Prisoner early release scheme paused by Andy Burnham may still go ahead
Probation union and crime victims had raised doubts over plan to free 6,000 offenders across England and Wales
An early release scheme for thousands of prisoners paused by Andy Burnham after an outcry from victims could still take place this autumn, despite warnings by probation officers of potential chaos.
The prime minister ordered an urgent review into the proposed early release of about 6,000 prisoners, due to begin in September with an initial group of about 700, saying he wanted to “minimise risk to the public” and would not hesitate to make changes.
But with government officials accepting that the prison system remains near capacity, and no appetite to use alternatives such as police cells beyond emergencies, it is unclear what options exist beyond continuing with the plan, even in a different form.
Victims groups had objected to the proposal for 6,000 people to be freed early under the new Sentencing Act, with Debbie Adlam, the mother of the police officer Andrew Harper, saying the proposed inclusion of two of her son’s killers – Jessie Cole and Albert Bowers – was “another letdown” for their family.
In the latest of a flurry of policy announcements since he took over in No 10 on Monday, Burnham said: “I am working closely with the new justice secretary and have instructed my team to put a pause on the changes that were due to start in September.
“No prisoners will be let out under this policy until we have conducted an urgent review and done everything we can to minimise risk to the public. Where changes are needed, we will not hesitate to make them.”
With officials warning that without the scheme, prisons in England and Wales will run out of capacity by November, the most likely outcome appears to be a tweak to the early release system, with some offenders held back.
Officials have refused to say if the plan could be amended to block early release for people convicted of offences against emergency workers, such as Harper’s killers, or against women and girls.
Alex Norris, the new justice secretary, told reporters on Thursday the government needed “time to get it right”. He said: “We’ve put an important pause on this policy. It gives us a little bit of time to look at this, to make sure we do our best by you.”
Probation officers have warned that a “sense of chaos” had descended across the Prison Service, with staff unable to make preparations for the mass release. Tania Bassett, Napo’s national officer, said that after the trade union asked the Prisons Service if staff should continue with preparations for the early release scheme, it was now informing them it has been paused.
She said: “Napo’s concern is this will mean probation staff stop doing pre-release work. Whatever the prime minister’s final decision is, he has created a delay as well as confusion amongst the staff tasked with dealing with this.
“He needs to be more decisive about critical public protection issues and we urge him to treat this situation with the upmost urgency.”
According to the union, preparations for release require probation staff to carry out extensive work that usually takes at least six to eight weeks.
This includes reviewing risk assessments, making referrals for accommodation, carrying out home visits, coordinating with victim liaison officers and domestic abuse support officers and developing multi-agency safeguarding plans.
It can also take several weeks to ensure that tagging measures are in place before an offender is placed in accommodation. Unless probation staff received “imminent, concrete direction” about who will be considered, established release plans could collapse, a union official said.
The review has caused chaos in prisons, where managers are responsible for calculating release dates over several weeks from 2 September.
The Sentencing Act 2026 introduced an “earned progression model” that replaces automatic halfway release for prisoners serving standard determinate sentences in England and Wales with a tiered, behaviour-based system.
It will allow most prisoners to be released after serving a third of their sentence behind bars rather than 50%, with the rest of their sentence served under strict supervision in the community with the help of electronic tagging.
Prisoners serving time for sexual or violent offences where the automatic release stage is set at two-thirds will become eligible for release at the halfway point, provided they have not committed serious breaches of prison rules.
This applies to Bowers and Cole, two of Harper’s killers who were jailed for 13 years in 2020 for manslaughter. Burnham confirmed that Henry Long, the main perpetrator, “will not be subject to any early release” under the scheme.
After news of the pause emerged, Debbie Adlam told ITV News that this was “not enough”. She said: “It’s a good start, and it really is a good basis to begin working on some sensible alternatives and looking at options for going forward, because there’s so many people this affects, it’s not just us.”
I’m a PP in London and we’ve been told that our senior leaders will get back to us by the end of next week to confirm any decisions re the Sentencing Act but until then all work is paused. In the meantime I’m due go on a prison visit to see someone who was due to be released on 2nd September. His sentence was reduced by about 5 weeks. What do I say to him? He has spent a lot of time locked up for long periods of the day due to a lack of staff. There have been no courses for him to demonstrate work re his offending behaviour and ETE is limited. As an SPO in my PDU remarked it’s a shit show.
ReplyDeleteWhat do I say to him?
Delete“You’re not being released early”
Victims and survivors cannot be put at the 'heart of justice' because nobody would ever be released. The pause will allow a few emotive cases to be adjusted and nothing else. This is a populist exercise, probably wise for a new PM. The basics remain however, most of these prisoners will have to be released or the system risks collapse.
ReplyDeletesox
Rehabilitation should be at the “heart”
DeleteI agree but it isn't. Punative revenge is the watch word now.
Deletesox.
Now we know why the Lord Shoemaker resigned. He knew his flagship policy was going to be kicked into the long grass.
ReplyDeleteLet’s be honest: none of us in probation asked for this policy. Every time the prisons reach capacity, the release valve is opened onto probation.
The problem is that the extra prisoners don’t come with extra probation staff, housing, treatment services or employment opportunities. Yet probation is expected to absorb thousands of additional people at short notice - AGAIN!
For months, probation staff at the mercy of narcissistic managers have been bombarded with demands to complete risk assessments, update records and prepare cases for early release. The emails and tasks have been relentless, the dashboards and spreadsheets multiply, and the administrative burden keeps growing. In return, we’re offered a token overtime payment with so many conditions attached and approvals required that many won’t even attempt to qualify.
If the Prime Minister is reviewing this policy, he should also reconsider the presumption against short custodial sentences. Until probation is properly funded and resourced, it makes little sense to keep transferring more responsibility into the community without the capacity to manage it safely.
And before anyone says “electronic tagging is the answer”, who is expected to monitor all those alerts? A probation practitioner carrying a caseload of 50 simply doesn’t have hours every morning to trawl through endless notifications.
If probation had any leadership it would have opposed much of the sentencing act from the outset - but not a single objection from probation. It’s telling that the police, prison governors and the POA have now openly welcomed the pause, while probation continues to present everything as business as usual. Those on the frontline know it isn’t and are waiting to breathe a sigh of relief and may actually be able to enjoy what’s left of the summer.
Every one on recall , learn some common sense and empathy probation folk your not the police
ReplyDeleteI agree probation isn't the police. But is the PP that gets scrutinised or rather blamed when an SFO occurs
DeletePerhaps Burnham could consider pausing short sentences that fill up the prisons with people who could be supervised. Ban Magistrates from making custodial sentences altogether. Most people would be happy to take on a few more cases with a 10% pay rise. But we know that we will end up with more work and less pay.
ReplyDeleteThat is the plan. But probation hasn’t capacity to support this and “everyone gets a tag” isn’t a credible answer.
DeleteClear as day evidence that the entire scheme was designed to prevent prison disturbances and disregard the wishes of ALL victims not just high profile ones
ReplyDeleteShit show
ReplyDeleteSeen on Twitter:-
ReplyDelete"And they wonder why we quit! We as staff have had enough of the lies, empty promises, meeting targets, being overworked and working long hours with no extra pay. Quitting was the best decision I made this year. Might be back when things change!"
Now’s the time to push for a decent pay rise and consider strike action whilst the matter is in the public eye
ReplyDeleteWhen early release was first mooted we should have struck then, without us the entire scheme would not have worked, they know it, prisons know it, since then we have limped along absorbing more cases all of which will not ( despite their claims to the contrary) be considered when there is an SFO….
DeleteFrom the Guardian:-
ReplyDeleteThe Southport killer Axel Rudakubana has been moved from prison to a psychiatric hospital after clinical assessment, the Guardian can disclose.
He was transferred to Broadmoor high-security hospital from the category A prison Belmarsh this week after it was concluded that he could not be managed safely in a prison environment, sources confirmed.
People in psychiatric units such as Broadmoor are treated as patients rather than prisoners. A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said he would remain locked up and is unlikely to ever be released.
The move is likely to anger many of the families of his victims, who will argue he was assessed as fit to stand trial in January 2025.
It means the cost of his incarceration will rise. Costs for patients in hospital secure units are more than £300,000 each a year, compared with about £60,000 for prisoners, Whitehall sources said.
Rudakubana, 19, from Banks, Lancashire, was jailed for life in January 2025, with a minimum sentence of 52 years, for the “sadistic” murders of Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven, Bebe King, six, and nine-year-old Alice da Silva Aguiar.
He attacked eight other children, the class instructor Leanne Lucas, and businessman John Hayes, who had tried to disarm him at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class on 29 July 2024 in Southport. He was also found guilty of producing the biological toxin ricin and of possessing an al-Qaida training manual, an offence under the Terrorism Act.
Alder Hey children’s NHS foundation trust confirmed Rudakubana had been under its care as a mental health patient between 2019 and 2023, when he “stopped engaging”. He was referred to them after taking a knife to school and later saying he had done so “to use it”.
He was also referred to the UK’s counter-extremism programme, Prevent, because he had been researching school massacres on a computer at his next school, the Acorns.
There were two other referrals to Prevent, but none were progressed as Rudakubana had no clear ideology behind his obsession with violence.
In May 2025, Rudakubana attacked a prison officer with boiling water, sparking an internal inquiry at Belmarsh.
Responding to the move to Broadmoor, Mark Fairhurst, the national chair of the POA union, which represents prison, correctional, and secure psychiatric workers, said his members believed he was “playing the system” so he could move to a more comfortable environment.
DeleteHe said: “[Rudakubana] is not mentally unwell. He is playing the system and is nothing more than evil. He should spend his entire sentence in solitary confinement staring at four walls.
“It is appalling to think that he will now enjoy all the freedoms a secure hospital is forced to give him and even more unjustified is the taxpayer actually paying him benefits because he is now classed as mentally unwell.
“It is POA members who will now have to carry out the wishes of those who think he can be cured. This is a sickening development and my thoughts are with the families of the victims and all those who have been affected by his atrocious crime.”
Broadmoor, in Crowthorne, Berkshire, is the oldest of England’s three high security psychiatric hospitals. It has been used to hold some of the UK’s most notorious murderers, including Peter Sutcliffe, the Yorkshire Ripper.
Patients remain locked up, with conditions heavily regulated by strict physical security including locked wards, monitored by staff and 24-hour CCTV. They receive mandatory therapeutic and rehabilitative programmes. If offenders no longer require treatment in hospital, the 1983 Mental Health Act provides for a swift return to prison.
If an offender presents an increased risk and cannot be managed safely in a prison environment because of a mental disorder, a request to be moved to a secure psychiatric unit can be made by clinical professionals.
Sources said the act and the clinical assessments meant ministers had no choice but to accept the request to transfer the prisoner in this instance.
A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: “The families of those murdered and injured in Southport will be in this country’s heart for ever and our thoughts remain with them.
“The offender who carried out these vile crimes will rightly spend the entirety of his 52-year custodial sentence locked up, and is unlikely to ever be released.
“High secure hospitals are not places of freedom. He will remain under constant supervision in a high-security psychiatric unit, and be returned to prison as soon as possible.
“The transfer of an offender follows a robust independent clinical assessment.”
… because Mark Fairhurst, the national chair of the POA union is a psychologist now !!
DeleteWhy be like that he's an experienced officer and knows how people are moved within institutions. He is merely making the stages known not suggesting he has some intellect on the subject
DeleteIt turns out the defence submitted no medical report. In my view such reports should be requested by the court and not left at discretion of defence or prosecution. There was a guilty plea as well.
Delete09:04, whatever you think of Mark Fairhurst and/or the POA, they have a proven track record of defending their union and taking action to protect their members rights and working conditions. Have a look at how prison officers wages have increased over the last twenty five years and compare that to what has happened in probation.
ReplyDeleteLook at the column inches in newspapers or the time involved in news broadcasts and compare it to NAPO.
Have a look at who jumps, and how high when the POA indulge in sabre rattling and give some thought to which is more effective, their stance or the tub thumping from another quarter.
Yes, the POA have their faults, ( many of them,) but as a trades union in the CJS they are well respected for good reason
.. but he’s still not a psychologist!
Delete“ Yes, the POA have their faults,” - and maybe this is why prisons are in chaos.
“Compare it to NAPO” - I’d rather not!
I think the ref to tub thumper is Napo GS a blow hard under achiever
DeleteThe record speaks for itself as poa enjoy their terms. I do not understand the attack on the chair of poa though as the shift to hospital states an assesment by independent. Are we to assume this was not a required medical assesment .
BBC News website:-
ReplyDeleteA lawyer for the families of the children murdered by Southport killer Axel Rudakubana says his transfer from prison to Broadmoor psychiatric hospital is an attempt by him to "manipulate the system".
Rudakubana, 19, was given a life sentence for the murder of three children - Alice da Silva Aguiar, 9, Bebe King, 6, and Elsie Dot Stancombe, 7 - and attempted murder of eight other children and two adults.
On Thursday, Rudakubana was moved from HMP Belmarsh to a high-security psychiatric hospital in Berkshire.
Prisoners who present a risk to staff, other inmates or themselves because of mental disorders can be moved to psychiatric units under the Mental Health Act.
Next Wednesday marks two years since Rudakubana carried out the attack at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class on 29 July 2024.
Lawyer Chris Walker, who represents the three bereaved families, said they were made aware of the transfer in the last two days.
"It is safe to say that whilst this news would devastate them at any time, the fact that this has occurred as we approach the second anniversary in our view is another move by AR who would appear to be attempting, once again, to manipulate the system," he added.
"We have been given the barest of details and whilst we are supporting the families through this we are urgently seeking a meeting with the appropriate authorities to understand the situation before commenting further."
In May 2025 there was an investigation after Rudakubana allegedly attacked a prison officer with boiling water.
The Southport Public Inquiry has heard evidence about his past mental health conditions.
Confirming the transfer on Thursday, the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) said the families of those murdered and injured would be in the country's heart forever and "our thoughts remain with them" and said it does not change Rudakubana's sentence.
Rudakubana was given a 52-year prison sentence in January 2025 but the judge was unable to impose a whole life order due to Rudakubana being 17 when he carried out the attack. He will likely never be released.
Under the Mental Health Act, the MoJ is likely to have had no choice but to accept doctors' recommendations about whether Rudakubana could be held safely in prison.
The law requires he be transferred back to prison when he no longer requires treatment in hospital. His sentence is not being converted into a "hospital order", which would mean he stayed at Broadmoor.
https://insidetime.org/newsround/andy-burnham-halts-thousands-of-early-prison-releases/
ReplyDeleteNot one Area Excecutive, PDU Head or Dep Head will give two hoots how this affects PO and PSO staff (and admin), they just want to hit targets and continue up the greasy pole, and let's be honest, even those SPO's who try to manage there teams wellbeing will just keep shovelling the shit downwards as that's all they can do. Until us frontline staff are allowed to appraise Deps & Heads performance annually which can be fed into their performance targets and pay, they honestly don't give a crap about us. Please, on James McEwens next all staff call please can everyone stop shouting out all thos positive crap they ask for and start telling him just how shite it is on the coal face....
ReplyDeleteWeird post. I disagree with your points.
DeleteMakes clear sense.
Delete“… Area Excecutive, PDU Head or Dep Head … just want to hit targets and continue up the greasy pole, … even those SPO's … just keep shovelling the shit downwards … they honestly don't give a crap about us. … just how shite it is on the coal face..”
Spot on 14;42……..
Delete@anon 15:57 "I disagree” is a perfectly legitimate position. It’s just a shame you stopped before getting to the interesting bit.
Delete@15:57 disagreeing is fine but it's useful to explain why so, do you think senior management actually do care about officers or what?
Deletehttps://www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/comment/public-protection-prison-releases
ReplyDelete'Getafix
Managing prison capacity provides an early test of Andy Burnham’s ability to grapple with trade-offs, argues Cassia Rowland
DeleteOnce again, a new prime minister faces the imminent prospect of running out of prison spaces. Andy Burnham has months, rather than the weeks Keir Starmer had on taking office in 2024 – but he also has even fewer options. The measures taken by the previous government freed up some breathing room, but were not enough to get the prison population on a stable trajectory long term. Having paused the planned early releases in September, the new prime minister must now choose among bad options. In doing so he should make public protection his first priority.
Previous governments made promises they couldn’t keep on sentencing
Prisons are not quite at breaking point, as they were before Labour’s first wave of early releases in September 2024. But they are close: men’s prisons are 97% full. The prison population is projected to keep rising, as more people are being prosecuted and many are held in custody for long periods waiting for trial. Prison capacity is also expected to grow, as new prisons are built and existing ones expanded – but if planned reforms are scrapped or significantly watered down, it will not be enough to keep up.
The fundamental cause of this problem was a failure to match prison places with demand, particularly in the early 2020s. In 2020, the Johnson government increased time in prison for certain serious offences by a third. In 2022, the Sunak government did the same for a much wider group of offences, attracting a sentence of four years or more. But in doing so, they were making promises they couldn’t keep. It was already clear in 2020 that there wasn’t enough capacity in prisons to absorb this increase, and by 2022 the problem was becoming acute. It was always extremely unlikely that the prison building programme would be able to keep up. It is now victims who pay the price when it is impossible to honour those sentences.
Early releases are the only credible solution – the question is who, how and when
Releasing people early is unfortunately the only alternative to running out of spaces to imprison people newly arrested or convicted. We cannot build enough spaces quickly enough to meet demand. Using army barracks, barges or similar simply would not provide enough spaces, even if they could be made secure and safe, and prisons are already at their limit for doubling or tripling up cells. However undesirable, early releases are generally safer for the public and victims than not being able to imprison people offending now.
The only question then is who gets released, how and when. Labour’s first early release scheme means less serious offenders are already being released after 40% of their sentence, rather than 50%. The new measures would lower that further to 33%. But sentence lengths have grown substantially over time, which means that a large proportion of prisoners are serving long sentences: 70% of sentenced prisoners are serving at least four years, and around half are serving at least seven – up from 40% in 2016. Freeing up enough space in prisons means either further reducing how much time short sentence prisoners spend in custody – perhaps as low as 15–20% of their sentence – or tackling sentences for more serious offenders.
Those serving the most serious sentences, who are deemed ‘dangerous’ or ‘of particular concern’ for terror or sexual offences, are already excluded from the planned reforms. There may be additional options around allowing carve-outs for prison governors to intervene to stop someone they think is immediately dangerous from being released. But these would be logistically difficult and open to legal challenge. Ensuring close communication with the probation service so that such offenders are effectively supervised on release is likely to be more workable as a means of keeping the public safe.
Reading through these comments, I keep coming back to leadership.
ReplyDeleteFrontline PPs are held accountable every single day. Our work is audited, our decisions are scrutinised, SFOs are investigated, performance is measured, targets are monitored and our professional judgement is constantly tested.
But where is the same level of accountability for leadership?
If sickness continues to rise, experienced staff continue to leave, morale continues to decline and teams repeatedly report feeling unsupported, at what point do we ask whether leadership itself should be examined with the same rigour as frontline practice?
Leadership isn’t measured by how many dashboards are green or whether another corporate target has been met. It’s measured by whether people feel supported, whether experienced staff choose to stay, whether new staff develop into confident practitioners and whether teams feel psychologically safe enough to speak up when something isn’t right.
Too often the burden of organisational failure is pushed downwards. We hear about resilience, wellbeing and culture, yet many frontline staff describe micromanagement, constant performance monitoring and an inability to challenge decisions without fear of consequences.
Perhaps it’s time we introduced genuine upward accountability. If practitioners are expected to evidence their performance, perhaps leadership should also be assessed by those they lead. Not as a popularity contest, but because leadership has consequences. It shapes morale, retention, psychological safety and ultimately public protection.
The irony is that probation asks practitioners to build trusting relationships because we know they change lives. Yet if we don’t value those same principles within our own organisation, we shouldn’t be surprised when trust continues to erode from the inside out.
High-quality supervision after release will do more to keep the public safe than longer in prison
ReplyDeleteAlmost all prisoners will eventually be released, and there is little to suggest that longer sentences make people less likely to reoffend on release. The most important way to protect victims and the public is to have effective, high-quality supervision by the probation service once someone leaves prison. That includes both necessary support on things like housing, and effective risk assessment processes to safeguard victims and the public.
That is not currently happening. The chief inspector of probation is so concerned about the quality of risk assessment in probation that he has paused their regular inspection work to focus exclusively on public protection. Over 2024 and 2025, two thirds of probation units inspected were rated ‘inadequate’ across all areas of service delivery, meaning that fewer than half of cases met the required standard.
In this context, ensuring victim and public safety should be the new justice secretary’s first priority. That means increasing the resources available to probation, such as through commissioned third sector services. It means pressing on with policy changes to target supervision and support where it is most needed. But it also means prioritising safeguarding over punishment. That includes not imposing home detention on prison leavers unless there has been an adequate domestic abuse risk assessment carried out. And it includes making sure there are spaces available in prison for those who pose an immediate risk.
There are no easy answers here. But the only way to avoid a return to this position and letting more victims down in future is to grasp a long-term solution to the capacity crisis.
I often find myself genuinely puzzled by this.
ReplyDeleteGovernments spend enormous amounts of time and money trying to solve problems within individual departments, yet so many of those problems are simply the visible consequences of failures somewhere else.
Prison overcrowding isn’t just a prison problem. Neither is probation a probation problem. Both sit downstream of decisions about housing, education, mental health, addiction services, children’s services, employment, policing and the courts. Probation probably sees that interconnectedness more clearly than almost any other public service because all those failures eventually arrive on our desks.
By the time someone reaches probation or prison, those systems have often already failed them in multiple ways.
We talk endlessly in probation about identifying the “golden thread” running through an individual’s assessment. Yet government rarely seems to look for the golden thread running through society itself. Instead, each department is expected to solve the consequences that have been handed to it by another.
Prison overcrowding isn't simply a prison crisis. Probation workloads aren't simply a probation problem. They are symptoms of a much wider public service capacity crisis. Sentencing policy, court delays and prison capacity all matter, but they are only part of the picture.
What puzzles me is why government and the public continues to debate each crisis in isolation when the evidence points to them being interconnected. Review after review is commissioned into prisons, probation, mental health, homelessness or addiction, yet it's rarely asked why the same people keep moving between all of those systems.
Until government starts addressing those issues as part of one connected system, we’ll continue lurching from one crisis to the next, building more prisons, trying to recruit more probation staff and announcing more reforms, while treating the symptoms rather than the causes.
The premise is sound: high-quality probation supervision is one of the best ways to protect the public. But that statement is only meaningful if government is prepared to ask the next question: what makes high-quality supervision possible?
ReplyDeleteIt isn’t created by aspiration or ministerial announcements. It is created by experienced practitioners with manageable workloads, supported by stable leadership, housing, mental health provision, substance misuse services and partner agencies that have the capacity to respond.
By the time someone reaches probation, multiple public services have often already failed them. Expecting probation alone to compensate for those failures is neither fair nor realistic.
My concern is that this review risks creating an even greater expectation that probation will somehow make early release “safe”. If that becomes the political narrative, then the responsibility for public protection shifts further onto probation without a corresponding shift in investment.
If government wants probation to become the cornerstone of public protection, then it cannot continue to treat it as the poor relation of the criminal justice system. Pay, recruitment, retention and professional autonomy are not workforce issues—they are public protection issues. You cannot expect increasingly complex risk management decisions from a service that continues to lose experienced staff faster than it can replace them.
The uncomfortable truth is this: when an SFO occurs, it is the probation practitioner whose decisions are scrutinised, not the years of policy decisions that left that practitioner carrying an excessive workload, supervising too many high-risk cases and working in a system stretched beyond capacity.
If probation is expected to shoulder ever greater responsibility for public safety, then government must shoulder an equal responsibility for creating the conditions that make effective supervision possible. Otherwise, the expectation simply becomes another burden placed on the very people already holding the system together.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/england/suffolk
ReplyDeleteFrederick Day, from Ipswich, was paid an extra £2,169 between February 2025 and January by the DWP due to a system error.
The 68-year-old then succeeded in stopping the DWP crediting his account with a further £1,400 he was not entitled to in May, only for the payment to land in his bank account in July.
"It's not right us customers have to pay for their mistakes and I would be disappointed if they asked for the money back.
"You struggle every week to keep your head above water and then all of a sudden you find yourself £3,500 in debt through no fault of your own," he added. "I did the right thing but millions of people wouldn't bother - they would just keep the money."
c'est la guerre.
Headline from the Times. (Paywall).
ReplyDeleteProbation officers could be given veto on early release of prisoners.
No we don’t want it to be our decision. So when it goes wrong we are blamed
Deletehttps://www.facebook.com/timesandsundaytimes/photos/prison-governors-and-probation-officers-could-be-given-a-veto-on-the-release-of-/1492004079623650/?set=a.629249029232497
ReplyDeleteYour fighting for an organisation and culture which is now defunct the probation service is a policing function pure and simple ran by 20 something robots Gey out and go to a YJS if you want to help people involved in offending , probation is not that organisation
ReplyDeleteThe managed decline was always part of the plan to replace the name Probation from the service as this implies help and assistance……the putative UK Correctional service is purely to manage and mitigate risk and is indeed the way things are heading, one only has to experience the paucity of the in line training to see how autonomy is not encouraged or required on this journey……..set for 2030……
ReplyDeletePrecis of data posted on a previous blog thread:
ReplyDelete2026 - Total Workforce: About 21,007 full-time equivalent employees managing roughly 240,000 at 31 Mar 2026
5,573 FTE band 4 probation officers
5,785 FTE band 3 probation services officers in post
* 11,358 frontline staff managing almost 1/4 million cases
2007:
Total Workforce: About 21,245 full-time equivalent employees managing 242,720 cases at 31 Dec 2007.
8,265.35 probation officers
6,506.78 probation services officers
*14,871 frontline staff managing almost 1/4 million cases.
That's 3,500 fte staff short to manage the same number of cases, but with substantial increases in procedure, protocol, processing, accountability, risk profiles, etc, etc.
The shakers & movers behind this utter shitshow - a total failure of [using their words] "protecting the public" - have NEVER been held accountable & have since been rewarded with promotions, gongs &/or vast sums of public cash, e.g. grayling, romeo, rees, spurr, etc etc & all of their lickspittle lackeys.
* The total probation caseload in England and Wales was 239,041 at the end of June 2010
*The total annual probation caseload in England and Wales for 2012 reached 224,823
*In England and Wales, the total probation caseload on June 30, 2013, stood at 219,548
* The total probation caseload in England and Wales at the end of June 2015 was 228,844
* In 2016 the total probation caseload in England and Wales reached a series peak of 267,146
* In 2021, the total number of offenders supervised on probation in England and Wales was 238,500 at the end of December
* The total probation caseload in England and Wales at the end of December 2022 was 240,431 offenders
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5a7489cd40f0b61938c7e41f/offender-management-stats-qtly-bullet-july-sept10.pdf
https://data.justice.gov.uk/probation/offender-management/caseload-total
3,500 shy of 2007's staffing complement, yet they claim 1,300 new recruits will paper over the cracks.
DeleteDo any of these articles sound familiar?
https://www.crimeandjustice.org.uk/sites/default/files/Probation%20Resources%2C%20Staffing%20and%20Workloads%202001-2008%20revised%20edition.pdf
"At present probation areas are being forced to plan to make reductions in staff, yet the recent fall in the numbers of professionally trained practitioners working with offenders must cause concern... it is true that the number of probation services officers has increased dramatically but qualified probation officers surely remain at the heart of effective work with offenders."
Inmates go free to ease jail crisis | UK news
The Guardian - 29 Jun 2007 — "1,200 'non-dangerous' offenders walked out of prison up to 18 days early yesterday as the government's emergency package to ease the jails ..."
"Prison Overcrowding Intersect: Record prison populations forced emergency early-release schemes, transferring immense downstream pressure back onto overstretched community probation supervisors"
But at least in 2008 Labour had ***some*** principled MPs: "The Offender Management Act 2007 sparked intense political friction, with over 40 Labour MPs forcing a government climbdown over plans to outsource core public sector probation tasks."
All it took was a tory govt & willing simple serpents & hey!presto! - TR.
Defo
ReplyDelete"There is no early general election. 20 plus million people voted for a manifesto. We're in a parliamentary democracy so that is what people voted for and I will honour that manifesto."
ReplyDeleteburnham on't'beeb has sparked outrage from the british public:
* "Politics is the only occupation I know where blatant, bare faced lying to protect your job, is admired and encouraged. Every poll makes it clear that the majority of voters think he has no mandate and a GE is needed."
* "Yes, we do want a General Election, Cuckoo Burnham. You have no mandate or legitimacy."
* "Andy Burnham has zero mandate. He wasn't even an MP in the 2024 General Election."
* "He's no better than Angela Rayner, with her refusal to pay back £16k severance pay. One rule for thee, another for me."
* "By not calling an election he just looks like a wannabe king."
________________________________________________________
"Accusations and formal findings of genocide in Gaza center on Israel's military campaign and total siege, which international bodies, UN experts, and human rights organizations argue are conducted with the intent to destroy the Palestinian population"
Let's look at his choice of leaders in this "parliamentary democracy". Burnham's Cabinet & associated ministers do not accept or recognise the ongoing genocide in Gaza. Why?
# john healey - labour together & pro-israel lobbyist + authorised UK spy planes to operate on behalf of israel
# ed milliband - pro-israel lobbyist - "I owe israel a great debt"
# douglas alexander - pro-israel lobbyist - "israel needs to deepen ties with the settler state"
# dan jarvis - pro-israel lobbyist - "labour advocates for a jewish state"
# wes streeting - pro-israel lobbyist + labour together
# dan tomlinson - wrote article "How Labour can take inspiration from Israel"
# jo white - pro israel lobbyist + labour together
# john mann - pro-israel + labour together
# alex norris, ellie reeves, james purnell - pro-israel
(Labour Together is a key political think tank linked closely to the leadership of the Labour Party, aligned with groups like Labour Friends of Israel... A significant portion of top Labour figures and cabinet-level members have historical affiliations or have received backing tied to pro-Israel networks, such as Labour Friends of Israel (LFI) and major donors like Sir Trevor Edwin Chinn CVO - a British businessman and political activist. He is a Labour Party supporter and donor as well as active in Jewish and pro-Israel causes. *In November 2024* he was awarded the Israeli Presidential Medal of Honour for service to the state of Israel.)
from 'thelondoneconomic':
ReplyDelete"Gary Lineker is one of over 100 millionaires calling on the government to implement taxes that would see them pay more.
This week, the group Patriotic Millionaires wrote an open letter to Andy Burnham urging his government to introduce a 2% tax on wealth over £10m.
The letter reads: “We want you to tax us. We can afford it. We’re not talking about higher taxes on those who get up and go to work for their income every day, but on the very richest whose income is derived from the wealth they hold.”
It adds: “As you decentralise political power, you should also disperse economic power. Extreme wealth sitting idle in the hands of a few can be put to work: reducing inequality, investing in sustainable jobs, strengthening hospitals, schools and social care, supporting entrepreneurs with the skills and infrastructure they need, and giving small businesses access to affordable finance. Our wealth is our country’s secret weapon - let’s get serious about using it.”
Other signatories on the letter included music producer Brian Eno, film director Richard Curtis, novelist Val McDermid and former financial trader Gary Stevenson."
Whaddya reckon? Are the disgustingly wealthy going to let a handful of angsting worthy millionaires persuade burnham & co to impose such a tax? I don't think so. There are roughly 3 million millionaires and 157 billionaires in the UK. Official Office for National Statistics figures show the entry threshold for the wealthiest 1% of households starts at £3,121,500.
Don't get me wrong... I wish them well, but hold out no hope for any such change. Too much power & influence exists in the hands of the obscenely wealthy.
https://patrioticmillionaires.uk/
burnham's labour won't touch the ultra wealthy because, well, just because... but he will happily attack the considerably less well off:
Delete"Pensioners who exceed the £35,000 income threshold and receive a Winter Fuel Payment will be charged extra tax every month until the money is fully repaid, unless they opt out of receiving the payment...The automatic recovery of Winter Fuel Payments for those with an annual income exceeding £35,000 applies across the whole of the UK."
"Patriotic Millionaires wrote an open letter to Andy Burnham urging his government to introduce a 2% tax on wealth over £10m."
A £10 million cash savings pot in the UK yielding an assumed 4% interest rate (£400,000 gross annual income), gives net after-tax income of approximately £220,000 per year... which would cover the 2% tax the patriotic crew as suggesting. And they'd still have £10million in the bank to cover the £33 extra tax for the heating allowance they didn't opt out from.
Pride: Thinking you are better or more important than others.
Greed: Wanting too much money or wealth.
Envy: Feeling angry when someone else has something good.
Gluttony: Eating or drinking much more than you need.
Wrath: Feeling a wild and out-of-control burst of rage/anger
Lust: Having a very strong and selfish desire for sexual pleasure.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m002ydrr/shabaz-asks-are-billionaires-bad
Deletewell worth a watch
https://www.civilserviceworld.com/professions/article/key-officials-appointed-to-lead-no10-north-and-onegov-delivery-agency
ReplyDelete"On Tuesday, the government announced a series of machinery of government (MoG) changes, including a new Office of the Prime Minister and Cabinet to be led by the cabinet secretary Dame Antonia Romeo, the prime minister Andy Burnham and first secretary of state Louise Haigh.
The OPMC will house No.10, the new No.10 North and a slimmed-down Cabinet Office, while a new OneGov Delivery Agency will also be established “within the Cabinet Office family”... A number of strategic functions will be transferred into No.10 North, including local economic growth and devolution strategy from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government and local economic growth policy from HM Treasury... "
see also:
https://www.civilserviceworld.com/in-depth/article/breaking-up-is-hard-to-do-mog-changes
"MoG changes – what are they good for? We look back on 20 years of what some Whitehall watchers affectionately call “rearranging the deckchairs” to see what’s worked, and what’s been a waste of time and money. Note: This article was originally published on 5 February 2025"
The civil service seems to be a paradoxical organisation in which both of the following apply:
1. The only constant is change
(ascribed to Greek thinker Heraclitus, who said that life is always flowing like water in a river)
2. Repeat the same mistake & expect a different outcome
(apparently a line from Rita Mae Brown's 1983 novel Sudden Death... NOT Einstein)
A shift in organisational thinking?
ReplyDeleteIf anyone has had an SFO, or have found that their decision making has been influenced by the fear of someone on their caseload committing an SFO (I expect that would be most), the following may be of interest.
https://hmiprobation.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/document/serious-further-offence-reviews-promoting-a-culture-of-learning-in-probation/
'Getafix
The survey ran from 25 July to 23 August 2024. There were 245 completed survey responses.
DeleteThe majority of the respondents had direct experience of an SFO, whether as the probation practitioner managing the case (44 per cent), their line manager (14 per cent), or as a colleague (7 per cent).
39 per cent of all respondents were not satisfied that the HMPPS SFO reviews were helpful, with 30 per cent responding positively to this question
55 per cent did not believe there was sufficient support for staff involved in SFO reviews, with 20 per cent responding positively
of those with direct experience of an SFO review (as a practitioner or line manager), 58 per cent did not believe there was a sufficient learning opportunity for the team as part of the process, with only 15 per cent responding positively.
In their survey comments, probation professionals told us about their anger at the culture of blame which they believed characterised SFO reviews.
SFO RMs believed that the review process was insufficiently transparent and that this was driving practitioner anxieties and myths about reviews.
*** "driving practitioner anxieties & myths about reviews" *** Not very balanced opinion, marty.
Here's his 2026 annual report:
https://hmiprobation.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/document/annual-report-2026/
I'd really like to know who works in the Policy unit for Probation and decides on operational changes and what makes them qualified to enact major changes, the new Tiering system for example has some merit to it but also many flaws. Do they ever ask PO's and PSO's for input, maybe that needs to be paused as well so they can take on board ant critique? They haven't even fully decided how it affects all the Pops so far (eg IOM flagged cases) which is just very shoddy.
ReplyDeletehttps://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6981de9d19d3abdb495f3749/HMPPS_Org_Chart_February_2026.pdf
Deletemcewen, jarman-howe, kte, herrington, grey + area exec directors + any number of faceless, nameless lobbyists.
Plenty of jobs at https://www.civilservicejobs.service.gov.uk
ReplyDelete11 x PMO/Project Support Officer (Ref: 19725)
The national salary range is £35,335 - £37,847, London salary range is £40,014 - £42,859
A Civil Service Pension with employer contribution of 28.97%
Location
East Midlands (England), East of England, London (region), North East England, North West England, Scotland, South East England, South West England, Wales, West Midlands (England), Yorkshire and the Humber
5 x Lead Developer (Ref: 20125)
The national salary is £58,511 - £65,329. London salary is £63,343 - £70,725
A Civil Service Pension with employer contribution of 28.97%
Location
East Midlands (England), East of England, London (region), North East England, North West England, Scotland, South East England, South West England, Wales, West Midlands (England), Yorkshire and the Humber
Interesting that in addition to all the standard civil service benefits if you work in MOJ you also get
Delete"Employees are allocated 10% of their working time for personal and professional development.
A £1k per person learning budget is in place to support all our people, with access to best-in-class conferences and seminars, accreditation with professional bodies, fully funded vocational programmes and e-learning platforms."
We get MyLearning...
Do probation staff get employer contributions of 28% to their pensions?
DeleteSuggest you email James McEwen Chief Executive Officer HMPPS setting out the issues.
ReplyDeleteJames.McEwen@justice.gov.uk Says he is open to suggestions to improve matters. Probably the only person anyone at HQ will listen to so worth a shot.
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6a58f62a3ae256c99b702f71/HMPPS-Business-Strategy_2026-to-2029.pdf
ReplyDelete"Since becoming the Chief Executive Officer of HMPPS, I have seen first-hand how our staff show resilience, compassion, and professionalism in all that they do. I have spent time listening to colleagues and leaders across our services, and to partners who work alongside us. What I keep hearing is very clear - we have courageous people doing extraordinary jobs."
"Probation Service: serves communities and works in partnership to manage, engage and support people to change their lives. We do this by delivering services that protect the public, support victims, rehabilitate and reduce reoffending." (note the order of priorities.)
"We have purposely set a 3-year timeframe so that we are funded and realistic about the progress we can make over this spending period. Beyond the 3 years, we have high expectations for HMPPS to become an increasingly modern and innovative service." (not efficient or effective or excellent then?)
"We will track delivery by setting ambitious yet realistic and affordable objectives in our annual business planning cycle" (you're being watched very closely)
"The Our Future Probation Service (OFPS) programme is addressing the imbalance between staff available and workload, to help deliver a probation service that is more effective and able to cope with workload pressures." (see also: the new choreography, noms, trust status, tr, etc ad nauseaum... word salad & empty promises from desk jockeys desperate to move to a bigger desk, on eye-watering salaries funded by the taxpayer).
"In probation: We will deliver sentences of the courts in a timely way that inspires rehabilitation and public confidence, focusing on culture, leadership, accountability, and systematic support. We will improve the quality of assessment, planning, and risk management, deploying digital and capacity enablers to support practitioners... there are a small set of metrics that are good indicators of whether we are being successful:
o Assessment and planning quality
o Risk management quality
o Unpaid work completions
o Accredited programme completions
o Staff resignation rates
o Probation capacity"
Here's the luvverly platitude that ALL strategic documents must contain:
"Moving forward, HMPPS Chief Executive Officer and the HMPPS Leadership Team (HLT) will be accountable for this strategy and for ensuring it is delivered successfully."
see also: antonia romeo, "the responsible officer" for the tr fiasco. Just how accountable was she for the shitshow?