure phone handsets across 57 prisons. The MoJ also ensured that prisons are prepared to take immediate action wherever cases or suspected cases are identified, including the isolation of individuals where necessary.
From Napo website:-
ReplyDeleteThe sad news of the death of a Probation worker in London just before the weekend will have been received with a heavy heart by their immediate colleagues in the MTC St Johns Office in the London CRC . We are sure that Napo members everywhere will also share the sense of loss and join us in expressing our condolences to the family once it is appropriate to do so. As stated below, it has not yet been established that the cause of death was related to Covid-19, and staff based in this office have been advised of the appropriate precautionary measures that they should follow.
Here is the statement issued by MTC:
It is with deep personal regret that I inform you one of our employees has sadly passed away. We are working with the police and health services to establish the cause of death. I cannot confirm at this point if it was related to Coronavirus (COVID-19). As a precaution we have asked all employees who worked with this employee at our St. John Street office to self-isolate and be mindful of Coronavirus symptoms.
It is important we all act professionally and responsibly at this time and do not add to any speculation out of respect to the family.
If you would like to talk to someone at this time, Health Assured, our employee assistance programme is available to you. They are an independent provider of confidential support and professional counselling services. Confidential Freephone helpline: 0800 030 5182.
My thoughts are also with our employee’s direct co-workers at this time and I am sure you will also join me in deeply felt sympathy for our colleague’s family and friends.
Awful they said a lot less for Harry Fletcher. Staff concerns are well placed now to protect ourselves.
DeleteIs it not time to close all probation offices and cancel all face to face visits to probation offices, including these stupid ‘doorstep visits’?
DeleteAs I indicated earlier and especially given the tragic news from London, comment moderation is in place until the morning. Take care everyone.
ReplyDeleteEvery death is a tragedy; when its someone you can identify with it feels worse; when its a close colleague & friend... & then there's family. Oft times there just aren't suitable words.
ReplyDeleteUSA: 158,000 cases & just shy of 3,000 deaths
GBR: 22,000+ cases & just over 1,400 deaths
Globally as at 21:00 BST: 750,000+ cases & 37,000 deaths
Stay Home. Wash Hands.
Andra Tutto Bene.