Guest Blog 100

Probation Past but not Forgotten 

Just to be upfront with my readers this blog is focussed upon the use and development of Business Processes and Computer Systems within the National Probation Service (NPS) and then a Community Rehabilitation Company (CRC) being based upon my working experiences from 2006 to 2016. I am not a qualified Probation Officer. But I have a long career prior to joining probation in the private sector in Business and Computer systems. First employed in 2006 within the NPS West Midland Trust, Learning and Development Unit, Selly Oak, Birmingham as a Business Support Training Officer. 

Then I jointly supported the Learning and Development Unit and the Central Birmingham based Business Transformation Unit (BTU) initially supporting the System Testing and Implementation of Delius. Then in 2013 I was appointed as a Transformation Administration Manager within the Birmingham based Business Transformation Unit (BTU). I was then transferred to a CRC in 2014 before being made redundant in 2016. 

I cannot blog on the current (2024) HM Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) since I have been outside the Probation Service since 2016. So essentially it is more of a historical record but the effort to write it is based upon me wanting to communicate on “a lessons learnt” basis that may influence and benefit those currently working within the HMPPS. It is also an historical record of the events I experienced at the NPS and then CRC.

So why start blogging on Probation after 8 years outside of the service?

When I was at Probation, like many others, I followed Jim Brown daily since he was telling the “truth” particularly through the blitzkrieg period of change. But over the last 8 years I have only on rare occasions popped onto his blog to see how things are going at Probation, now the HMPPS. So having done one of my normal LinkedIn posts that covered a bit about Probation, I was surprised to get a personal message to call him. Which I did and we had a brief chat on Monday 23/09/24. He asked me if I had any more relevant contributions. I explained that obviously all my experiences are now from the 2006 – 2016 period so lacking relevance to HMPPS in 2024. 

Then it occurred to both of us during our conversation that those experiences might help those trying to sort out HMPPS today. I explained that particularly my NPS experience, not my CRC experience, was a very positive part of my career, particularly in respect of the people with whom I worked. Whilst my experience of the Business Systems and Computer Systems was just the opposite. But I had started in 2006 with the best intentions of improving both of these aspects and to be perfectly frank, after 10 years of hard motivated work, I achieved nothing. I don’t know another part of my career where it was so difficult to influence and effect change to Business Processes and Computer Systems. So if any contribution on here could help those now within the HMPPS family achieve these changes now, I wouldn’t feel my 10 years was such a waste of effort. My commitment can only be a positive and constructive one since I don’t do negative or political.

So I walked out of the Probation Offices in Central Birmingham for the last time on the 3rd July 2016, having been disposed of by Reducing Reoffending Partnership (RRP), a Community Rehabilitation Company (CRC) that was now trying to run the Probation Private Services for Derbyshire, Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire, Rutland, Staffordshire and the West Midlands. I was deemed redundant and my services were no longer required. Not the best of timing for them or me. In their case with me having a long career prior to Probation in Business Systems design and implementation in the Private Sector, they needed me and others like me more than ever with the chaos now being unleashed. Instead they were dependant on the ”all knowing” but “knowing nothing” highly paid consultant swarms now descended on Probation. Many just out of university but deemed chargeable to the Ministry of Justice no doubt with a cashback into the RRP coffers. But it also has to be acknowledged that there were some very smart experienced consultants with some clearly wanting to support our side of how we wanted change implemented. That is carefully and progressively.

These consultants actually listened and didn’t just feedback but actively joined us in trying to get some constructive steer on the changes themselves and the rate of change being planned. They also took some risks within their own Consultant Management Companies, who had won the lucrative change management contracts from the MoJ, in supporting our side of the story. But unfortunately they weren’t listened to either, so blitzkrieg commenced at pace.

The tide of change from Government and the MoJ was too strong and too fast for all of us to contain or control it. They had enforced a blitzkrieg approach to changing Probation. Probation had established its fundamental principles over 100 years and these were already being improved upon as a result of the Carter Report, by a Probation Officer, and its implementation through the 2006 to 2010 period. Things were improving in a Japanese style of incremental improvements like the national use of a new Offender Management System called Delius and access to the Police ViSOR System. 

Although OASys was in most need of re-engineering it was not on the to do list. Probation had never faced a blitzkrieg Government attack before and it was very ill prepared to counter it. Other Government Departments, particularly our own HM Courts and Tribunals Service (HMCTS) never came in with any support since whilst we were under attack they could standby, avoiding being attacked themselves. Needless to say HM Courts and Tribunals Service (HMCTS) was also being attacked under austerity principles with many local court closures impacting the application of good and tried local justice principles. The blitzkrieg approach funded by the Government threw money at the private sector to establish the principles of probation moving to the private sector in the form of the CRC’s. So I was transferred to a CRC.

We CRC staff, being ex- NPS staff, were now considered only eligible to be treated with a sort of private sector employment status. Essentially exiled out into the wilderness. With no doubt their planned lowering of pay rates to reflect our drop in both economic and social status. Yes I was now employed by a new lowly entity in the Government MoJ come Probation hierarchy, which was soon to be dropped a peg down on bloc below the unit with the lock and keys the Prisons which were to upstage Probation in the political hierarchy creating the illogical HMPPS.

NPS Induction Training in West Midland taught the hierarchy where the Courts were the very top, supported by the Probation Service with the Prisons as a service locking them up as punishment and to protect the public. Whilst the Carter Report rightly recommended the Prison’s rightly focussed on rehabilitation whilst in a custody setting. Training Prison Officers on Rehabilitation Practices, we were always amazed at how enthusiastic they were about acquiring these new skills and looking forward to applying them within their prison settings. Just the locking up although critical was very boring and contributing to prisoners futures much more rewarding. Probation was a highly respected Court Service which has been that way almost from the beginnings of Probation as detailed in the Probation of Offenders Act 1907. Totally integrated into the Court System allowing them to administer justice and protect the public. Probation was a service geographically distributed in the community operating in support of the Courts as a Court Service.

So that was it. Probation was over for me. I had tried very hard with many other like minded and motivated people to get the Probation Business Processes into a better state. We even organised a group of Trusts covering London, Devon and Cornwall, Nottinghamshire, Staffordshire, South Yorkshire and the West Midland to establish a common National Business Standards System on the TIBCO Nimbus business mapping product we all had installed and were using daily. Although we tried we got little support from the MoJ in terms of this initiative which was in fact seeded from the bottom of the organisation upwards. Never the right way to get something established. 

The West Midlands had already led on Business Change with its Modelling District Projects but it was only when we combined with the Staffordshire Trust that we gained access to their more advanced use of TIBCO Nimbus which we quickly adopted. Obviously other Trusts had quite independently taken to using TIBCO Nimbus no doubt being targeted by the TIBCO sales force. Whilst we had some MoJ meetings in London where they were impressed by our TIBCO Nimbus efforts, it was never formally adopted and was not included in any MoJ Directives to the Trusts.

I suspect many in Probation may not even be aware of this TIBCO Nimbus initiative taking place in some Trusts. Even within the TIBCO Nimbus active Trusts their own staff were not always aware of its purpose and presence. Not being a subject included in any National Probation Communications for many using it was not seen as a priority. There was certainly no national sign off of the TIBCO Nimbus Business Processes thereby not making them the de facto way of working for everybody. It was a mess. Had it been better established it may have helped us better deflect some of the blitzkrieg attack on our undocumented working practices. We really had nothing concrete or national to defend ourselves with in respect of standardised business processes. With no defences it was inevitable we would lose the battle.

But the one last stand I took supported by my Business Process Design colleague along with surprisingly an RRP Consultant, was to try and convince the Reducing Reoffending Partnership Board to use our Business Processes already mapped in TIBCO Nimbus as a basis for building the new business models brought about by the creation of the CRC’s It made so much sense. This proposal to the RRP CRC Board was dated the 9th July 2015 and I still have a copy I can share on here in the future. I also initiated a brilliant commercial negotiation with TIBCO to virtually have free use of Nimbus for a period to get it established. What was there not to like. But the proposal got rejected by the RRP CRC Board.

The TIBCO Nimbus Servers were torn out of their server racking and sent for scrap. Somewhere I have photos of them lying on the scrap pile representing many years of process design and data entry work. Then beyond belief they started a Business Process Mapping Project to go around collecting all the information again from relevant Probation staff groups and then re mapping it all in Microsoft Visio a product considered very unfriendly for everyday business users being more aligned with the needs of IT Staff.

So to the end of my story at Probation with the CRC RRP making me redundant on 3rd July 2016. Exactly 1 year after our TIBCO Nimbus proposal to the RRP CRC Board had been rejected. My work Nimbus colleague was kept on to continue but without having TIBCO Nimbus and having to return to using Microsoft Visio the objective of installing business systems onto all employee desk tops where they would be used daily by the service was now impossible. My Nimbus work colleague soon left since Business Process Planning was not a priority in the midst of all the firefighting now required to maintain some sort of Probation Service.

Now just to complete the conversation I had with Jim Brown. He said write me a “taster” and I will see if I want to link to it. This is that taster. But included in it is a early High Level Flowchart for use in the West Midlands that I produced way back to illustrate the importance of having a holistic view of all the Business Systems.

The truth is I have many other resources that are now dated like all the original TIBCO Nimbus Process Maps extracted in a PowerPoint format. Along with various other methodologies and techniques we developed and used like iPresentation and iProcess along with Work Instructions. In fact lots of my historic bits and pieces accumulated over 10 years at Probation that may possibly interest probation staff historically or maybe in some cases prove worth reusing today in the HMPPS.

But to be effective though what Probation needs is what my last American Company had which was what they called its own university (Pollak University). In fact it wasn’t a University in our sense of the use of the word meaning a verified academic learning institution. But it was where all product knowledge, manufacturing knowledge, research knowledge, business processes knowledge and computer systems knowledge was documented, co-ordinated, researched and communicated. It had dedicated librarianship, research and training capabilities. Research papers could be submitted and reviewed and so forth. Essentially a “one stop” place for all knowledge and processes within the business entity. So they called it a University. 

Now if this blog got to the MoJ and it triggered them to setup up a “Probation University” that would justify all the 10 years I spent and enjoyed at the National Probation Service. The first thing that needs researching, documenting and standardising and communicating is all the Business Processes. This is about adopting an ideology that Probation can have a common set of Business Processes applied right across all geographical and business areas. To make it happen it needs a champion in this ideology and that champion being in a position at the top with the powers to implement it. There is an argument that computer systems in the future will have built into them workflow principles and this has been accelerated by the AI developments. But until these systems are developed and made available it is vital that all Business Processes are standardised and documented in a user friendly way.

Some may consider the Probation Institute established in 2014 could act like the Probation University I have proposed. My view is it should definitely form part of the Probation University. But a concern might be that once it became MoJ financed would it as a "membership" financed organisation have its independence compromised. I don't see it this way. The membership of the Probation Institute are working at the front line of the Service and their constructive contribution is vital and should be within the proposed Probation University framework. 

But the scope of the Probation University is much larger than that of the Probation Institute. The Probation University defines and drives the operational activities of Probation both staff and systems. I appreciate it's a much used cliche to suggest we should all operate like Amazon and some strong views exist suggesting you cannot apply their methods of effectively shipping goods to essentially the practice of a social science. All I would just say is let an Amazon IT system designer with their keystroke counting audit techniques and workflow engineering skills redesign OASys. The time we waste on OASys could then be spent with our clients (Do we call them clients or offenders these days?) doing our social science best practices more effectively.

Within the Probation University the study of Social and Behavioural Sciences should far exceed the focus on Business and Computer Systems. They are our prime activity. It is what we do working with our clients. So Psychology, Sociology, Anthropology and Criminology along with an endless list of other subjects that need to be included within the Probation University framework. If this blog post achieved the setting up of a Probation University whilst I am now outside the organisation it would be amazing since I could never achieve it whilst working within the organisation.

Now to share with you a High Level Offender Management Vertical Workflow Map which is now 12 years old covering Offender Management Process Flows (circa 2012) within the Staffordshire and West Midlands Probation Trust. I am sure this could be edited in less than a few hours to accurately represent current HMPPS Probation Business Processes since I suspect much of the supporting documentation (paperwork) has remained unchanged. Although the computer record updating may have changed. I just don't know. Maybe it is a starting point to commencing Business Workflow and Process Mapping. Certainly Indeterminate Prison Sentencing has changed with the removal of IPP's by coincidence in 2012 (As usual just after the map was drawn !!!!) although their removal was from memory not retrospective. If it generates any interest I have another High Level Horizontal Workflow Map I can share showing the relationships between all those parties linked to Probation once again somewhat dated but easily updated. 

Enjoy, 

Banno

Link to High Level Map below.

Once launched use the normal "pinch-to-zoom" gesture to zoom in and zoom out of the PDF to read the small print.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Pw4dIYts48SVHQxhE1iKxl5r6eil4RJE/view?usp=sharing

Probation : A Profession?

Thanks go to regular reader 'Getafix for pointing us in the direction of the following Position Paper just published by the Probation Institute:-

Professionalism and Probation

Introduction 

This Position Paper is a contribution to the important discussions about professionalism in probation. The service is taking steps towards formalising the professional status of practitioners through a licence to practice, codes of conduct and values, continuous professional development and registration. We hope that this paper will stimulate discussion in the probation service and among the many various partner agencies, about the meaning of professionalism in probation. 

The Probation Institute is developing a sister paper on the relationships between regulation, scrutiny, inspection, accountability and individual practice, particularly in the context of risk assessment, risk management and victims.

Professionalism and probation over time 

It is interesting to note that the status of probation as a profession has been contested throughout its history. Writing in 1985, in the third of his four papers discussing the evolution of probation practice, Bill McWilliams noted the resistance to professional training for probation officers between the 1920’s and the 1960’s, for fear that professional status may diminish the zeal of the original police court missionaries. Even at time when a professional social work qualification was required to practise as a probation officer, there was no mechanism for setting standards for probation work, nor of regulation and monitoring of practice. And, despite the job role requiring professional qualification, the Probation Service did not have a formal process of registration and monitoring for practitioners, in the way that health roles have always had, and which social work and psychology, for instance, do now.

Following the demise of the reorganisation of probation services through Transforming Rehabilitation, the issue of regulation for probation work was resurrected. Writing in 2021, The Centre for Justice Innovation made the case for professional registration of probation work, and identified the key factors which it considered define a profession; a professional register conferring a licence to practice; a code of practice and associated standards; and an independent body which regulates practitioners who are subject to registration. (Bowen, 2021.) 

It is critical to note that, historically, professional status and regulation evolved out of the recognition that professional roles conferred significant responsibilities on practitioners working with people who could be defined as vulnerable – patients in the case of medicine, children and vulnerable adults in the case of social work, and, for probation, people who are doubly vulnerable, whose status as probation supervisees may well have been informed by their own experience of trauma, and, in addition, who are involuntary users of the Service. In this context, it is important to note that people convicted of crime may also be victims themselves - a commonplace scenario in probation work, and one which confers additional vulnerabilities, requiring corresponding additional responsibilities of integrity and professionalism of probation practitioners. 

The Probation Institute came into existence primarily to seek to enable the formal registration and monitoring of probation practitioners, via an externally regulated independent body, and that remains a priority.

The PI is aware of the recently formed Internal Register for Probation Practice, and that the aim of The National Probation and Prison Service is to formally register all practice roles within the Service. This position paper seeks to look more broadly at professionalism in probation, and to consider key aspects of what being a professional probation practitioner actually means. 

Concepts of professionalism 

The concept of professionalism, and what being a professional means, has been similarly contested over time. The range of perspectives includes seeing professional status as a mechanism for protecting an elite and exclusive group of practitioners. Conversely – and perhaps more helpfully, in terms of probation practice – Elliott Freidson, who has written extensively about professionalism, defines a profession as ‘an occupation that controls its own work, (is) organised by a special set of institutions, and sustained in part by a particular ideology of expertise and service.’ (Freidson, 1994, 10.) 

Clearly, Probation practice does not wholly control its own work, being subject to government policy, for instance, with regard to early release from prison; the sentencing decisions of the Courts; and the workings of the parole process. But the idea of probation work being ‘organised by a special set of institutions’ seems very apt, and may include formal institutions, notably the order of the court which generates the work of the Probation Service; and the organisational practices, often through regulations, which define what practitioners do – such as the induction process for supervisees, systems of reporting and of breach and recall, and the ways in which people are assessed via the utilisation of the Offender Assessment System. (OASys.)

It is also essential to acknowledge the key work of The Probation Service with people who are victims of offending. Alongside working with people who are direct victims of crime, and their families, it is important to reinforce the point made previously, that a significant number of people subject to statutory supervision are, or have been, victims of crime themselves. In this complex scenario, due process demands that victims are treated in their own right, with the acknowledgement that victims hold a different role and place in the court process; and that care needs to be taken not to blame a victim of crime, possibly through prejudice, and inappropriate assumptions and stereotypes as to who constitutes a ‘legitimate’ victim.

Listening to the accounts of victims, and validating their experience, is key to their capacity to move forward; and Restorative Justice, pioneered by The Probation Service, can be a valuable process for both perpetrators and victims, in making sense of their differing experiences, and so to enable positive change. Core probation skills are needed to undertake this delicate and sensitive work, alongside specialist knowledge, and experience, of the contexts in which people have become victims of crime, particularly those from BAME groups, victims of domestic abuse and people who may have been trafficked, or are seeking asylum, and may be in breach of the law themselves. As part of its role in seeking to establish professional status for probation work, The Probation Institute also works with partner organisations on these issues; and is committed to sharing learning regarding situations that victims may find themselves in.

Professional identity and professional practice 

With regard to professional status, It is significant that, consistently over time, research with probation practitioners has concluded that, amongst other traits, they perceive themselves to be professionals, characterised by a deeply held professional identity, and which is justified by the specialist expertise and skills of probation work, manifest in the one to one supervisory relationship (the ‘therapeutic alliance’) with the person on probation; and by collaboration with other agencies of the criminal justice system, notably the courts, but also via, for example, MAPPA arrangements. 

Additionally, it is important to focus on the mental and emotional demands of probation work, for which possessing a sense of professional identity may be key to navigating the challenges of the role. Stuart Collins, writing in 2016, i.e. during the significant period of Transforming Rehabilitation, described what he termed ‘professional commitment:’ by which he means the investment of personal resources, or what is often called emotional labour, of service before self; a strong sense of community with peers – what could colloquially be termed as one’s ‘tribe;’ opportunities for progression in the professional role; a sense of autonomy; and confidence in the organisation to which practitioners belong. (Collins, 2016, 32.)

This sense of professional identity is strongly related to and underpinned by a commitment to what are perceived to be the values of probation work. Professor Emeritus Rob Canton (2011) discusses these ‘traditional probation values’ as including: location in and engagement with communities; social inclusion and reintegration; restorative justice; a belief in the possibility of change; and recognition of the role of social capital in desistance. A study from 2013, conducted by Rob Mawby and Anne Worrall, discussed the persistence of related beliefs over time, noting the significance of themes such as a belief in the capacity of people to change; satisfaction in the job, which was closely linked to a sense of autonomy; and practitioners finding meaning for their work through their professionalism. A particular concept which may find resonance with practitioners is Mawby and Worrall’s discussion of ‘responsible creativity,’ the capacity to work in chaotic and challenging situations, to think on one’s feet, and to continually rethink practice in order to engage the people subject to supervision, and sustain the overarching priorities of effectively assessing and managing risk. 

Two other elements seem to be critical to professionalism in probation work – reflective practice, and anti-discriminatory practice. 

Reflective practice derives from the work of Donald Schon, who formulated the notions of the reflective practitioner, and of reflection in action, as key to professional roles in a range of settings, including social work, education, and criminal justice. He identified what he described as the ‘messes’ where practitioners operate, which inform day to day practice (Schon, 2016: 42). He stated that: 

‘There are those who choose the swampy lowlands. They deliberately involve themselves in messy but crucially important problems and, when asked to describe their methods of inquiry, they speak of experience, trial and error, intuition, and muddling through.’ (Schon, 1991: 43, emphasis mine)

Schon further argues that, within this context, each professional relationship will generate different problems and challenges. This demands specific approaches and skills of the practitioner, working in a febrile and possibly volatile context; but, also, that each encounter presents new situations for learning by both practitioner and supervisee. (Schon, 1991: 155).

In a paper from 2022, written shortly after the reintegration of probation work into The Probation Service, Anne Burrell suggested that Schon’s approach ‘pretty accurately describes the experience of being a probation practitioner. And, consequently and inevitably, a typical day in the working life of any practitioner is unlikely to follow whatever is mapped out in their diary at its outset. This capacity to operate within an incessant state of flux requires particular skills and attributes – as does operating in an environment with scant rewards, whether financial or appreciative; and a setting where the outcomes of the work may be opaque for some considerable time.’ (Burrell, 2022, 441.) In other words, it may not be possible to know whether probation intervention is successful by the end of a period of supervision – the rewards for positive change may well come much later on in a person’s life. 

Relatedly, reflection affords consideration of the practitioner’s own prejudices and ideologies. Ainslie identifies that reflective practice enables practitioners to challenge their own knowledge base and assumptions - arguably, as well as the assumptions of their organisation, particularly with regard to ‘what works.’ In this context of reflective practice enabling a challenge to both personal and organisational prejudices, it is of note that, in 2021, HMIP published a highly critical report into the ways in which probation services were working with Black and Minority Ethnic (BAME) service users, as well as the experiences of BAME staff. This report concluded that, subsequent to Transforming Rehabilitation, The Probation Service had retreated from anti-discriminatory practice; and that there was therefore much work to be undertaken in this regard.

It is inevitable, therefore, that the processes of professional development for probation practitioners remain constant throughout their working lives, as probation work evolves and changes; and as the context and demands of the role are required to continually adapt and reframe. 

Conclusion 

Writing in 2018, the late Paul Senior, former Professor of Probation Studies at Sheffield Hallam University, and also former Chair of the Probation Institute, argued robustly that ‘probation is a profession – never let that go.’ In that article, and elsewhere, he worked to achieve for a Regulatory Body for Probation and Rehabilitation staff. 

And Gwen Robinson, who has researched extensively into probation work, suggests that, as the Probation Service seeks to establish itself as a unified service, key to its effectiveness will be the ways in which the Service addresses ‘issues of agency, identity, and voice.’ (Robinson, 2021:152). Significantly, she suggests that the proposed professionalisation of the service, via a professional register, is one device to seek to gain moral legitimacy within the criminal justice system. Additionally, Robinson suggests that it is the interface on a local level, with other agencies, which will provide the locations where ‘probation work is real and tangible, and where perceptions of legitimacy will be formed.’ (Robinson, 2021,161.)

So, how can professionalism in probation be summarised? The focus could be on the formal organisational processes of professional practice, and the value of monitoring and regulating probation work, and probation practitioners. These are important issues, and the landscape regarding professional registration seems likely to continue to change in the immediate future.

But it is equally important to consider the meanings of professionalism for probation practitioners on the personal level, in terms of what probation practice is, and how it is conducted. 

Firstly, it seems unavoidable that a key component of probation work is that of forming and sustaining relationships, between probation practitioners and the people whom they are supervising, as well as with victims of crime; other criminal justice agencies, primarily at a local level; and, importantly, with local communities. Professionalism encompasses how practitioners present themselves, in a range of settings. It includes skills of reflection, which enable practitioners to identify, and to address unconscious biases. Professionalism and reflection can generate an awareness of issues of power in the supervisory relationship, and the impact of practitioner decision-making on the lives of the people who are being supervise. These qualities can similarly enable effective practice in work with victims of crime. 

In their 2013 study, Rob Mawby and Anne Worrall (2013: 154) refer to probation as ‘an honourable profession.’ They concluded their book on their project by asserting that: 

‘It would be courageous …….to respect that this work inevitably involves a willingness to work holistically and optimistically, though not naively, with uncertainty, ambivalence and (to a degree) failure. Someone has to do it.’ 

And that seems to be a great summary of what probation work is all about...

Probation work is challenging, rewarding, frustrating, satisfying, and sometimes downright scary. But it is intrinsically worthwhile, with the strength of probation practice coming from the people doing the job. The Probation Institute is firmly of the belief that proper professional recognition, independently supported and sustained, will be key to the future effectiveness of this vital work. 

Summary Points 

1. The Probation Service has been in existence for over a century; yet probation work has never held formal professional status. 

2. Probation work inevitably involves working with vulnerable people, whose risks and needs mean that they require effective interventions, with a focus on safeguarding. 

3. Formal professional recognition would provide a mechanism for independent effective monitoring of probation practice, and of probation practitioners. 

4. The registration process would enable application of a code of ethics, which would place responsibilities and duties on the practitioner, whilst also providing protections from unethical or dubious policy decisions. 

5. The current landscape for probation work, and the breadth and gravity of probation practice, including serious organised crime, politically motivated offending, and cases of serious harm and abuse, demands that practitioners working in these settings are professionally qualified, and supported in their role.

References 

Ainslie S: (2020) ‘A time to reflect?’ Probation Quarterly 17: 9–12. London: Probation Institute.

Bowen P. (2021). 'Delivering a smarter approach. Probation professionalisation.' Centre for Justice Innovation. (Online.) (Accessed on 18 September 2022.)  

https://justiceinnovation.org/publications/ delivering-smarter-approach-probation-professionalisation 

Burrell, A. (2022). ‘The Reflective Practitioner in Transition. Probation work during reintegration of probation services in England and Wales.’ Probation Journal 69 (4) pp 434 – 451. 

Canton 2011: (2011). Probation: working with offenders. Abingdon: Routledge. 

Collins S: (2016). 'Commitment and probation work in England and Wales.' European Journal of Probation, 8 (1) pp. 30 – 48. 

Freidson E: (1994). Professionalism reborn: theory, prophecy and policy. Oxford, Polity press. HMIP: (2021) Race equality in probation: the experiences of black, Asian and minority ethnic probation service users and staff. London: 

HMIP. Available at: Race equality in probation: the experiences of black, Asian and minority ethnic probation service users and staff (justiceinspectorates.gov.uk) (accessed 3 August 2021). 

Mawby R. and Worrall A. (2014). 'Probation worker cultures and relationships with offenders.' Probation Journal 61 (4) pp. 346-357.

McWilliams W: (1985). The Mission Transformed: professionalisation of probation between the wars. The Howard Journal, vol 24, no 4, pp 257 – 274.

Robinson G. (2021). 'Rehabilitating probation: strategies for re-legitimation after policy failure.' The Howard Journal of Crime and Justice, 60 (2) pp 151-166. 

Schon D: (1991) The Reflective Practitioner. London: Arena publishing. 

Schon D: (2016) The Reflective Practitioner: How Professionals Think in Action. Abingdon: Routledge. 

Senior P: (2018). ‘Probation is a profession, never let that go.’ Probation Quarterly, issue 8, pp 6 – 8.

PSR Lament

Over the years we've covered this subject a number of times and once again it's become the focus of attention with a recent HMI report revealing that:-  

• Less than half of all inspected court reports were deemed to be sufficiently analytical and personalised to the individual, supporting the court’s decision making.

• There were notable differences in quality between the types of court report. Oral reports met the overall quality judgement in only four out of 10 cases, short format reports in half of the cases, and standard delivery reports in more than six out of 10 cases. 

• Court reports for those individuals from a Black, Asian or minority ethnicity background were less likely to be deemed sufficiently analytical and personalised, supporting the court’s decision making.

Right from the introduction the HMI report proudly confirms:-

The provision of pre-sentence reports (PSRs) has been a key part of the Probation Service’s work since its very earliest days, providing advice and information to help judges and magistrates decide upon the appropriate sentences for those appearing before the courts. The importance of this work has been highlighted as follows: 

‘it can be argued that the provision of reports for the courts is – in some ways – the most significant task. Pre-sentence reports (PSRs) are the primary point of contact for sentencers, who are the main customers for probation work.’ (Mair, 2016).

so it might come as some surprise to many that over the last 20 years or so all manner of interventions and policies have conspired to downgrade the task, marginalise it within the criminal justice system and make the task as difficult and unwieldy as possible. Once a key part of every field Probation Officers role and often informed by their extensive knowledge of a person's offending history, the task is now performed by dedicated court-based staff with limited time and no prior knowledge beyond that possibly gleaned from crap IT systems such as OASys.

Oh and this again as outlined in the HMI report put a tin hat on the whole thing:-

Over the last decade, under the Transforming Summary Justice and Better Case Management efficiency programmes, and in line with long-standing efforts to reduce the length of the court process, there has been a move away from the more thorough and detailed standard delivery reports (with their typical turnaround of up to 15 working days) and towards fast delivery reports, first towards oral reports (which can often be delivered on the day of request or within 24 hours) and later to short format written reports (turnaround time of around five working days). Following concerns about the numbers of people being sentenced without any form of PSR, there has most recently been a focus on reversing this downward trend, particularly for cases where a community order was most likely; in 2014, 85 per cent of community orders had involved a PSR, which had reduced to 45 per cent by 2019. Research shows that, at least for community sentences, completion of the sentence is more likely when a PSR has been requested and provided than where it has not (Ministry of Justice, 2023).  

Very much late in the day it now seems that dots are being belatedly joined up and realisation dawning that much of the mess we now find ourselves in is a direct result of having so successfully done away with a vital element of probation's work in informing sensible sentencing decisions. But it's all too late as the damage has been done by the absurdity of moving skilled PO staff into prisons under OMiC, thus breaking down the local knowledge base and de-skilling PO staff in the field who now struggle with the whole report writing concept and task.

In my view this HMI aspiration will not improve the situation one bit:-

The measures set out in the 2021 Target Operating Model for probation services aim to increase both the number of cases that receive PSRs and the quality of those reports, leading to increased sentencer confidence in the probation service and potentially helping to reverse the recent decline in the use of accredited programmes (HM Inspectorate of Probation, 2024). High-quality PSRs also have a positive impact in terms of supporting well-informed, analytical, and personalised post-sentence assessment and sentence planning, which is the starting point of the well-established and recognised ASPIRE model for case supervision.

Probation practitioners working in courts now use the Effective Proposal Framework (EPF) digital tool to ensure that ‘interventions recommendations and licence conditions address risk and need, are in line with policy and sentencing guidelines and supports consistency of practice, proportionality and the reduction of bias’ (HM Prison & Probation Service, 2021). The EPF tool contains a list of all available interventions and their eligibility criteria. Court officers can input the details of the individual before the court, such as risk levels, gender, age, geographical location and offence details, and the EPF provides a shortlist of interventions that are suitable and available to that individual.

Just more alphabet soup bloody processes and tools to add to an endless list of them, but failing utterly to understand and get to grips with fundamental flaws that now inhabit all aspects of probation work that have made it part of the problem and not any part of a solution. The new Labour Government promised a wide-ranging 'Probation Review' in their election manifesto and they'd better bloody get on with it before there's nothing much left of a once proud gold standard profession worth saving. 

At this point can I flag up the following quote from a blog from a former Probation Officer now working for Revolving Doors:-

As a former probation officer myself, I can say that probation officers took a real pride in these reports, and sentencers were immensely grateful for them. The other benefit was that if the person received a community order and was supervised by the probation officer that wrote the report, there was already a level of trust and good faith between them which helped set up a purposeful relationship which made meaningful work more likely.

I wholeheartedly agree! The blog continues:-

Failed reforms and increased time pressures

However, reforms aimed at expediting criminal case resolutions and improving efficiency, including initiatives like Transforming Summary Justice, promoted an increase in pre-sentence reports with quicker turnaround times. This shift led to a decline in the use of standard delivery reports, which typically take up to 15 working days, in favour of fast delivery reports, which take around five days, and oral reports, often completed on the same day or within 24 hours.

The problem with oral and fast delivery reports is that the interview happens over a very short period of time: often within the court building, with maybe just 20 minutes to spare and with the officer under pressure either to get back to the court and deliver the oral report, or to get to another person also waiting for their interview.

Under such circumstances it is not surprising that the officer is not able to build a relationship with the interviewee that allows them to extract the same level of information and so the assessment is less detailed and so, in our view, holds less validity.

The irony of this move towards speed is that it has happened in the context of mass court backlogs, meaning cases take longer than ever before. The rush to sentence is in contrast to the glacial progress of cases through the system.

Impact on the revolving door group

In 2022 we published the Probation Inquiry, exploring the experiences of those in the revolving door on probation, including in relation to court reports. Many people reflected on how rushed their interview felt, and how disappointed they were with the process.

However, others reported it as a transformative experience, where they had been able to disclose things they had never felt comfortable to before, including domestic abuse experiences, and others reported the report resulting to them finally getting them the interventions they needed. We think this demonstrates that report interviews need to be done over a good length of time – with opportunity for both parties to build a rapport.

It is worth noting that the Inspectorate also reported that Court reports for those individuals from a Black, Asian or minority ethnicity background were less likely to be deemed sufficiently analytical and personalised, supporting the court’s decision making. It is our belief that short interviews do not allow for nuanced discussions around cultural and racial issues within the interview, disadvantaging those who already face discrimination within the justice system and society more broadly.

We believe the reduction in longform standard delivery pre-sentence reports has significantly contributed to the decline in the use of community orders by sentencers, with these decreasing by more than half (54%) between 2012 and 2022.

Reports no longer offer strong enough analysis as to why a specific community sentence will be so rehabilitative. This is just one of the reasons why we believe that the decline in standard delivery reports has significantly disadvantaged those in the revolving door group, whose offending is driven by unmet health and social needs.

Presenting for sentencing without the opportunity for previous convictions and former failed sentences to be contextualised seems more likely to end in a custodial sentence in our already calamitously overcrowded prisons, rather than with the targeted, rehabilitative non-custodial support our group so desperately need.

Return to more thorough PSRs to break the cycle

The findings of the Inspectorate’s report underscore the critical need for high-quality, detailed pre-sentence reports to support effective sentencing.

The shift towards faster, less comprehensive reports has unfortunately compromised the ability of sentencers to make fully informed decisions, particularly for those with complex needs, such as individuals struggling with substance use or mental health issues.

This trend not only undermines the goal of rehabilitation but also disproportionately impacts those who are already vulnerable, perpetuating the cycle of crisis and crime.

To break this cycle, it is imperative that we advocate for a return to thorough, personalised pre sentence reports that truly inform sentencing decisions and promote more equitable outcomes for all.

Kelly Grehan
Policy Manager

A Sadly Familiar Thread

The last couple of days has triggered us to return to a sadly familiar thread and I think it's important to pull it together because I'm acutely aware many probation staff are currently under even greater stress. It began with this:-

My partner and I have made the decision for me to resign, after 24 years as a PO with numerous successful secondments, I have simply had enough. The change I have lived through is breath-taking and disturbing. I have seen inspirational POs, who never sought high office and whose professional curiosity was amazing to witness, marginalised and put down by young upstarts not in the slightest ashamed to voice their lofty ambitions. Bullying, racism and homophobia are now rife in an organisation that once was held up as a beacon of progressive professionalism and recognised internationally. My resignation is going in tomorrow morning and the sense of relief is beyond description, odd as it may sound I feel free.

Following yesterday, my notice is in. A very slow response from management, no doubt a huddle took place to formulate a response however one rather youthful SPO passed comment on “how difficult it must for you to adapt to change”. I bit my tongue. At 48 years of age she was young enough to be my daughter but really lacked the dignity of my children. This one moment just solidified my decision to leave. I feel unshackled, I feel free and I feel sadness. But my overriding feeling is of relief. As I speak my wonderful partner is cracking open a bottle of wine whilst she sings only now right now as I type do I realise how my probation frustrations were so visible to her. I respect and love her so much. I wish all of you the best and I have to express my utter admiration and respect to Jim for the legacy of your blog, you are truly a legend.

--oo00oo--

The Weight of the Badge - A Personal Reflection on Nearly 20 Years in Probation:

As I approach two decades in the probation service, I find myself feeling more isolated than ever. In a role designed to foster rehabilitation, support, and second chances, it's ironic that I now feel in desperate need of those very things myself. Over the years, I’ve navigated countless changes, adapted to new policies, and checked boxes that seem to multiply by the day. But the toll of it all is undeniable.

I lead a team of dedicated officers who, despite their best efforts, are also feeling the strain. Together, we try to keep morale afloat, to stay motivated amid constant shifts, but the pressures from above – from the Head of Service and beyond – have become suffocating. It feels like we’re caught in an endless cycle of demands that never seem to let up, and each day leaves us running on fumes.

For over a year now, I’ve been covering more than one team, stretching myself thin in every direction. The demands of the job have drained me completely. Where there once was pride in the work, now there’s only exhaustion. Weekends don’t offer enough time to recover, and by Sunday, the anxiety of the week ahead sets in. Monday is a day filled with dread as I face another seemingly insurmountable five days.

I’m struggling. My anxiety is constant, and my depression has deepened. It feels like the joy has been sucked from my life. I’m left questioning how much longer I can keep going like this, trying to juggle the needs of my team, my own mental health, and the overwhelming weight of this job.

I share this not just as a personal release, but in the hope that others who feel similarly might realise they aren’t alone. Probation work is hard – harder than many understand – and we need to acknowledge the toll it can take on us all.

--oo00oo--

I totally agree with the sentiments you express and I empathise with the dilemma you are in however merely acknowledging the problem will not make it go away. As has been said previously, and again by [others] there is ample evidence to support a private prosecution by the unions on the grounds of health and safety, but it is also up to individuals to do whatever is necessary to protect themselves and to safeguard their own well-being. Strategies have been outlined in the past but people, for various reasons feel obliged to keep turning the wheel despite it being obvious that nobody listens, nobody cares and nothing will change of its own volition. Simply making yourself ill or taking your frustrations home with you won’t change anything and you are unfortunately no better thought of. Do something positive to help yourself, even if it is going off sick or semi- retirement or taking a sabbatical and surveying your options.

--oo00oo--

Hello Jim,

I resigned as a PO in June after joining the service initially as residential support worker in AP. I have met numerous brilliant people who are working within a broken organisation.

I trained as a PO with very much a focus on wanting to aid rehabilitation but found myself ground down by the corporate nature of senior management. A regional director likening his background as an investment banker to managing high risk offenders being an prime example.

The eagerness to recall and enforce rather than explore behaviour left me disillusioned and questioning the point of the job - I concur with a recent submission that the role has essentially an extension of custodial supervision. There is a culture of fear amongst frontline staff of being thrown under the bus by management if something goes awry.

I do not have all the answers but the culture needs to change to empower staff to make brave decisions and not revert to risk averse behaviour out of fear for their job.

Kind regards,
An ex PO

--oo00oo--

This is what many of us remember, but it seems the memory no longer extends to current management, but if it does, how can things have become so toxic in the workplace and why is nobody doing anything about it?

I missed this in 20/21... don't know if it made your blog, Jim, but it should hold a place in the archive:

https://www.butlertrust.org.uk/eve-chester/

"As I see it I am doing what I ought to do, work in a way that demonstrates my values and the values of the Probation Service I joined in 1982. [When I started] I was completely bowled over by the amazing staff I met at Hull Probation Office where I took up my first student placement. I work on the basis that we need to treat clients with respect. That doesn’t mean we admire all that they have done in life but we act on the basis that there are reasons why people behave as they do – blaming people for actions is not very productive – and the majority of people want to live lives where they can feel safe and valued. Most people do not care to work with others whom they perceive to be patronising, judging them and/or fault-finding.

“We do hear and see things as Probation staff that disgust or appal but if we want people to move on to live better, less harmful lives then we have to see people as a whole, not just the offence; where feasible, get beneath the behaviour (not ignore it) to understand if possible what it is about, the value and purpose of it to the client and integrate that with where that client wants to be as a person in the future and how to get there. If we want Probation clients to treat their family and fellow citizens with respect then we as staff supervising them, need to demonstrate that in how we treat them; we recognise the capacity to harm and also the capacity to move away from further harming. It also means discussing boundaries, we all have them and know how we dislike others’ attempts to breach them. I see my role in Probation is to address those breaches and to try and help people steer away from further similar behaviour.

“If a person’s behaviour harms people and if society values people, society needs to find ways of unravelling that purpose and helping re-channel that energy. What has taken years to develop isn’t going to dissolve over-night so one has to be patient and tempered. You have to withstand set-backs, client lapses, rejection. It’s a joint enterprise but the engine is the client. If their energy or will can’t be engaged, it’s a very slow process but still worthwhile. I’ve kept true to this approach of respect and looking for ways to connect because I have found it works; it engages most clients, works at a pace they can manage and keeps the majority out of re-offending. That sounds very simplistic but it requires considerable patience, willingness to keep fresh in thinking, attention to detail and adaptability. You can’t work this way on your own, you need good support from colleagues whether in Probation or linked agencies to share ideas, check out assumptions and access resources so you also need to be an adept advocate and team worker.”

Eve concludes with a personal recollection – and a vivid description of how she’s found her career:

“I hated it when as a child and young person I experienced personally or saw others, being ‘labelled’ or ‘written off’ so yes, I have a passion for challenging labels and negativity and I have found in Probation an amazing albeit demanding space in which to do this… It’s a career I have found fascinating, infuriating, wearying and stimulating but overall, incredibly worthwhile in seeing the majority of clients lighten up, move on, have families, handle lurch and sway to regain equilibrium and… stay out of trouble!”

Eve Chester

Probation Meltdown

The new government is slowly working through the mountain of problems created by the Tories, but the probation service cannot wait much longer for that promised 'review'. When is it being announced? The service is in meltdown, discussed here in some detail on PoliticsHome:- 

The Probation Service is "In Meltdown", Say Staff

Every probation service in the UK is failing to meet minimum standards as the service buckles under the weight of record staff shortages and huge caseloads, an investigation by The House magazine has revealed. Staff describe dealing with unsafe numbers of cases and a “s**t show” system “in meltdown” even before this month’s early release of thousands of prisoners to alleviate a jails crisis.

Some probation services are operating with less than half the number of required staff prompting grave internal doubts about their ability to cope with the increased demand.

And with the consequences for those subject to domestic abuse a particular concern prompted by the early release programme, The House has found every probation service in the UK has been criticised for failures – either protecting others from released detainees or ensuring those released are not abused themselves.

The probation service manages the cases of a quarter of million people, largely those who have been released from prison into the community or have been sentenced to community service. That is three times the number of those actually in prison, and yet it is one of the lowest-profile parts of the criminal justice system.

“It's a really difficult, complicated job,” says Martin Jones, the government’s chief inspector of probation. “I think it’s also under-appreciated because it’s such an invisible job.”

But while out of sight and out of mind, pressures have nevertheless been building relentlessly alongside those elsewhere. An analysis of the last 33 reports into every probation service inspected by the government watchdog – HM Inspectorate of Probation – over the last two and a half years reveals the extent of the crisis.

It shows every service has received a failing grade in that period – either ‘requires improvement’ or ‘inadequate’. Two got the lowest score possible. (Typically services are rated from 1 to either 21 or 27, two received a score or 1, a further five of just 2.)

Inspectors repeatedly identified understaffing and "unmanageable" workloads across the country, which had left services failing to do basic jobs like ensuring domestic abusers weren't contacting or threatening former victims, failing to safeguard children and systemically failing to assess the risk posed by former detainees to the public.

Every report found some sort of failure in regards to domestic violence – either failing to support those released from prison who could be victims to it or failing to risk assess those who previously were or could be potential perpetrators of abuse themselves.

Sometimes that wasn’t the direct fault of services themselves – at one unit in Liverpool inspectors found they had a backlog of 1,350 domestic abuse inquiries with the Merseyside Police that had gone unanswered.

At one failing probation service in Peterborough, “nowhere near enough attention” was being paid to monitoring the potential risks posed to the public by released offenders, with officers in 72 per cent of cases failing to properly protect the victims of released offenders.

Sickness and absence rates are so high in some services senior managers were having to handle the casework they were supposed to be overseeing – a situation inspectors called “unsustainable”.

“It’s clear if you read the reports that the probation service is under huge strain,” Jones tells The House. “Having worked in the criminal justice system for over 30 years, the pressures on the probation service are equally as bad as those on prisons by my assessment.”

“It's something that requires urgent attention from the government,” he adds.

At one service he reviewed in Essex, Jones says 55 per cent of the posts for probation officers were vacant, meaning the few staff actually still working there could be dealing with around twice their usual workload. Those kinds of massive staff vacancy rates were common across the country, particularly in big cities like London.

As staff shortages worsen caseloads increase leading in turn to worse staff retention. Some staff are said to be doing up to 200 per cent of their normal caseload as the system struggles to manage 250,000 people.

The personal toll on probation officers can be devastating. “When you see a colleague crying at a desk, that's not at all unusual in a probation office,” says John, who also tells us about another colleague who developed PTSD and attempted suicide from the scale and intensity of the work before being forced to take ill-health early retirement.

John is a near two decade veteran of the probation service who has spent most of his career in the North of England. We changed John’s name to allow him to speak freely and protect him from professional repercussions.

“Everything we do is superficial and last minute. If you've got way more work than you should do, you haven't got the time to sit and spend more than an hour with somebody,” he says.

“If you're always going at 100 miles an hour, you're not doing a considered piece of work when you write up their risk assessment, you’re doing a rush job because you know that you've got another three cases due by a certain time.”

Part of the fear with that kind of overwork is that it means officers are missing chances to stop people from committing serious crimes. Some 578 ‘serious further offences’ were recorded last year, a 10 per cent increase on the year before, though still lower than the record figures set during the system’s privatisation. While those are a small percentage of the total number of people released, each can have an untold, and preventable, impact on the victim or their families.

While the media narrative often focuses on that potential risk to the public, it often ignores the wider impact these failures have on the lives of those newly released from prison. Just under one in seven people are released from prison homeless in 2023-2024, an increase of a third on the year before.

“If probation officers do not have adequate time to address those sorts of issues, then inevitably there's a risk that it just becomes a revolving door,” says Jones. “And the reoffending rates in England and Wales are astonishingly high.”

Part of the reason for that huge increase in cases goes back to former Justice Secretary Chris Grayling’s “disastrous” partial privatisation of the service, which was overturned in 2019 after the number of serious offences like murder and rape by those on probation skyrocketed to record highs. As part of the privatisation deal, companies were forced to take on managing the wellbeing of previously unmonitored low level offenders on very short sentences. When it was renationalised, that new obligation was taken on by the public sector.

The problems in the probation service are heavily worsened by the problems across the rest of the justice system – from record court backlogs to prison overcrowding – which make managing cases a nightmare.

“The whole of the criminal justice system is in meltdown and we’re an important component of that,” says Ian Lawrence, general secretary of NAPO, the trade union for probation workers. He said the union has been repeatedly pushing for a Royal Commission into the failures across the justice system. “It’s a s**t show, basically,” he concludes.

When Labour first announced its plans to authorise the early release of prisoners, insiders say they had had a grim sense of deja vu.

Just two months earlier, the last government had (more quietly) expanded its own early prisoner release scheme, called ECSL, to mean countless more prisoners would be released early. Probation staff had little warning or time to prepare for releases and few criteria were applied on what type of prisoner might be released. It was labelled by NAPO at the time as an “unmitigated failure” and a trigger for potential strike action.

Lawrence says under that scheme probation staff felt “under pressure to sanction someone's release when they knew for a fact they were a high risk” to the public.

“The new scheme couldn’t be worse than ECSL,” John recalls. “But what they've done again is prioritise prison at the expense of probation.”

Under Labour’s programme which begins this month, prisoners will be eligible for early release after serving 40 per cent rather than 50 per cent of their sentences. In theory, certain serious offences, like those with domestic violence convictions would not be covered, but this month the government confirmed that was not always the case. If someone had a history of, say, serious sexual offences, but was currently serving a sentence for something else, they would be eligible.

Some 40,000 prisoners are estimated to benefit from the scheme, meaning the probation service’s caseload could eventually shoot up by as much as a fifth. Some 5,500 prisoners are expected to be released in the next two months alone.

The new scheme came with a promise to recruit 1,000 new probation officers by March 2025 to help deal with the new caseload and address staffing shortfalls in the service, though given it takes 18 months for an officer to qualify, it could be years before the service feels any benefit.

“I'm concerned about the potential impact that this will have, particularly in the short term,” says Jones. “Extra officers in a year or 18 months is great but you've got to through the next 18 months first.”

A Ministry of Justice spokesperson stressed that the government “inherited a prison system in crisis” that was “putting pressure on the wider justice system particularly probation staff”. They added they had been “forced into taking difficult but necessary action so it can keep locking up dangerous criminals and protect the public”.

All of those working in probation who spoke The House spoke said the scale of the crisis had made them rethink the entire structure and future of the probation service.

Jones says the “chronic” issues in the service meant the government needed to consider pruning the numbers or types of ex-detainees the service oversees as “it's probably better to do 70 per cent of the job really well than do 100 per cent of the job poorly”.

NAPO also calls on the government to end or phase out short-term prison sentencing.

“There are too many people in prison for offences that realistically, you should put them on a community order or some other form of reparation,” says NAPO general secretary Lawrence.

"We cannot keep doing this. The early release plans may make a difference to overcrowding in the short term, but it’s a palliative not a long-term cure.”

Andrew Kersley

D-Day Is Here

So, D-Day is here and probation has to try and deal with a massive emergency release of prisoners. I notice Danny Shaw has written a piece for the Spectator, helpfully summarising the grim probation reality and possible routes towards a solution. We're only some 60 days into a new Labour government, but as yet no sign of the promised fundamental review of probation. The only way to fix the problem is get probation out of HMPPS control and civil service and rebuild it as an independent agency. Nothing else will stop probation being part of the problem rather than a key element of a solution.

Thousands of prisoners are about to be released early. Is probation ready?

I met Anthony by the gates of Thameside prison in south-east London. A skinny, gaunt-looking man in his 40s, he’d spent much of his adult life in and out of jail for offences linked to his mental health problems and addiction to drugs. His latest spell inside had lasted eight months. He was hugely relieved to be out and vowed, like so many other newly-released prisoners, never to go back.

Over the next few hours I joined Anthony and a support worker from a charity on a car journey across London as they raced against the clock to find him a bed for the night, register with a GP, so he could get the medication he needed, visit a benefits office and attend a probation appointment. It was a crazy few hours – complicated by the fact that Anthony’s identification documents were stuck in another prison and there’d been little time to organise things in advance of his release.

That encounter with Anthony, for a radio feature a few years ago, came to mind as the government prepares to free some 2,000 prisoners on Tuesday – double the number they usually let out in a week. It’s the first stage of a scheme which will see 5,000 prisoners let out early in September and October to create space in jails across England and Wales, where the population has reached a record high of 88,521. Inmates will serve 40 per cent of their sentence in custody instead of the standard 50 per cent.

However much planning has taken place, many of those released will face the same mad dash as Anthony did to access the services that will help them re-settle in the community. Key to it all will be the probation staff charged with their supervision. Since 2015, every offender, no matter how short their sentence, must be monitored by probation for at least 12 months after they leave jail. It’s a huge burden on a service which is overstretched and under-performing.

Only two out of 12 probation regions are operating satisfactorily, according to the latest ‘scorecard’ from the Ministry of Justice (MoJ). Three areas – East Midlands; London; Kent, Surrey and Sussex – are rated ‘inadequate’, seven are said to require improvement. In his final report after four years as chief inspector of probation, Justin Russell said his ‘greatest’ concerns were around public protection with staff unable to accurately assess and robustly manage the potential risk of serious harm posed by some offenders. Russell highlighted poor supervision and unmanageable workloads, with some officers dealing with 40 or more cases each.

A large part of the problem is that there aren’t enough staff. The MoJ wants there to be 7,339 fully-qualified probation officers, yet there’s currently a shortfall of 2,179. Leaving rates are up and most alarmingly, every year up to 20 per cent of trainees drop out before they even qualify.

To address the staffing crisis Martin Jones, the new chief inspector, has suggested reducing the burden on existing probation officers by removing the requirement to supervise prisoners who’ve served short sentences. It would cut the caseload by around 40,000, 17 per cent of the current total, and give staff more time to do meaningful rehabilitation work with offenders who pose a greater public threat. It’s an attractive idea but politically deadly: an unsupervised prisoner will inevitably commit a ghastly crime and ministers will get the blame.

A better option would be to tackle the bureaucracy surrounding probation work so staff have more one-on-one time with offenders. Russell highlighted Civil Service rules that meant it could take weeks to order equipment and fill posts. ‘Multiple layers of approvals and standardised and centralised commissioning processes stifle innovation and can feel disempowering for local leaders,’ he wrote. Officers also complain about legislative demands and data management requirements that they have to fulfil but which aren’t part of their core duties, as well as clunky IT systems that make every task take longer. If workloads are to be made manageable, this is an area the MoJ must urgently focus on.

The department appears to be pinning its hopes on a campaign to hire an extra 1,000 trainee probation officers. That will undoubtedly ease some of the pressures, but it would be a mistake to think that simply boosting numbers will improve performance. A theme of recent reviews into murders committed by offenders on probation is a lack of ‘professional curiosity’ on the part of officers entrusted with their supervision – they’re too willing to accept what they’re told at face value and don’t inquire deeply enough into what’s going on in the background. Much of this is down to inexperience: one-third of probation staff have been in the service for less than five years. A recruitment drive is unlikely to address that problem unless it’s targeted at older people who can bring skills from different walks of life.

Indeed, that was the recommendation from a report carried out for the Conservative government which said the probation service needed to hire more ‘career changers’ in their 30s, 40s and 50s. The findings of the review, which wasn’t published, also called for the service to bring in more men. Seventy-five per cent of probation staff are women but 91 per cent of those they supervise are male. The chief probation officer, Kim Thornden-Edwards, has agreed that the gender mix needs to change to give senior staff more options when allocating cases. ‘It might be really good for a woman to be leading on a domestic abuse case – but also, it might be good for a man to be challenging those kind of issues around masculinity and power from a male perspective,’ she told the BBC.

Thornden-Edwards made those remarks 18 months ago, but the gender balance in probation hasn’t shifted. If the service is to be more effective at keeping the public safe and helping offenders with rehabilitation the workforce needs to be more diverse, particularly in terms of age, life experience and gender. That is not to denigrate those who currently work there, they are doing a valuable and challenging job. But we should acknowledge that they need more support so that former prisoners like Anthony and the thousands exiting jail this week get the best chance to turn their lives around.

Danny Shaw

--oo00oo--

Also from today's Spectator:-

Probation officers won’t be able to cope with 5,500 prisoner releases

Today the government is releasing an estimated 1,700 prisoners early, under the scheme (SDS40) in which most inmates will only serve 40 per cent of their sentence. By the end of October, some 5,500 prisoners will have been released early. The idea is to take pressure off the prison system, and buy enough time to build more capacity. Life may become a little easier in our jails, but for the probation service, this means yet more pressure.

Probation is a crucial part of the justice system. It is responsible for supervising people who are serving community sentences, and those who have been released from prison ‘on licence’. Probation officers are expected to ensure that people do not breach the terms of their licence, do not reoffend, and that they participate in programmes to address substance or behaviour problems. If an offender breaches their licence, a probation officer may have to ‘recall’ them, sending them back to prison for some or all of their sentence. In many ways, it is much harder to supervise offenders in the community as opposed to a prison. At least in jail, we generally know where a prisoner is sleeping each night.

The early releases will challenge a service that is already in crisis. Staffing is in a critical condition, with only 70 per cent of the needed number of qualified probation officers: a shortfall of around 2,000. While the government has promised to recruit another 1,000 trainees by March next year, the reality is that trainee hiring has collapsed, down almost 60 per cent year-on-year, and the service actually lost 178 officers in the last quarter.

Morale is terrible. A probation officer in the Midlands said: ‘Staff don’t feel protected. They don’t feel like the service cares about them.’ The view of many probation officers, from speaking with their union, NAPO, and individual POs, is that management and the organisation will not support them if the worst happens and someone they are supervising commits a serious further offence. This fear is likely one factor behind our astonishingly high rates of recall. Around 55 per cent of prisoners released from jail will be recalled. While for many this is because they’ve committed further offences, probation officers often take the decision to recall because they don’t believe they can keep the public safe in any other way.

Of course, public protection has to be at the heart of the justice system, but a properly staffed and resourced probation service would be able to manage far more offenders in the community. Instead, understaffed and overworked, probation oversees a system in which more than a quarter of released prisoners are proven to have reoffended within a year.

This stressful environment has significant consequences. Tania Bassett, of the probation trade union, NAPO, said: ‘We’ve got really bad levels of sickness at the moment, mainly as a result of poor mental health.’ A probation officer in the South West remarked that ‘staff go off sick with work-related stress, then get given a warning and an 18-month improvement period, but there’s no change to their workloads’. In a hostile and unsupportive management culture like this, it is no surprise that staff are leaving.

I understand that probation staff have only had a few weeks’ notice of the additional people they will be supervising, and in some cases were only told last week. This provides no time for the staff to familiarise themselves with the prisoners’ needs and risks, or to put in place support around drugs, housing or behaviour which may keep them out of prison. Prisoners who are released homeless, without a job and without any meaningful support are at a particularly high risk of reoffending. As a probation officer from the north of England said, ‘I just don’t think SDS40 has been thought out properly. It’s unsafe.’

This, combined with the pressure on individual probation officers, may well mean that this early-release cohort is even more likely to be recalled or commit further offences. If so, we might expect more than 60 per cent of the 5,500 prisoners to be back in jail before too long. It is hard to see how the government is going to find enough extra capacity. The prison population continues to climb, and we are already seeing hints that the Tories’ laughable plan to send prisoners overseas may be revived. This isn’t serious policy. Our prisons are full because of longer sentences, a court backlog which this government has exacerbated by reducing court dates by 2 per cent this year, and the soaring rate of recalls.

As Tania Bassett said to me: ‘We need to start the long-term conversations now.’ Serious reform would mean significantly expanding the open prison system and working to deport the estimated 10,000 foreign nationals held in our jails. Early release isn’t the solution, and if it results in a wave of reoffending, while failing to save the prison system, then the government will only have itself to blame.

David Shipley

David Shipley is a former prisoner who writes, speaks and researches on prison and justice issues.

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Postscript

Hello, I work as a ARD German Television Producer. We are the main public broadcaster in Germany comparable to the BBC and our London office deals with any UK based stories.

I am putting together a report for one of our prestigious prime time Sunday evening current affairs programmes about Britain's prisons overcrowding crisis and the ways in which the new government is looking to solve it.

We are hoping to speak to probation officers about the challenges they are currently facing and also if they have any concerns about the new early release scheme. We are also looking to speak to ex- offenders who were recently released from prison about the conditions of overcrowded prisons and the challenges they face once they leave prison. This could be both on and off the record just for my background information or as part of the programme.

If interested please contact me directly via email on r.hayes.fm@ndr.de or on my direct line on 02073916263.

Rabea Hayes
ARD German TV | Studio London
Producer

Probation Reality of Early Release

This came in yesterday and highlights the grim reality for many probation staff:-

Hi Jim,

I would prefer this is kept anonymous for obvious reasons.

Today, I was at work. Today, I actually cried at my desk. If that isn't horrible enough, two other colleagues were in tears at other parts of the day too.

I speak as a qualified PO. It is unsustainable. I haven't felt like I've been able to fully help someone in months, there have been no wins.

We all know the problem areas; housing, substance misuse support and mental health treatment are struggling as much as we are, but it feels like we are the only ones expected to take on more and more. Empty the prisons onto our caseloads with no extra resources and expect miracles.

In the last 36 hours I've recalled two people, mostly because their needs haven't been met adequately, either through lack of provision in the community or lack of proper focused work in custody. I imagine other POs have exceeded that particular disgraceful statistic.

SDS40 is a longer term plan really. And I fully understand something needed to happen, but there has been absolutely no meaningful emergency support for us. I've lost track of our staffing numbers. At least 3 long term off sick, and other leavers roles not filled. I haven't seen a temp in my office in about 18 months.

Oh, but why am I complaining? Because after reset my WMT is under 100%. So no overtime for me. Even though I am sending this at 10 o'clock on a Friday night and my last email sent for work was at about 7.

Anon

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This from the Guardian on Friday:-

Some probation officers given a week’s notice of serious offenders’ release, union says

Exclusive: Napo says officers do not feel protected as 2,000 offenders to be let out early to try to ease prison crisis

Probation officers have been given as little as a week’s notice to prepare for serious offenders to be freed in England and Wales under the government’s early-release scheme, the Guardian has been told.

About 2,000 prisoners are expected to be let out on Tuesday 10 September amid warnings of a coming spike in crime. But members of the probation officers’ union Napo were only informed on 3 September that this would include some serious offenders being released into their supervision.

Officers are usually given more than three months to prepare services to help monitor and rehabilitate a serious offender. The development comes as the prison population reached a record high on Friday.

The justice secretary, Shabana Mahmood, said in July that the SDS40 scheme – under which offenders with standard determinate sentences will be released after they have served 40% of their term – would be introduced in September to give the Probation Service time to prepare.

Tania Bassett, a national official at Napo, said: “Our members from across the UK have not been given eight weeks to prepare for the high risk of harm of some dangerous offenders. We have received reports of late information about releases from the north-east, Reading and other areas. In some cases, our members were told on Tuesday – a week before the early release date – that serious offenders would be released in their area.”

She said the number of recalls of offenders was expected to rise because of the increased workload on officers. “If prisoners are released so late that our members are given a few days to prepare for people who may be serious offenders, then, inevitably, recalls are likely to go up.”

While the majority of people being released under the scheme will be lower-level offenders, there have previously been serious incidents after prisoners were released on licence, including Jordan McSweeney, who murdered two days after he had been recalled to prison.

The union said some members have said the early release scheme has left them feeling further exposed to persecution if their clients commit a serious offence. One officer told the union: “We don’t feel protected. It feels like the service doesn’t care about us.”

The probation watchdog has told the Guardian that “a small proportion” of the 2,000 offenders due to be freed could be expected to go on to commit serious crimes.

Martin Jones, the chief inspector of probation in England and Wales, said that late information about who was being released would place “huge additional pressures” on probation staff.

“The eternal optimist says that the scheme will go well. But the realist in me says that some of those released will go on to reoffend, and a small proportion of those will be serious offences,” he said.

About 300 offenders on probation commit serious further offences every year, which relate to specific violent or sexual offences that make them a particular risk to the public.

Under the SDS40 scheme, an estimated 2,000 prisoners serving sentences of less than five years will be released on 10 September, followed by a further 1,700, who are serving sentences of more than five years, on 22 October.

The scheme was announced by Mahmood days after the general election amid warnings that the criminal justice system was on the brink of collapse.

Official figures showed there were 88,521 people in prison on Friday, 171 more than the previous record set at the end of last week.

A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: “The new government inherited a justice system in crisis, with prisons on the point of collapse. It has been forced to introduce an early release programme to stop a crisis that would have overwhelmed the criminal justice system.

“That is why the new lord chancellor announced in July that she was scrapping the previous government’s early release scheme, replacing it with a system which gives probation staff more time to prepare for a prisoner’s release and a live database for affected cases that staff can check in real time.”

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Postscript

David Shipley, a former prisoner who now writes about prison and justice issues, and who has written for On Probation, is writing an article for the Spectator about the dangers and extra pressure for Probation staff as a result of SDS40. He would welcome any anonymous quotes and views from current probation staff. David@david-shipley.com