With 207 comments on the last post we need to take a breath. This contribution seems as good a way to start ready for the New Year:-
It's astonishing that some 20,000 staff (give or take the lickspittles & collaborators who've had special treatment) have accepted such shit pay arrangements for so long. Is it 3 pay rises in 16 years? And none meeting any cost of living increases. "It’s a way of controlling costs while still claiming a pay rise has been delivered."
Its also a very effective way of controlling staff per the 'old school' adage of "treat 'em mean, keep 'em keen". Hmm, what does that remind you of?
It has been said by many here over the past decade or so that probation staff are the victims of a massive power imbalance, i.e. an abusive relationship that they can't, won't or are otherwise disabled from disengaging with that relationship through (predominantly) financial & emotional abuse, aka shit pay & bullying.
Are you the same people who deliver programmes intended to effect change in perpetrators of abuse in relationships and reduce risk of harm to others?
Domestic Violence Programmes
Building Better Relationships (BBR) - A programme for perpetrators of violence and abuse... BBR aims to increase understanding of motivating factors in domestic violence, reduce individual risk factors linked to violence and develop pro-social relationship skills
Community Domestic Violence Programme (CDVP) - A programme aimed at reducing the risk of domestic violence and abusive behaviour ... by helping perpetrators change their attitudes and behaviour and to reduce the risk of all violent and abusive behaviour in the family.
Healthy Relationship Programme (HRP) - A prison based programme for men who have committed violent behaviour in an intimate relationship. The aim is to end violence and abuse against participants' intimate partners. Participants will learn about their abusive behaviours and be taught alternative skills and behaviours to help them develop healthy, non-abusive relationships.
Cognitive Skills Booster (CSB) - Designed to reinforce learning from other general offending programmes (ETS, Think First and Reasoning & Rehabilitation) through skills rehearsal and relapse prevention.
Enhanced Thinking Skills (ETS) - Addresses thinking and behaviour associated with offending through a sequenced series of structured exercises designed to teach inter-personal problem solving skills.
Make the connections - empty promises, jumping through ever smaller hoops, withholding pay, lies, making examples of staff, catastrophising in order to punish... while the privileged few in control pocket bonuses & very healthy packages, and are never held to account for their failings as 'leaders'.
Its no accident that the mysterious invisible chief probation officer has temporarily appeared in written form in advance of an imminent decision that will be nothing short of further & increasing levels of abuse, i.e. you'll get fuck all AND you'll be blamed for it.
Wakey! Wakey! Get Organised!
Comment moderation is back i'm afraid as I'm going to attempt to prevent a certain individual from sabotaging the discussion.
ReplyDeleteI may not get the chance later today, so I hope Jim and all other contributors have a safe New Year and a very happy 2026.
DeleteStay safe all xxx
Let’s be honest, all this discussion will ultimately go nowhere. Those at the top show little genuine concern for the terms and conditions of those below them, or for what probation could or should be. Their overriding priority is the maintenance of position and status, whether Head of PDU, Head of Operations, Regional Probation Director or Chief Probation Officer.
ReplyDeleteAny pay rise, if and when it arrives, will be minimal, delivered alongside the imposition of sentencing review recommendations and whatever further changes are forced through in 2026. This will happen exactly as intended, largely because probation has effectively no meaningful union resistance at all. The imbalance of power is entrenched, and those making the decisions know it.
The outcome is already decided. Everything else is noise.
Over the summer, Napo feature a series of now long-forgotten articles on “professionalism in probation”. Yet what has Napo, or probation as a system, actually done to deliver even the slightest of the recommendations or rose-tints set out in them? That question becomes even more pressing when set against a year’s worth of HMIP recommendations telling us the same thing in different words: poorly paid, badly resourced and unsupported staff cannot deliver the level of service expected of them.
This is not a mystery, nor is it new. If an effective probation service is genuinely the aim, then effective training, fair pay and decent terms and conditions are not optional extras. They are prerequisites. Without them, all talk of professionalism, quality and public protection is little more than rhetoric.
Reflections on the meanings of professionalism in probation practice
https://napomagazine.org.uk/reflections-on-the-meanings-of-professionalism-in-probation-practice/
The Concept of Professionalism in Probation – A View from the Frontline
https://napomagazine.org.uk/the-concept-of-professionalism-in-probation-a-view-from-the-frontline/
A strong passion – professional identity in Probation
https://napomagazine.org.uk/a-strong-passion-professional-identity-in-probation/
Happy New Year, all. May you be safe and healthy in 2026.
ReplyDeleteDuring festive socialising, chatted with friends who work in Education and Health Services. Same conversation: high levels of sickness absence predomininantly stress related, evaporating wages, and huge numbers of experienced workers looking to exit early or cut hours dramatically. Increasing exasperation at the lack of opportunity to do the Actual Work, with insane chasing of bureacratic targets that do not measure the value or point of the Actual Work. TR legacy, is particular to Probation, but the profession is not alone amongst public services. So in response to the call to arms "Wakey Wakey, get organised!
Much of what is needed is common to all these public services, so it would be good to see the Unions properly joining forces on: pay, sickness management, H&S. y
Then there is the issue specific to Probation: how its identity, function and purpose has been thoroughly trashed, and all subsumed into the Prison Service.
If we are going to make resolutions to wake up and organise, what to do and how to do it are the questions. We know what the problems are, how to actually affect positive change is the poser.