tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8578343158425987632.post7482688800770942839..comments2024-03-28T23:10:52.046+00:00Comments on On Probation Blog: Lets Look at E3Jim Brownhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00258147767051200157noreply@blogger.comBlogger15125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8578343158425987632.post-41821184264346384522016-01-19T01:27:40.380+00:002016-01-19T01:27:40.380+00:00Hurrah!! Great news from Shropshire:
Shrewsbury b...Hurrah!! Great news from Shropshire:<br /><br />Shrewsbury born and bred, Beccy has been in the Probation Service since 2001 after completing her studies at the University of Birmingham.<br /><br />She has 10 clients to look after and spends her spare time being part of island life, including trips to discover its rich and varied wildlife.<br /><br />It wasn’t just her love of Shrewsbury Town that she took with her to the Falklands. She iss also hoping to follow in the footsteps of Shrewsbury’s most famous son Charles Darwin.<br /><br />She said: “In 2013, I happened upon a job advert for the probation officer role in the Falkland Islands, and applied. I was hoping that I would get the chance to follow in Darwin’s footsteps. After an interview in London, at the Falkland Island Government Office, I was successful and the great adventure began.<br /><br />“I am the probation officer for the Falkland Islands and am responsible for helping to rehabilitate offenders back into the community. I cover all aspects of the work, from preparing reports for court, managing offenders in the community and within the prison population.”Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8578343158425987632.post-81364900320819747422016-01-19T01:21:28.691+00:002016-01-19T01:21:28.691+00:00Okay, so it was an orchestrated heist involving th...Okay, so it was an orchestrated heist involving the daylight robbery of £hundreds of millions of public money, but you have to ask yourself this question:<br /><br />*** Who gives a fuck? ***<br /><br />PAC? Clearly not.<br />HMG Opposition? Too busy fighting each other.<br />Unions? Never had a clue in the first place, and now all they're trying to do is catch up with the E3 debacle - another done deal they've missed by a country mile.<br />MPs? Not anymore.<br />Press? Not until there's an obviously linked tragedy, but even then some poor probation employee will be hung out to dry and the truth will be buried in the blame & shame game.<br /><br />And that's it.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8578343158425987632.post-21894023233793505762016-01-19T00:51:37.155+00:002016-01-19T00:51:37.155+00:00The 2013 post from ex-Serco necromancer Johnson ju...The 2013 post from ex-Serco necromancer Johnson just goes to prove that robbing the public purse is one of the more straightforward dark arts in the beancounters repertoire, and that the shafting of the probation service was clearly a well planned heist, although not quite The Italian Job, Ocean's Several, etc, etc:<br /><br />"But we are old-hands at this outsourcing game and know how to tick all those boxes. It comes down to price... We know that the MoJ is looking for a 30% cost saving... In order to make it work, we will have to: strip out overhead; look for significant redundancies on the frontline; take the remaining staff through a radical cultural change programme, rolling out a new rigour in performance management; and also find ways to deliver some of the court orders differently (for example, using call centres instead of face-to-face contact)."Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8578343158425987632.post-57767338973274650682016-01-18T22:07:04.751+00:002016-01-18T22:07:04.751+00:00A comment in the fourth paragraph from Allars is *...A comment in the fourth paragraph from Allars is *very* interesting: "We must be realistic about the level of service that we can expect from others".<br /><br />Recognition in NOMS that all is not well with the CRCs?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8578343158425987632.post-3550213436238612702016-01-18T19:53:21.385+00:002016-01-18T19:53:21.385+00:00Jim since privatisation have you noticed the decli...Jim since privatisation have you noticed the declining quality of commentary in blogging and increased crap being posted. Privatisation has destroyed the quality of probation Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8578343158425987632.post-62706211495111435232016-01-18T19:49:19.476+00:002016-01-18T19:49:19.476+00:00Here is hoping they get on with it no matter what ...Here is hoping they get on with it no matter what the demented plan they intend inflicting on us. Like you i am fed up with the speculation. Whatever outcome you can be rest those in command will be the winners and the rest of us who are currently holding the process together awaiting shafting round 2. So just get on with it rather than prolonging the agony.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8578343158425987632.post-19864816033527512892016-01-18T19:03:09.413+00:002016-01-18T19:03:09.413+00:00We were all of these things before the bastards sp...We were all of these things before the bastards split us up......a plague on your house for such wanton destruction.....as you can I am nowturning to sorcerery to right the wrongs of NOMSGandolfs brothernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8578343158425987632.post-90725499606087030922016-01-18T17:46:27.977+00:002016-01-18T17:46:27.977+00:00does the next segment give details of the new staf...does the next segment give details of the new staffing structure? Still rumours of POs being taken out of courts - is this true? Rumours of POs being taken out of teams and into prisons - is this true? Are offices mainly to be manned by an SPO and PSOs? I hope the next part of the article clarifies these things.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8578343158425987632.post-73755002009792840362016-01-18T14:40:28.153+00:002016-01-18T14:40:28.153+00:00Very useful to be reminded of Richard Johnson'...Very useful to be reminded of Richard Johnson's assessment. Later in the article he made the point that in order to make savings in the long-term from reductions in reoffending you have to invest. He quotes the following figures that are from 2008 but still give a clear picture of the costs.<br /><br />The total cost to the economy of crime committed by recent ex-prisoners was between £9.5bn–£13bn; of this, the cost of crime committed by offenders released from short prison sentences was around £7bn–£10bn a year. <br /><br />Johnson argued that to save you have to invest – a spend and save model. There is sound evidence that investing leads to savings in the long-term. This would mean providing new services, not cutting existing ones to the bone.<br /><br />Instead all the NPS offers is the slash and burn model – aka E3Netnippernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8578343158425987632.post-91858008545812389322016-01-18T11:23:46.413+00:002016-01-18T11:23:46.413+00:00TR was never about saving money, apparently:
Dame...TR was never about saving money, apparently:<br /><br />Dame Ursula Brennan, PAC 2014: "To pick up the point about savings and Treasury targets, Ministers have been clear from the start that this programme of reform is not designed to produce savings in and of itself..."<br /><br />And at the ebd of the witnesses' woeful performance the PAC recommended that the relevant departments "Write to us in six months to update us on their progress against the 2013 White Paper action plan." I wonder where that written update went to?<br /><br />However, way back in June 2013 a certain Jim Brown highlighted the following from a prospective bidder for a CRC area. Richard Johnson was managing director of Serco's Welfare to Work and wrote this in an article on his blogsite 'Buying Quality Performance'<br /><br />"If we are to win this contract, our tender will have to meet a quality ‘threshold’. But we are old-hands at this outsourcing game and know how to tick all those boxes. It comes down to price.<br /><br />We know that the MoJ is looking for a 30% cost saving. We are going to have to bid at around £20m per annum. For this, we will take on all court-directed activity, including new supervision orders for people receiving sentences of less than 12 months. It is not going to be easy! But our Board are very keen indeed for us to secure this contract. They have, after all, agreed with the shareholders some stretching growth targets that can only be achieved through new contract wins.<br /><br />We will inherit in Area F the ‘newco’ of transferring probation staff. In order to make it work, we will have to: strip out overhead; look for significant redundancies on the frontline; take the remaining staff through a radical cultural change programme, rolling out a new rigour in performance management; and also find ways to deliver some of the court orders differently (for example, using call centres instead of face-to-face contact).<br /><br />This transformation programme is going to cost us a lot of money, which is obviously going to have to come out of the £20m too.<br /><br />What this certainly is not is a rehabilitation revolution. It is not a mechanism to deliver a big decrease in re-offending. In order for that to be the case, real returns would have to be possible from the introduction of entirely new services over and above court orders. This conflicts with the objective of cuts. Payment by Results or outcome-based funding does not necessarily mean additional results – when combined with simple cost-cutting it generally just means de-risking public expenditure through shifting to cash-on-delivery."<br /><br />As Netnipper rightly highlights, Allars confirms the reality of the programme of cuts - a programme of slash & burn that was categorically denied in evidence given to the PAC.<br /><br />Constructive dismissal?<br /><br /><br /><br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8578343158425987632.post-30321137822008040802016-01-18T11:11:24.683+00:002016-01-18T11:11:24.683+00:00On the job evaluation exercise, I think the unions...On the job evaluation exercise, I think the unions should carefully consider whether they should be participants. This JE is essentially about making changes to contracts of employment and thus by their involvement the unions will be complicit in making these changes. JE gives off the air of being rational and objective, but really its purpose is to rubber stamp radical role changes and cheapen the workforce. Would it not be better to force the NPS to go down the changing contracts route? Netnippernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8578343158425987632.post-7701149485822018752016-01-18T10:05:00.000+00:002016-01-18T10:05:00.000+00:00The major influence for this upheaval in roles and...The major influence for this upheaval in roles and responsibilities is austerity. By the second paragraph there is reference to 'resources' and 'savings' and then, later, 'reducing costs'. Not a single mention of investment. If this blueprint, despite all the fine rhetoric about consistency, sharing best practice and excellence, failed to deliver financial savings it would be discarded. The only way they can make savings is by making cuts to staff costs, as these account for 80% of the budget. So there will be the charade of a job evaluation exercise which is a foregone conclusion. It will redesiginate roles and responsibilities to deliver a lower unit cost. And they don't believe compulsory redundancies will be necessary is the strongest reassurance they give on job securityNetnippernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8578343158425987632.post-46405469919073909352016-01-18T09:05:39.651+00:002016-01-18T09:05:39.651+00:00Correction: "... Expat Brits who don't or...Correction: "... Expat Brits who don't or won't speak Spanish."<br /><br />There's no such thing as "can't".Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8578343158425987632.post-3169976652167401802016-01-18T08:10:26.457+00:002016-01-18T08:10:26.457+00:00- TR formed the NPS as an entity but it did not es...- TR formed the NPS as an entity but it did not establish common ways of working across the organisation...<br />- For some of you the proposals are likely to require changes to the way you work...<br />- It is worth recognising that much of what we do will not change...<br />- The harder legacy is that we have also inherited significant differences in how we do our job, how many people do it at what level, and at what cost...<br />- It is worth recognising that much of what we do will not change...<br />- Transforming Rehabilitation has fundamentally changed the operating model for probation...<br />- It is worth recognising that much of what we do will not change...<br />- It was always recognised that there would need to be change in how some of our work is undertaken and by whom, once the NPS had been established...<br /> - It is worth recognising that much of what we do will not change...<br /><br />What a confused, mealy-mouthed, contradictory & desperate pile of poo...<br />"It is worth recognising that much of what I say will not make sense"Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8578343158425987632.post-73464372942455392182016-01-18T08:00:45.269+00:002016-01-18T08:00:45.269+00:00This document says it's based on evidence, whe...This document says it's based on evidence, where is it? Where's the evidence that existing "delivery models under probation trusts" don't work, eg local delivery units and 'end to end offender management'. These very same models in which all targets were met and a gold award was won. Isn't this why the highest risk work was left with the NPS and to be completed by qualified probation officers? The MoJ now wants to change job roles and the work we do. This is not to provide a better quality or service but simply because "the NPS caseload is higher than we had planned for. Implementation of the changes described here will release the capacity to absorb that work". This move is the result of NPS probation directors doing exactly what the likes of Sodexo Links et al are doing. Even though this is a "blueprint" meaning a draft in layman terms, we know they have already reduced the quality of PSR's, they are recruiting PO's to send them into prisons (despite some prisons closing and others getting rid of probation OMU staff), and they're recruiting PSO's to replace qualified PO's in the community. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com