I notice this was written at 02.06 this morning and in my view deserves highlighting:-
I'm never sick, but I'm getting on and suffer from poor eyesight and arthritis (I feel like a dinosaur). Some colleagues in my generation have died of Covid - notably the ones that came in whilst those statistically at less risk stayed at home. At my desk throughout the lockdowns, holding the fort. Every pay deal has been a further kick in the teeth because heaven forbid they pay anyone more for hanging in there.
Band 4 is a joke with many staff who have never been probation trained are now Band 4, 5 and 6. I mentioned that years ago we had some professional autonomy and discretion as POs the other day in a team meeting and my line manager (I'd been doing the job ten years before she was born!) nearly gagged on her spinach smoothie. 'You're here to get the job done the way it has to be done and not to question how the higher ups want it done'.
Like anyone has any respect for those higher up in the management hierarchy who if they didn't exist tomorrow not only would a lot of money be saved but the machine would plough on regardless because people like me would carry on carrying on. If I didn't have bills to pay I'd tell her where to stuff the current job as it certainly wasn't what I signed up for.
Working for the CRC was actually a lot preferable to the kind of crap I now have to put up with just trying to do the PO job with a few principles. They have created a bureaucratic nightmare that does not help anyone reduce reoffending but simply serves to grind staff down and strip them of the last vestiges of dignity they have managed to retain before forcing them to comply or leave.
What a bloody mess and if I hear another manager tell me I am a hidden hero I will puke in an envelope and send it to them. Heroes die and are forgotten, whilst overpaid people who have mostly saved money by not having to commute from their posh houses in the suburbs get gongs and buildings named after them and can afford nice things and early retirement with big lump sums for all their years of high paid work.
I hope you have a goddam awful new year Amy Rees. Lord knows you and your top team deserve a bucket load of bad luck, red tape and pointless repetitive bureaucracy and as much crap as you pass down the line needs to come right back up at you until you are up to your neck in it. You and your cronies are not worth your salaries that should be at most three times the lowest paid full time employee.
Thank you for the perfect & most complete description of post-2001 probation, if not the UK in general:
ReplyDelete'You're here to get the job done the way it has to be done and not to question how the higher ups want it done'.
For the 600,000+ NHS staff across our nation (from Alfred, Lord Tennyson's The Charge Of The Light Brigade):
"Someone had blundered.
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die.
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred thousand...
Boldly they rode and well,
Into the jaws of Death,
Into the mouth of hell
Rode the six hundred thousand."
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/45319/the-charge-of-the-light-brigade
To the person who wrote that comment - I feel your pain. I'm not as experienced as you but have been in the service plenty long enough to notice the influx of barely qualifieds rushing past me into 'management'. I attended training delivered by one of them recently and it was embarrassingly bad but delivered with an almost aggressive tone, as though daring anyone to mention it. My hat goes off to you because if any so called manager had told me 'You're here to get the job done the way it has to be done and not to question how the higher ups want it done', they would have been on the receiving end of a swiftly delivered grievance! Like you, I am staggered and disgusted by the layers upon layers of bureaucracy which accumulate between us and our ability to do the job we were trained for. It saddens and angers me every day. But please remember - you were likely one of the officers, slightly older than me, who inspired me and many others to want to work with our much misunderstood, frustrating but nonetheless valid client group. Please don't stop fighting! Keep pushing back. This week I challenged an email in which one of my men was referred to as 'PoP #12345' - it wasn't the sender's fault, he'd been directed to refer to the men by number rather than name 'for data protection reasons', in an INTERNAL email. I despair.
ReplyDeleteMany many years in and thankfully out. None of what's is said is new. This started years ago. Too many helped pretties by some despicable acos they know who they are. Too much stolen funding fiddles by the cpos . Vanity projects mates into roles. Non po senior appointments for retired other specials despite better internals. It's too late now the new order won a long time ago and that is why they say don't dare question us. There is no opposition no national terms no protection good luck.
ReplyDeleteTrite little phrase that nags at the back of my head when I am at work (OM): "If you're not part of the solution you are part of the problem". I try to be part of the solution for my clients and their victims: In private conversation with managers at many levels they will acknowledge the mess we are in, the hopeless bureacracy, the box ticking, the paint-it-by-numbers interventions, the endless top-down exhortations to jump through utterly pointless hoops, the lack of any professional discretion, the back-covering. They will say that they are doing their best to have a positive impact, but they need to think about the question I posed: are they part of the problem or of a solution, and what sort of solution are we going for anyway? What can we feasibly retrieve from this really terrible state of things?
ReplyDeleteah, but if you have risk assessments in triplicate then you have three times the weight of evidence as to who was responsible for a perpetrator's heinous crime.
ReplyDeleteModern probation practice is designed & defined by the risk averse, to ensure that the 'excellent leaders' can justify their existence & exorbitant salaries by blaming someone lower down the chain of command for something. Anything. And that's it.
Its a blame-based paradigm built around the simple premise of I'm-ok-you're-ok-they're-not-ok-its-their-fault:
- perpetrator blames victim & crime is committed
- public are outraged & want to blame someone
- media offer public blame headlines
- politicians lay blame where its most expedient
- professionals pass the blame down the line
- perpetrator is long forgotten by now
And nothing changes:
https://www.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/hmiprobation/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2020/05/A-thematic-inspection-of-the-Serious-Further-Offences-SFO-investigation-and-review-process.pdf
"Probation system ‘not doing enough to learn from past mistakes’"
https://www.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/probation/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2014/03/peterwilliamsenquiry-rps.pdf
https://www.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/probation/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2014/03/hansonandwhitereview-rps.pdf
https://www.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/probation/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2014/03/anthonyricereport-rps.pdf
https://www.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/probation/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2014/03/londonroh_reportjul08-rps.pdf
https://www.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/probation/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2014/03/London_Special_Inspection_Report-rps.pdf
As far as I can see the probation remit has been intentionally & cynically dragged from its rightful place offering an appropriate & achievable means of socially responsible intervention aka 'advise-assist-befriend'.
It is now described as follows:
"What the Probation Service does - The Probation Service is a statutory criminal justice service that supervises high-risk offenders released into the community."
https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/probation-service
If a probation officer is not afforded the right to use professional autonomy, then to my mind, they are actually being stripped of their professional status. Everywhere professionalism has been exchanged for process, the way we teach our children, the way we build houses, the way we produce our food. It's an extremely damaging exchange because not only is repetitive process habit forming where people involved in the processing can't imagine how things might be done any differently without the processing, but process sets the bar far lower then the professional approach. Quantity, not quality means it will be the point where the lowest common denominator is reached that defines when the outcome has been reached, and that's what's become important in today's world, how that outcome could have been so much better is lost. Target reached. Sign off, move on, job done.
ReplyDeleteWithout the use professional autonomy by probation officers, there is no probation service, it's something else altogether.
I read the following yesterday, and I'm inclined to agree with it totally.
https://ebrary.net/62530/education/deskilling
'Getafix
on Twitter @SecretPrisoner has just asked "Is Probation worth it?"
ReplyDeleteIt would be a more interesting thread if any current probation staff were free to comment
one reply to @secretprisoner says:
DeleteGood question. But we need to define what 'probation' is & what 'worth it' means, e.g. the effort, the financial cost, the purpose.
Old hat probation was to support someone to effect +ve change, "advise, assist, befriend"
New hat seems to be "do as I say or you're off to gaol"
getafix & others here seem to echo those sentiments.
@1.33 highlights the Govt's own description of probation work, i.e. "The Probation Service is a statutory criminal justice service that supervises high-risk offenders released into the community."
No mention of pre-sentence work, of pre-release work, or of work with anyone other than "high-risk offenders released into the community".
Exactly where politicians always wanted to put probation, i.e. under their control & with a glossy, super-sexy hi-sugar content wrapping.
It gives them a silo of righteousness into which the risk-averse pricks can hide the inconvenient bodies; not just the terrorists, sex offenders & child murderers, but also the lefty-pinko do-gooders, the troublemakers & the dissidents.
It is all over I feel we all let it go too easily. No proper campaign from branches or Napo. Too many concessions.no time weightings fight from Lawrence. No nnc terms fight either. No fight over equalised pay and gradings. No regular commentary or criticism of the NPS. No wonder we are lost in a process job quantifiable. Just what does the general secretary do in a week or month for his salary. I bet nothing and less since covid. Napo must be redundant themselves shortly.
DeleteNot only was the destruction of probation done in plain sight with barely a murmur, but £75k a year - or £600,000 since 2013 - to ensure the unions to roll over & play dead is a paltry, insulting sum.
DeleteShould have gone to Test&Trace - £37billion
or bid for PPE - £TensOfMillions
Undoubtedly probation is a bit different now then it was in 2011, but there's some insightful observations from the probation office waiting room in this article from back then in Inside Time.
ReplyDeletehttps://insidetime.org/probation-officers-just-doing-their-job/
'Getafix
Probation Officers – just doing their job
DeleteAs a regular visitor to the local probation office to conform to the conditions of my parole licence which stipulates that I will do as required by my offender manager and report when required to do so, I am always curious as to the various expectations of parolees and those under probation supervision when I engage with ex-offenders in the waiting room.
I should note that I refer to us as ex-offenders which seems to me to be a dilemma for probation officers who continue to refer to us as offenders which might imply that we are still offending and that is reinforced by the change of the description of probation officers who are now known as offender managers.
It also seems to me that the world is full of senior managers, managers, team leaders and coordinators that I really do wonder who the troops are and if we as their clients whom they refer to as offenders are still offending it then the waiting rooms of all probation offices should be empty and we should either have been reconvicted and be back in prison or recalled. Semantics it might be but when I refer to an ex-wife, I really do not mean that she is still my wife. An ex is exactly that, an ex and history, it’s all in the past as offending should be if I am conforming to the laws of the land and all those conditions imposed on me.
But no! One must never be allowed to forget. Indeed we are compelled to carry the burden of our past misconduct; we are still labelled as offenders.
‘I have a really good probation officer’, ‘I have a probation officer who really understands me’, ‘I get on well with my probation officer’, just some of the passing comments that I encounter as I wait to see my offender manager, so much faith, so much confidence and so much hero type worship of someone who is a representative of a repressive criminal justice system which was instrumental in recalling as they did some 13,000 ex-offenders to prison in 2010 most who had committed no offence except perhaps missing an appointment or some administrative failure whilst many would have simply had a difference of opinion with their probation officer.
Having a ‘good relationship’ with their probation officer merely implies that they are conforming to what is expected of them all in the name of public protection which are the wheels on which the probation service runs and for the client having a ‘good relationship’ with their probation officer is not the same thing as being provided with a social service as socio-economic factors such as unemployment, homelessness, marital estrangement, drug or alcohol problems are so easily translated into risks rather than problems requiring support and help to overcome them and for many ex-offenders these are factors which continue to present difficulties in their daily lives.
Sitting one day in the waiting room to see my probation officer I was struck by the sentiments being expressed by one client as to the relationship he enjoyed with his probation officer, ‘she’s a diamond and leaves me alone, I don’t get any bother from her’, oh dear, such confidence as she soon appeared, ‘hello Kevin (not his real name) as he was ushered through the waiting room door towards the interview room with the all the pleasantries of someone who might have cared. ‘How are you today?’
I continued to glance around the waiting room at all the posters and leaflets which exist to provide signposts to ex-offenders seeking help and training and soon became involved in a conversation with a middle aged chap in semi uniform who I thought perhaps might be on the way to work after his visit and who I had seen there before but no, he soon established himself as a member of the security staff. Security? Then it all made sense as the waiting room was under CCTV and the access to reception staff was via a reinforced glass partition window with the entry point to the offices being via an intercom system the network was complete. Perhaps it was all designed to keep out any undesirables or the fear of dangerous individuals with ill intentions entering the premises.
DeleteHow things have changed from the days when probation staff would be less guarded but why the paranoia today?
Perhaps the answer lay in the events which evolved when having reported to my probation officer I made my way out of the building till next time and had to encounter a number of police officers rushing along the probation offices corridor towards where I just come from. I thought I would remove myself as promptly as I could but waited around in the foyer long enough to see a handcuffed chap being escorted out of the offices.
With all the expletives he could muster, ‘what am I being f**king recalled for?’ ‘What have I done?’, ‘f**king probation’.
Only a few minutes before he was describing his probation officer as being a ‘diamond’ and ‘helpful’ and someone who he had a good relationship with and with her expressing a kind of sincerity as to how he was keeping on meeting him perhaps he might have realised as he sat in his prison cell that night that the whole thing was a charade and utterly false for it was almost certain that the reception staff had been instructed by her that as soon as he reported that they should call the police and allow him to go through the procedure of reporting, that he had been set up and along the way been put at ease as though this was going to be just another day.
No it wasn’t for he was now a prisoner again and his diamond and the one whom he had so much faith in no doubt saw herself as just doing her job.
Stop Press
According to a Justice Select Committee Report probation officers ‘spend just a quarter of their time in direct contact with offenders’ because they have so much paperwork to deal with. The tick-box culture imposed by the previous Labour Government has obliged officers to ‘spend hours completing forms and answering emails’. The MPs say that no one would find it acceptable if teachers spent only a quarter of their time teaching. Despite efforts by Ministers to curb the ‘worst excesses of the tick-box, bean counting culture’ the report says that macro-management is still continuing.
A response:-
Deletemmm this is a puzzling one i admit there's good and bad in all jobs.
now i have had a jobsworth previously but to be fair to some probation officers or smegging offending managers as they are now refered to there are some excellent ones as well.
mind you i never thought the day would come when i say that, however beware the wolf in sheep clouthing thats always paramount in my mind.
the puzzling thing is what is actually their main role/function?. to address previous offending or to prevent future offending mm a very interesting one.
to future offend that is without doubt the ex-offenders decision and theres nothing on planet earth that noms can do to prevent that. be it 1 week, month, year down the road probation cannot prevent that person re-offending its all in the ex-offenders mindset.
its circumstances that prevent re-offending a happy medium a ex-offender with no thoughts of revenge in his/her mind this is when the police come into it. in once sense the probation officer has a very difficult task appeasing the police (mappa) and guiding the ex-offender. who gets it in the neck if it goes wrong the probation officer and definately not the police the police always blame probation as they are the so called offending managers and in the police mindset the ex-offender was not being managed properly perhaps if the police carried out their jobs properly then their be a much more better happy medium.
Author responds:-
I can answer your question, what are the functions of probation officers.
It is Public Protection, Enforcement (of licences supervision and court orders) and rehabilitation.
I have previously written on the very issues you raise in Probation Officers Agents of Control December 2004.The Changing Face of Probation August 2007.Probation Officers Friend or Foe February 2009. All in Inside Time. When the Probation Service was set up in 1907 it had Christian ethos to befriend and assist and that remained its purpose until the 1990s when the Public Protection model came into force. At one time probation officers needed to have the Diploma in Social Work but that was replaced with the Diploma in Probation Studies which focuses on Public Protection and enforcement. Probation Officers are NOT social workers anymore and as Paul Boateng a Home Office Minister said in August 2000,the probation service is a law enforcement agency, that is what we are and that is what we do. Hence some 13,000 offenders recalled to prison in 2009-2010 the majority who had committed no offence. Public Protection is what the service is all about. The days of being concerned with the socio-economic factors of offenders is NOT their role anymore and indeed things like unemployment or homelessness is more likely to be seen as a risk factor than a social issue that needs to be addressed such is the obsession with public protection.
https://www.workwithoffenders.co.uk/news/news_article/108448
Delete'Getafix
In amongst the raw sewage of news about our callous government, this floated into view:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/jan/11/uk-inmate-gave-birth-to-stillborn-in-prison-toilets-inquiry-finds
Residential workers in APs have been due rebanding monies backdated to June 2020 they were promised it in their December salaries.
ReplyDeleteIt was not paid to a great deal of us and were told it was an admin error thst woulb be fixed soon.
This error has left RWs short of money immediately after Christmas, RWs like many others at the sharp end are not able to work from home.
The response from Senior management and payroll at the time was.....
"Out of office I will back mid January"
And this choked me up while driving today:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m00139c5
Give it a listen.
Released On: 11 Jan 2022
Available for 29 days
Felicity Finch reports on a pioneering project that sees members of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra working alongside inmates in HMP Norwich. The aim is to workshop, draft and perform personal songs that will help establish a bond between offenders and their children.
A lullaby is the most immediate of musical forms. The singer is a parent, the audience a child. The communication is intimate and helps form intangible bonds. A reality of prison life is that those bonds are, to a great or lesser extent, broken. The Lullaby Project, run by the Irene Taylor Trust, is an attempt to create all the positives of that parental link, without undermining the reality of prison life.
Felicity has been given unique access through the Irene Taylor Trust, to follow their artistic director Sara Lee. Sara and a group of musicians made three visits to Norwich prison to help the inmates write lyrics and work on ideas for melodies and rhythms that will result in lullabies that can be recorded. The process is rewarding in itself, but it also encourages inmates to reflect on the nature of their relationship with their children, and how they would like to be perceived by them.
Similar projects have been tried in both the USA and the UK, but following the pilot this is the first time the media has been given access to the process.
Felicity follows the process from the early and very nervous engagement between musicians and prisoners, through to the astonishment and delight at what emerges from the collaboration, a delight felt on both sides.
Boris mate of course you want to party let your blond locks go and stammer through some songs. I know karaoke is popular and you never manage a chorus but what are you thinking. The busys are coming over to chat now. Look most people want to know did you catch the covid at one of your parties . If you did contract in may then end up in intensive care I think June don't you think that bed block could have been avoided. Also what about all those fined people had for walking around the countryside seems a bit offside now. Also I thought if you agreed that Matty handycock had to resign as he was caught literally red handed with another householder stuck to his face and his wandering hands all up her arse. Cringy but what's the difference in your own situation so I can defend the indefensible outrage you and your lot seem to think is ok. Finally why or at least do you think the other attending are going to keep schtum as they can't all be made lords . Anyway keep up the greatest incompetant display ever seen your worth it so we can all see how bad you need to be to run the UK into the ground oh yes and its people litrally. All the best in your lies and deception and thanks for shafting all the bill payers for astronomical energy prices and another u turn on your promise to cut vat once Brexit is fine everyone is looking forwards to see who else you can fuck in office.
ReplyDeletetonight's itv news could be fun... as is this delightful extra:
ReplyDelete"Downing Street staff were advised to clean up their phones by removing information that could suggest lockdown parties were held at No 10, The Independent has been told.
Two sources claim a senior member of staff told them it would be a good idea to remove any messages implying they had attended or were even aware of anything that could “look like a party”. "
Everyone's giving it a go, i.e. lying through their teeth then blaming anyone else when they're caught out:
ReplyDelete"the world No 1 male tennis player blamed his agent for an incorrect declaration about his pre-flight travel and acknowledged an “error of judgment” in knowingly attending an event while Covid-positive."
In Number10:
"according to those working in Downing Street at the time, there was a hopeful feeling at the top of government that the deadly wave of Covid was passing and the country would reopen before long. One insider said it verged on a “saviour complex”, whereby the hard work and sense of having triumphed over the virus divorced those inside the No 10 sanctuary from the reality of rules outside."
Meanwhile, in a quiet corner of govt:
"Smart motorway rollout suspended amid safety concerns
Controversial schemes to convert stretches of M3, M25, M62 and M40 will be paused until at least 2025
Analysis: ditching the hard shoulder proved too hard a sell to MPs and motorists"
Your observation is right. I went on a speed course having been flashed in smart motorway section. Just not convinced it was legitimate as other cars on the same shot who's to say what triggered as I was just behind a bus anyway. The only thing I recall is feeling how unsafe it is without hard shoulders. Ironically the stupid tutor on the course was all made up safe smart safe exclent computers TVs you name it smart is goooood . I argued got into it with her . But no use they are not skilled group workers like probation. A week after some damping research appears and now they are closed. Technology on a lane closure won't stop human error and too many are dying to illustrate the point. It's just a revenue raiser close them for good.
DeleteStroke of luck for bonson today as the pedo of the palace gets told to get lost on his technical continued abuse of his victim.
ReplyDeleteBonson apologised today but like any apology it was insinserly put. Like any offender would justify why he got things wrong but not accept it was clearly wrong. Unjustifiably he blathers slowly no stumble today as he realises he needs to get to the point not fluff time away with stammering sound bites. Absolute shite man of.thenworst kind. I guess if he bumped into the pedo prince at buck house he would nip along to one of his kind of parties and expect us to believe he was innocently there just working . It's no good he has to go someone give him a pen to sign a resignation.
So how do those apples look now, probation staff? You are civil servants in the employ of the government headed by Boris Johnson, who is:
ReplyDelete* a serial philanderer
* an absentee father of numerous children to various mothers
* someone who has no qualms about throwing everyone else under the bus to save his own skin
* who is way beyond the realms of ethics when it comes to holding any form of public office
* who was a serial cheat, liar & promoter of hate-speech as a journalist - so much so that he was sacked
* who is happy to steal vast sums from the public purse, and thus from the British public, for the benefit of his chums & ultimately to buy favour for himself
* who has presided over the deaths of nearly two hundred thousand citizens through his mismanagement of the pandemic
* who thinks regular use of alcohol in the workplace is normal
* who believes he is above the law in every respect
How can you do your job with any sense of sincerity? All the rugs have been whipped away, castles built on sand.
Many walking through the doors of probation offices will be the disenfranchised, &/or the lowest paid, &/or the least likely to..., &/or in thrall to alcohol &/or other substances, the least nourished in every respect; those who Johnson & co have crushed & ground down over the last decade, those who Johnson & co have reduced to tears, to despair and, in tragic cases, to dust.
Someone said on the radio earlier today that its heartbreaking that this country is represented on the world stage by Boris Johnson & Andrew Windsor (the arsehole formerly known as a Prince).
And now the UK has to wait for one of Boris Johnson's lackeys to write her report, which she will submit to him, to determine if Boris - or any of the silent shitheads - broke any rules or laws by getting pissed en masse when the law said you couldn't.
Try writing that PSR...
Some background info for that psr author -
DeleteAs a young journalist at The Times of London, he fabricated a quote about King Edward II from a historian. He was fired
He was Brussels correspondent for the Daily Telegraph in the early 1990s, filing exaggerated stories of EU waste and red tape. Those “Euromyths” about one-size-fits-all condoms and plans to ban “bendy bananas” helped turn British opinion against the bloc
Brexit was won in a 2016 referendum campaign that contained many questionable claims
Johnson suffered an early political setback when then-Conservative leader Michael Howard fired him in 2004 for lying about an extramarital affair.
Howard also forced him to apologize to the city of Liverpool for accusing its residents of “wallowing” in victimhood.
Over the years Johnson has called Papua New Guineans cannibals, claimed that “part Kenyan” Barack Obama had an ancestral dislike of Britain and compared Muslim women who wear face-covering veils to “letter boxes.”
quotes from:
https://apnews.com/article/boris-johnson-europe-london-92b49a05ae7210ef09486e276e968b9d?utm_medium=AP_Europe&utm_source=Twitter&utm_campaign=SocialFlow
Despite its blighted & right-leaning news coverage, BBC are puting out some strong documentary work. This was today:
ReplyDeleteNight Watch - Released On: 13 Jan 2022
Available for 29 days
At night women say goodbye, telling each other "text me when you're home". We carry keys between our knuckles, avoid dark streets, cross the road, then cross back again, keep looking over your shoulder.
In Night Watch, four women from different parts of Britain share stories of street harassment. Woven through this feature is a new, specially commissioned poem by Hollie McNish.
The murders of Sarah Everard and Sabina Nessa compounded the perception of city streets as male spaces- unwelcoming and unsafe for women, and other marginalised groups. Is this the way it's always been?
In these raw and unfiltered accounts women will hear their own experiences echoed back in others' words; stories of shouted insults, rejected come-ons, intimidation.
Featuring the voices Nosisa and Alison Majuqwana, Aggie Hewitt, Katie Cuddon, Alice Jackson the co-founder of Strut Safe, author Rebecca Solnit, author and moral philosopher at Cornell University Kate Manne and design activist Jos Boys.
If you've been impacted by any of the issues raised in this documentary contact details for support organisations can be found in this link:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/2MfW34HqH7tTCtnmx7LVfzp/information-and-support-victims-of-crime
The measure of the man, erm, I mean weasel, or 'when is an apology not really an apology at all':
ReplyDeleteBoris Johnson told Tory MPs 'he doesn't deserve blame' over Downing Street party...
...while the PM told MPs in the Commons he understood the "rage" many people felt over the revelations, it has been reported that Johnson was said to be less contrite when speaking privately in the tea rooms to his colleagues afterwards.
According to The Times, the PM met with colleagues in the House of Commons tea rooms after his apology and told them “we have taken a lot of hits in politics and this is one of them”.
The paper claims he added: “Sometimes we take the credit for things we don’t deserve and this time we’re taking hits for something we don’t deserve.”
credit: Andy Wells, YahooNews
13 January 2022, 1:40 pm
A good read from a member of the Sage subcommittee advising on behavioural science:
ReplyDelete"Boris Johnson’s non-apology underlines his utter contempt for the British public"
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/jan/13/boris-johnson-british-public-prime-minister-no-10-lockdown-party
A good apology can work wonders in improving relations between individuals and between groups. In acknowledging the wrong, taking responsibility for it, and doing something about it, one can repair the identities of both the offender and the offended. The person apologising is no longer a threat, and the one receiving the apology is no longer denigrated, allowing the two to come together in a new and more positive way.
DeleteThe problem is that yesterday’s statement offered by Boris Johnson was not a good apology. It was full of justifications and it offered nothing in the way of actions. Indeed it was not an apology at all, for it didn’t accept that an offence had been committed in the first place. Rather it was a classic example of the political non-apology, which takes the rhetorical form of saying sorry (and indeed prominently includes words like “I am sorry” and “I apologise”), but which ultimately attributes blame to the other rather than taking it upon oneself. Far from repairing relations, it compounds the original offence and makes things still worse.
We are all familiar with non-apologies of the “I’m sorry if you were offended” sort, where the import is that you were unreasonable in taking offence, rather than that I was unreasonable in what I said or did. This logic is usually implicit and rarely spelled out, although the Texas Republican congressman Joe Barton famously apologised for his defence of BP during the Deepwater Horizon oil spill disaster, saying: “If anything I said this morning has been misconstrued to the opposite effect, I want to apologise for that misconstruction.”
Johnson’s offering may be somewhat more camouflaged, but it is equally brazen in its attribution of blame. As ever with non-apologies, he starts by saying “I want to apologise”. Then, after acknowledging the rage of those who “think” that Covid regulations were broken by Downing St, Johnson insists that “when I went into that garden just after six on 20 May 2020 … I believed implicitly that this was a work event”. He further insists that he was right since “it could be said technically to fall within the guidance”. However, “there are millions and millions of people who would not see it that way”. People, he added, who have “suffered terribly”. Finally, Johnson offers his “heartfelt apologies” to these people (and to the House of Commons).
According to this statement, the problem does not lie in anything Johnson did. The problem lies in the inability of the public to appreciate the facts – and if Johnson erred in any way, it was in not appreciating just how wrong the public can be. To add insult to injury, even the suffering of the public is weaponised against them to imply that this was associated with their inability to think straight. Ultimately, then, when Johnson mouths the words “heartfelt apologies”, he is actually saying sorry for the flaws of others.
Not only is this the opposite of a genuine apology – it has the opposite effect to a genuine apology in terms of its impact on social relations. The sense that there is “one law for them and another for us” has resulted in a catastrophic and enduring lack of trust. The creation of in- and outgroups becomes particularly toxic when the outgroup is seen as a threat to ingroup members. Nothing signifies threat quite like the sense that others view you with contempt. And the prime minister’s non-apology communicates contempt for the public in at least three ways.
DeleteThere is direct contempt in the claim that the public is incapable of understanding the guidance. Then, there is indirect contempt in assuming that anyone might be gullible enough to believe that Johnson went into his garden and didn’t realise a party was going on, especially when his own principal private secretary had emailed staff to tell them about the party. To compound it all, there is contempt in the notion that Johnson’s statement constitutes any sort of apology and that we should now accept it, shut up, and let the internal inquiry run its course.
All in all, this tawdry episode does nothing to improve relations. On the contrary, it serves only to confirm Johnson as someone who stands apart from and against the public. That isn’t good for the Conservatives. But nor is it good for our democracy in the face of such an acute crisis.
Stephen Reicher is a member of the Sage subcommittee advising on behavioural science
the only new release from hmpps:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.gov.uk/government/publications/hmpps-child-safeguarding-policy-framework
Anyone in HMPPS want to fall on their party sword before they are outed? Downing Street, The Cabinet Office, CCHQ, Covid TaskForce... seems being a civil servant is just a barrel of laughs.
ReplyDeleteWhe someone said civil servants were all "whiney" I thought they meant as in whingeing, but it seems they meant 'winey' as in boozing all the time.
Here's the Govt's own "guidance" issued to civil service staff during lockdown:
“Although there are exemptions for work purposes, you must not have a work Christmas lunch or party, where that is a primarily social activity and is not otherwise permitted by the rules in your tier”
Given the wording I'm presuming that there is only a certain level of civil servant permitted to get pissed whilst at work, viz-"not otherwise permitted by the rules in your tier"
They're fucking sly, aren't they?
Twitter.
DeleteNow this is awks. Bas Javid, brother of Sajid Javid, wrote about how he was in charge of the Met's Covid policing last year in The Spectator. There's an urgent need into an inquiry as to why there has been no investigation into #DowningStreetParties
https://t.co/ubTzrtucyt
"It’s fashionable to criticise the police these days, but to anyone considering it as a career I’d say: do it. There’s no other job like it. It’s hard but it’s satisfying. We believe in the oath we take, to serve the Queen ‘with fairness, integrity, diligence and impartiality’. Above all, we’re a family... [Saj & I} reminisced about the time I’d taken him out on the beat to show him what it was like. That was 2006 and I remember, when we returned, we discussed our dream jobs. He wasn’t even an MP at that point and said he’d love to be home secretary or chancellor. My ambition was to be a commander in the Met. He asked if I thought I’d ever do it. No, I said, people like us don’t have the right contacts to get to those kinds of jobs."
DeleteSo now you ARE in those kinds of jobs, DO THEM PROPERLY ‘with fairness, integrity, diligence and impartiality’.
Watch the PM & his cronies play out a repeat of the probation-style FUBAR experience this week, throwing staffers overboard while the utterly useless self-defined 'excellent leaders' remain to continue to create havoc, line their pockets & fuck everything up beyond repair.
ReplyDeleteLadies & Gentlemen, please welcome the Justice Minister:
ReplyDelete1. Dominic Raab vows to reverse Lords vote making misogyny a hate crime - Making misogyny a hate crime would be “counter-productive”, Dominic Raab insisted on Tuesday as he vowed to reverse a vote by peers to introduce the change to improve the protection of women.
The House of Lords voted for the reform, which would result in longer sentences for offenders motivated by a hatred of women, at the same time as inflicting a barrage of defeats on the government’s controversial Police, Crime and Sentencing Bill.
2. Magistrates to get power to jail offenders for a year - Magistrates in England and Wales will have greater sentencing powers to enable them to take on more cases, under plans to clear court backlogs.
The government plans to let magistrates sentence cases where the maximum sentence is a year, rather than the current maximum of six months.
It would allow magistrates to hear cases often held in Crown Court.
But criminal lawyers warn the plan may backfire, and defendants would still have the right to go before a jury.
Justice Secretary Dominic Raab said he hoped the move would reduce the pressure on Crown Courts and lead to quicker justice for victims.
The move would allow magistrates - who are volunteers with no legal experience - to sentence more serious cases, such as for fraud, theft and assault.
3. Asked whether a minister who is found to have lied to Parliament should have to resign, Dominic Raab says it "depends on the context."
4. Dominic Raab accidentally admits 'party' then backtracks in car crash interview
The Deputy PM told Kay Burley about a Downing Street 'party' then stuttered 'no, exactly, er, no, er, the, no no no no' - as he insisted Dominic Cummings was talking 'nonsense' by claiming the PM lied
Perhaps this might be an appropriate time to finish the blog. End on a high.
ReplyDeleteOh JB no stay on it .things will bounce back debate is slow as we are pandemic weary job worn out and back teeth fed up with bojo.
DeleteDebate has been quiet but Jim has done an incredible fete of documenting the destruction by idiots of the probation once fantastic services. That said I hope this wonderful blog that keeps me sane as I am not alone stays. Well done Jim.
DeleteAll good things come to an end. Let’s face it the Probation Service has lost its spark and the millennials have take over. They have little interest in the old ways. Too many managers and not enough practitioners. It has become a soulless conveyor belt of one pointless change after another. Instead of advise assist and befriend it is more like suffer survive and panic. A really sad end and the blog has done what it can but frankly it must be like a millstone around your neck Jim with no end in sight.
DeleteYou could be tight on some of that. None the less what JB does for readers and people in need of wider situations is provide and publish genuine concerns. I think JB his blog is resistance central. Like in any intelligence group you need a command point of reference a morale boosting compass setting hero. Don't presume JB is not wanting to ensure a beacon is remains in a capacity to promote older fight back values. This blog has been the sentinel of voice. More than any over paid useless official unions.
DeleteIs it back to the office 5 days a week from Monday?
ReplyDeleteYou haven't had the order yet?
Delete"Civil servants ordered back to office after Covid restrictions lifted in England
Unions warn against a rush back to workplaces as government departments told to return to ‘full occupancy’ "
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jan/21/civil-servants-ordered-back-to-the-office-plan-b-covid-england
While our venal govt squabbles over booze & partying & how many houses they should be living in during lockdown...
ReplyDeletehttps://www.gov.uk/government/publications/homelessness-reduction-act-duty-to-refer-policy-framework
"This policy framework sets out duties, rules and general guidance for prisons and probation staff for meeting their statutory duties under the Homelessness Reduction Act 2017 to support those individuals who are at risk of homelessness in England.
Since 1 October 2018, prison and probation staff have had a statutory responsibility to refer homeless individuals (or those at risk of homeless within the next 56 days) to a Local Authority. This is under Section 10 of the Homelessness Reduction Act 2017."
For example:
"Referrals following sentencing
The Probation Service Court Officers must make a direct referral to the local authority where:
no immediate custodial sentence is imposed
a custodial sentence is imposed but it is deemed to have been already served because of the time spent in custody
In all other circumstances, the Probation Service Court Officers must notify the appropriate community Probation team that a referral under the duty to refer is required."
Wonder how many staff know about this? Or how many have failed to discharge their duty under this Act?
The hard part is, of course, what's the point when there's nowhere for people to live anyway?
Presumably THIS is the 'new' TTG procedure:
"Prisons and Probation in England must refer those who they have identified as being at risk of homelessness to an LHA. The individual must give their consent to making the referral (either in writing or orally) and they can identify any LHA of their choice. They may also be referred to more than one LHA."
The get-out clause?
"Without consent, a referral cannot be made."
This bit made me laugh:
"Prisons and Probation making referrals may not share any information about a spent conviction, any behaviour that led to a spent conviction or any other circumstances relating to a spent conviction with a Duty to Co-operate agency or any other agency, organisation or individual. This includes information in risk assessments and discussions at MAPPA meetings."
Why laugh? Because when attending liaison/referral meetings with our local police/housing they ALWAYS manage to have access to a recent PNC printout which is read out - in full - to the gathered 'professionals', thereby exclusing almost everyone referred-in on the grounds of ASB, drug use or risk of violence.
https://england.shelter.org.uk/professional_resources/legal/homelessness_applications/duty_of_public_authority_to_refer
Not so collusive one union branch before my own redundancy fought off the private employers of which the blog was a strategic part of the branch and their ability to make public nationally the scandal that lay before them. In turn the blog facilitated the victories and scandals despite I am aware of the national Napo attempts to quell the fighting by surrender alongside more pathetic naivety of unison.
ReplyDeleteThere was more than one branch in Napo sticking it to Grayling and also working tirelessly to protect those in the CRC whilst most of those elected and those employed as officials in Napo HQ were completely useless on every level. Probation privatisation was a terrible decision but not not all CRC owners were the same. Napo should have ben devolved power to the branches years ago and run in a very different way for the members by the members instead it seems to exist to keep HQ staff in employment and little else. If it had been reformed then we would not be saddled with such a useless general secretary surrounded by yes people.With full membership we could afford regional offices and not some expensive London office that is hardly ever used and leeches money. Why doesn't Lawrence publish his diary for members?
DeleteCompletely agree with you except most and I mean nearly all branches went dysfunctional during the Napo national drip feed. They held back information and made staff vote late in lost terms. It was not all one person but a group of inherently fearful officials who have no idea on how to build proper residence or develop a strategy that involved the branches. In fact it was only 1 solid branch that took the battle to the management. Ignored the national nonsense and hot in with ensuring staff protections remained in force. It was this blog that followed and published the skirmishes and helped that branch win out in the publication nationally of the crcs on the make sfos are top draw matters the clue is in the name and the crcs were punched hard for every failing that started to accelerate in the changed working model of the single by far worst CRC . The evidence the battles the pr all reported on here brought them to book and some of us were proud to have played a small part. There was no fight back at that level anywhere and that is a fact.
DeleteKudos to Dino & team
DeleteThat is true I know only one branch went all the way to joint secretaries as a start . It is published on this blog . The south west.
DeleteDidn’t the SW Napo leadership get a nice lump sum pay off and signed a non disclosure agreement ? So much for principled opposition.
Delete
ReplyDeleteHer Majesty’s Inspectorate of Probation together with Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Prisons are undertaking a joint thematic inspection of the Offender Management in Custody model (OMiC): offender management in prison, and resettlement into the community.
We are seeking to recruit an organisation that can provide lived experience expertise of the criminal justice system, to obtain the experiences of people in prison and upon their return to the community.
Are you an organisation that:
is passionate about providing opportunities for people within the criminal justice system to have their voice heard
can provide personnel with lived experience of the criminal justice system
is knowledgeable about the multiple and complex problems faced by people within the criminal justice system
takes a collaborative and inclusive approach to the work that you do
understands the unique challenges of working in prison.
We are at the start of our process to design our inspection and we are looking for an organisation to join us as part of our inspection team. The inspection will consider key questions focussing on organisational delivery, sentence management and outcomes.
What we need from your organisation:
previous experience of designing and managing lived experience projects
experience of delivering projects or research within a prison environment
a knowledge and understanding of the OMiC model
the ability to work as part of a team and communicate effectively with people from diverse backgrounds
experience of analysing and presenting research findings using a range of methods appropriate for different audiences.
Please note that in view of the Covid-19 pandemic, the way we conduct the inspection will be kept under regular review and guided by national public health advice and risk assessment. Inspections usually involve frequent travel and overnight stays away from home for which travel and subsistence payments will be made to cover transport and overnight stay costs. However, depending on the situation at the time, remote working methods may need to be used.
Organisations are advised that the full cost (including VAT if applicable) must be less than £10,000 when providing quotations for this work.
If this sounds like you then please read our OMiC Expression of Interest document, which includes more information and details on how to apply.
Not a shock horror but yet again Boris has had to unreported now reveals birthday parties. The self centred narcicist did not mention these nor apologise. We buried our dead alone . No life celebrations for victims. The yes team around Johnson tell him he is wonderful. Now Russia is on the verge of trouble who in the hell wants this but case in charge of our potential response in NATO.
ReplyDeleteBlurring the boundaries, erasing probation:
ReplyDelete"A CHILD sex offender is back behind bars after police found evidence of his continuing sexual interest in young girls... The prosecutor said the offender manager working with X after his release last September from a nine-and-a-half-year jail sentence for child sex offences was concerned about his internet searches... "It seems to me that you are simply not manageable in the community," said the judge.... That was why the Parole Board would have to look very carefully at level of risk he poses when he is next eligible for release."
'offender manager' = police officer.
Not one mention about probation.