Roadmap to Recovery

Yesterday the government published this:-

PROBATION ROADMAP RECOVERY PHASES 

Current position – Step One

We will continue to operate according to the Exceptional Delivery Models and Plans currently in place, with no major changes of our approach planned at least for the next 2 weeks. This includes: 
• Staff continuing to work from home wherever possible, in recognition of the importance of staff and service user safety. 

• Where staff do need to work from a location which is not their home under the current exceptional delivery arrangements, managers and staff need to ensure that the working environment is a safe one, in line with the government guidance, detailed in Annex B – ‘Working safely during COVID-19 in offices and contact centres’. 

Risk assessments for each location should be maintained to ensure social distancing measures and good hand and respiratory hygiene can be maintained, safe working practice is possible and appropriate equipment is in place to manage COVID related risk. 

The government guidance on office working (annex B) should be followed, summarised below: 

• Ensuring anyone with symptoms leaves the workplace immediately and they and their family self-isolate at home 

• Effective and regular hand washing 

• Reducing the footfall in each location (in line with our exceptional delivery arrangements) 

• Reduce the number of people a person has contact with each day (in line with our exceptional delivery arrangements) 

• Maintaining a 2m distance from one another 

• The suspension of hot-desk and the sharing of desks and equipment 

• The avoidance of sitting face to face especially at close distance 

• Where social distancing at 2m is not possible, staff and service users should wear fluid resistant masks (which we will provide). But we are clear that the best protection for all our staff is effective and regular hand hygiene and to maintain social distancing wherever possible.

Step Two 

We will follow a staged approach to a less “locked down” approach to our work, continuing to prioritise public safety, but gradually increasing what we can do as social distancing constraints change over time. As set out in our principles above, any relaxation of social distancing within probation will come into effect with at least two weeks’ notice (other than in exceptional circumstances), so will happen at least two weeks after the Government’s wider move to “step two”. 

Some of the earlier changes are likely to include:

Scaling back doorstep supervision and scaling up face to face supervision. In order to ensure that social distancing is maintained at Probation Offices it will not be possible to return immediately to face to face supervision for all offenders. The following principles will be used at Local Delivery Unit (LDU) level to develop bespoke recovery plans for face to face supervision: 

Each LDU will need to undertake a capacity analysis that identifies how many offenders are able to report each week in a way that supports continued social distancing. Managers should consider extending office opening times (this will need to include the availability of sufficient staff) and utilising any available estate and partnership buildings (following local agreements and thorough risk assessments). 

Offenders currently receiving doorstep visits are also supervised by audio/ video telephone calls in between doorstep contact. During the initial phase of recovery, the audio/ video calling will continue, with only the doorstep visits being replaced by face to face supervision at a Probation Office. Even with this constraint it is still likely that available capacity will not be able to meet the demand and offenders will therefore need to be prioritised for a return to face to face supervision using the following criteria: 

Category 1 - Very high and high risk of serious harm offenders where there are domestic abuse and/ or child safeguarding concerns 

Category 2 - Other very high and high risk of serious harm offenders 

Category 3 - Medium risk of serious harm offenders where there are domestic abuse and/ or child safeguarding concerns If an LDU is able to accommodate all three categories of offenders and there remains additional capacity, then the prioritisation exercise should be repeated with face to face supervision being offered as a replacement for audio/ video calls. 

Home visits (where a member of staff enters the home of an offender and conducts supervision) will not be possible during this period. As a result, doorstep supervision will remain an important alternative method of risk management for some offenders, particularly those living with their victim or living with children at risk. Doorstep supervision can therefore continue to be utilised in tandem with face to face supervision as part of a risk management plan. 

All changes to supervision and risk management activity will need to be accompanied by a corresponding review of the risk management plan and sentence plan. It is recognised that this will place a significant burden on front-line staff. This activity will be properly benchmarked and resourcing options considered. 

We will ensure that the groups are small in numbers to move slowly and safely away from doorstep supervision and we will conduct a review after one week for each group before we move to the next.

As we would move to increase face to face supervision, in line with the risk assessments we will complete (details can be found in Annex B), we would further consider: 

• Where the social distancing guidelines cannot be followed in full, we will take all mitigating actions possible to reduce the risk of transmission. We will: 

Assess whether protective screens should be fitted in interview rooms and reception areas where required o Consider further changes to office opening hours 

Give staff the option to work alternative hours to minimise footprint in offices o Consider implementing a staff rota for attending the office such as, a one week on one week off system which alternates o Explore changes to our office set up, changing desk layouts and creating a one-way route with one entrance and one exit mapped out 

• Keeping the activity time involved as short as possible – we will ensure staff are only based in the workplace for as long as needed to carry out critical operational delivery. 

• Using back-to-back or side-to-side working (rather than face to face) whenever possible and explore changes to our office set up, changing desk layouts and creating a one-way route with one entrance and one exit mapped out. 

• In our risk assessments we will have particular regard to whether the people doing the work are especially vulnerable to COVID-19 (or live with those who are). All staff are urged to inform line managers of any special circumstances which may mean they or people they live with are particularly vulnerable to the coronavirus, we will conduct individual risk assessments before returns to work and take all reasonable steps to ensure the safety of our staff. 

For anyone considered vulnerable or at a higher risk of impact from COVID19, an individual risk assessment should be completed before returning to an office location. 

• When travelling everybody (including critical workers) should continue to avoid public transport wherever possible. If they can, people should instead choose to cycle, walk or drive (but not sharing a vehicle with those outside their household). If staff do need to take public transport, the Government is now advising that you should aim to wear a homemade cloth face-covering for your journey. 

In line with the guidance, we will display the Government approved notice in all work environments to show we have followed this guidance, confirming that: 

• We have carried out a COVID-19 risk assessment and shared the results with the people who work here and trade unions 
• We have cleaning, handwashing and hygiene procedures in line with guidance 
• We have taken all reasonable steps to help people work from home 
• We have taken all reasonable steps to maintain a 2m distance in the workplace 
• Where people cannot be 2m apart, we have done everything practical to manage transmission risk 

This can be found via link 

To support gradual increases in face to face supervision, we also plan to increase flexibility of operating hours for buildings used for face to face contact. This is to allow for greater numbers to be seen over a day without increasing the total number of people on site at any one time, and to reduce the risks involved in rush hour travel. It may also have the knock-on benefit of being desirable for staff with caring responsibilities. 

To be clear, the earlier changes as part of this stage will not include opening more offices wherever possible, we are strongly focused on ensuring the small number of sites we have open are fully safe by completion of full risk assessments detailing that we are adhering Government guidelines (as set out in Annex B). We will explore opening these smaller number of offices for longer hours to minimise staff footfall. We are committed to staff continuing to work from home wherever possible, even if that is only part of the week. 

Other earlier changes as part of step to are likely to include: 

Scaling up court work as needed by increased court activity. The following areas of work will be taken forward across England and Wales: 

• The NPS will continue to work closely with HMCTS and staff open Courts as required. 
• The NPS will fully engage with the roll-out of Technology Enabled Justice in order to maximise the potential of remote digital working. 
• The NPS will feed into the recovery planning work being undertaken by HMCTS. There is a significant backlog of criminal cases across England and Wales which will result in an increased demand for sentencing advice, bail information and the management of community sentences. The HMCTS recovery plan will be used to effectively distribute our resources to meet business need. 

Restarting unpaid work and interventions, initially on a limited scale. This is central to maintaining the confidence of sentencers as well as meeting our broader aims of public protection and reducing reoffending. The following areas of work will be taken forward: 

• Working with our providers to explore possibilities for commencing unpaid work e.g. singleton placements compatible with social distancing measures. 
• Working with providers and Intervention Services on options for the delivery of accredited programmes in innovative, socially distance ways. 
• Identifying and sharing innovations in the area of supervision and rehabilitation that have been effectively delivered during the COVID-19 period. 

It is recognised that there will have been significant development in these areas over recent weeks and that such work has the potential to make probation practice more effective and efficient.

Restarting Programmes – we will consider how we can safely reintroduce delivery of programmes within the NPS, in line with the Government guidance (Annex B), if people must work face to face for a sustained period with more than a small group of fixed partners, then employers need to assess whether the activity can safely go ahead. No one will be obliged to work in an unsafe work environment. 

This will form the basis of our consideration on when we can safely re-introduce programme delivery and group work. We are currently exploring the ability to run programme work on a one-to-one basis or remotely to minimise risk to staff and service users. 

Restarting Offender Management in Custody (OMiC). In liaison with colleagues in prisons, we will look to re-deploy OMiC staff back into prisons when appropriate and in line with Prison regime changes. 

Step Three 

The next step will take place when the Government assessment of risk from COVID-19 warrants further adjustments to the remaining measures. The ambition would be (working in line with the Government COVID-19 Secure guidelines) to: 

• open remaining offices in a coordinated way and in line with the guidance set out in Annex B 
• restart Unpaid Work and Interventions on a larger scale 
• restart face to face training and associated activities 
• Commence re-opening of Approved Premises (AP) which have been closed due to non COVID-19 reasons 
• We will start to plan to re-open AP closed due to COVID-19 
• We propose to maintain single occupancy within AP until Government, Health and other guidance along with data suggests that we can safely move back to double occupancy 

STAFFING 

Through our established daily reporting mechanisms, we will continue to monitor our staffing levels closely to ensure we are able to respond effectively and safely deliver services. 

We will take the following approach, in order of this hierarchy of resourcing options, to move out of the current Exceptional Delivery Models and introduce new service delivery elements. 

1. Existing staff establishments 

2. Staff overtime 

3. Agency staff 

4. Redeployment of other HMPPS staff 

5. Former staff identified as part of the ‘returners work’ 

6. Other Government Department offers/arrangements 

7. Third Sector arrangements 

We will ensure that there is clarity on incremental increases to service delivery, as well as consistency in delivery and decisions on how we will staff the changes, through utilising this hierarchy of options on how we will cover staff availability and/or increases throughout.

As mentioned above, unless in exceptional circumstances, we will give staff at least two weeks’ notice before any significant relaxation of current measures comes into effect, so there is time to prepare and for transparency.