This report in the Guardian from Tuesday about a mental health diversion from custody scheme in London is extremely heartening. Based at Thames Magistrates Court, a female psychologist is available to interview and assess women coming through the system and in effect offer the court alternatives to prison, including on-going support during community sentences.
This service is provided by a mental health charity 'Together' and part funded by the London Probation Trust and Primary Care Trusts. Without doubt an absolutely brilliant idea, but it raises a lot of questions. Why is the service not available to men and why isn't such a service available at all Magistrates courts and all Probation Trusts? Everyone seems to agree that the service has enormous beneficial effect - it was highlighted by the Bradley Report and Reforming Women's Justice - so why isn't such a facility felt to be important enough for core funding?
I have spent years failing to persuade those in authority above us of the value of having access to psychological services for the benefit of our clients and to give expert support and guidance to officers supervising deeply disturbed clients. I well remember raising the issue with a senior NHS person in the lunch queue at a plush conference and was told that 'a Community Psychiatric Nurse was cheaper'. Such ignorance in high places still amazes me.
Having experienced privatised criminal justice - a Cat-B prison - I am profoundly ambivalent about this development.
ReplyDeleteObviously cutting costs and increasing profits is the core business purpose of any private company and I discovered that this was done through employing staff at extremely low wages and attempting to restrict the levels of staff and the service they provide.
However, private companies can also bring a strand of new thinking to bear on the business problems they face. Assuming that Probation suffers from the same managerialist bureaucratic mind as the Prison Service, it may be that a private company could import some new thinking.
Obviously, though, they have to be closely scrutinised as they develop their services. That makes a case for a more robust Inspectorate but not necessarily a case against the involvement of private companies in criminal justice across the board.