What Voters Think

Thanks go once again to ace contibutor 'Getafix for truffling out an outfit I've never heard of before - Common Ground Justice Project - who claim to not only know what voters think is wrong with our criminal justice system, but what they think would fix it! This is one of my biggest takeaways:-

"Of key institutions, only the police narrowly retain majority confidence (51%) – with prisons (41%), probation (38%) and youth justice (33%) lowest."

Held to Account 

Understanding the crisis of public confidence in British criminal justice – and what voters want to change. 

Finding common ground on crime and justice 

With prisons full and reoffending high, the UK's criminal justice system isn’t working. Victims feel ignored and voters feel powerless. But a noisy, polarised debate on crime is getting in the way of change. The Common Ground Justice Project listens to the public across divides, finding common ground for a new way forward on criminal justice in the UK. We are an independent non-profit initiative, hosted by the Centre for Justice Innovation (UK charity no. 1151939)

What We Do
01 LISTEN ACROSS DIVIDES We conduct creative research and deep listening exercises across the UK, listening to voters, victims and communities who don’t feel heard.

02 FIND COMMON GROUND We uncover shared values and ideas on crime that cut across divides – uncovering a new way forward with broad public support.

03 SPARK BOLD ACTION We create a more constructive conversation on crime, shifting policy towards common ground solutions that cut crime and rebuild trust.

Foreword
I know what it means to be held to account. When I was 19, I threw a single punch that killed James Hodgkinson. I went to prison for manslaughter. It wasn't till years later, through restorative justice, that I sat down with James’s parents, Joan and David, and faced the harm I had caused in a much deeper way.

During that meeting there was no escaping that harm. Nor should there have been. Joan and David were able to tell me directly what my actions had done to them and their family. I had to listen, acknowledge it and take responsibility.

That process taught me something about justice that punishment alone never could. It gave me the motivation to completely change my life.

Joan and David still believe my sentence was too short. But over time, the question of accountability became about more than the length of my prison sentence: they wanted me to take responsibility for what I did and show that I had changed. Today, after helping me make that journey, they are senior advisers to the Common Ground Justice Project.

Our experience has taught me that justice is not necessarily a choice between consequences and rehabilitation, or between the needs of victims and perpetrators of crime. Acknowledging harm, giving victims a voice, taking responsibility, facing consequences and demonstrating change over time can all be part of holding someone properly to account.

It is one of the reasons I co-founded the Common Ground Justice Project along with Sam Boyd and Alice Dawnay. We shared a frustration that the debate on crime too often reduces complex questions to being “tough” or “soft”, pitting punishment against rehabilitation, and prioritising short-term point-scoring over long-term change. Our response was to start somewhere different: listening to people across the country who don’t feel heard.

The findings in this report suggest that Joan, David and I are far from unique in what we needed from the justice system. The British public want meaningful consequences – but also for people to own the harm they have caused, and change so they do not create more victims. And they want the system to be more accountable for delivering on its promises.

That core finding gives me hope: that when we really listen, the public are less divided about justice than our politics suggests. We hope this report encourages those in power to respond in kind: to put party politics aside and build the modern justice system that Britain deserves.

Jacob Dunne
Co-founder Common Ground Justice Project

Executive Summary

C H A PT E R 0 1 CRIME WITHOUT CONSEQUENCE
Understanding the crisis of confidence in British criminal justice 

Most Britons think crime usually has no consequence 

Fewer than one in five voters (18%) believe people who commit crimes usually face real consequences; half say consequences follow only occasionally or almost never. “Nothing happens” was a recurring refrain across our focus groups and interviews. Perceived lawlessness and unfairness in criminal justice appears to be contributing to a wider sense of national decline and erosion of trust in politics. 

Fear of victimhood is high, especially among young women 

Nearly two in three Britons (63%) expect to be a victim of crime within the next year, and one in three expects a violent or sexual crime. Fear of violence is concentrated among the young: over half of women under 35 (53%) expect to suffer a violent or sexual crime this year, as well as 39% of men under 35. These figures are roughly four times the actual rates of victimhood reported by the most recent Crime Survey for England and Wales, albeit this survey may underestimate actual victimhood on some crimes.

No core function of the justice system is rated well by a majority 

There is no function of the justice system a majority rates as doing a good job – just 22% say it does a good job of reducing crime, and only 38% of protecting the public. Of key institutions, only the police narrowly retain majority confidence (51%) – with prisons (41%), probation (38%) and youth justice (33%) lowest. The crisis of confidence in criminal justice appears to be feeding a wider sense of national decline and mistrust of politics. 

Underfunded, ineffective and unfair: the roots of mistrust 

Perceived leniency is only part of the reason for low confidence – voters point equally to underfunding, ineffective delivery and unfairness of treatment. Low confidence in prisons, probation and youth justice is mainly attributed to a failure to cut reoffending and lack of resources. Perceived unfairness is another key driver of mistrust, arising around questions of police treatment (66% believe policing is unequal by ethnicity, split evenly on who benefits), and inconsistency in sentencing. 

Voters want accountability to cut both ways 

Just as the public expects offenders to be better held accountable for their actions, they also want the system itself to be more accountable – for being fair, effective and honest. Broken promises and the cycle of crisis-response are seen as a system failing on its own terms and letting down victims, with every failure deepening the crisis of trust. 

The public want bold and balanced change 

Almost two in three Britons (62%) say the criminal justice system needs major changes – a demand spanning every party – with broad support for balancing punishment with rehabilitation and prevention. Keeping the public safe is clearly the top priority (87%), with youth services first in line for new spending. The public back bold but balanced change: a system that punishes but also treats and prevents crime.

C H A PT E R 0 2 ACCOUNTABILITY AS ‘OWNING, PAYING AND CHANGING’

Understanding what the public mean by accountability for crime

Punishment is seen as necessary but not sufficient for accountability 

Punishment is where many voters start, but only around one in ten lean towards the view that a served sentence delivers accountability on its own. Across five forms of accountability we tested – the '5 Rs' of repercussions, responsibility, repair, reform and reintegration – every one is rated important by at least 88%. The demand is 'punishment plus', not punishment alone.

Accountability as 'owning, paying and changing' 

The public see accountability as containing three key steps: owning the harm, paying for the harm, and changing behaviour. This is common ground that spans divides, and points the way towards justice reforms that will command widespread confidence. 

Responsibility is key – and the clearest common ground 

Accepting responsibility is the most widely endorsed form of accountability (96%) and the most unifying. On our 0–10 scale of importance, a tenth of a point separates Labour, Conservative, Reform and Lib Dem voters on this principle. But responsibility must be seen as genuine – demonstrated over time, not performed for a process. The public agree that taking responsibility includes engaging in treatment for addiction, where this is driving offending.

C H A PT E R 0 3 TACKLING PROLIFIC OFFENDING 

A case study of delivering accountability in practice 

Frequency of offending increases demand for punishment – but not at the cost of rehabilitation In response to repeat offending, the public raise their demands for punishment, but not at the cost of rehabilitation. Prison rises from the least popular response to a first offence (17%) to the top response once offending is repeat and organised (61%). Yet rehabilitative responses remain popular: compensation or unpaid work stays near 60% support, while treatment and help into work also stay high. Voters mostly want both. 

The role of addiction increases support for treatment – but not at the cost of punishment 

Told that repeat offending is driven by homelessness and addiction, support for treatment jumps 19 points to 73% and becomes the clear winner among every party’s voters – but support for prison never falls below 43%. Empathy is evident and reduces the demand for punishment, but it does not remove support for clear repercussions.

‘Punishment plus’ policy packages win broadest support 

In our conjoint experiment, eight of the ten most popular policy combinations to address prolific offending paired a clear consequence with treatment or visible repair. 'Punishment plus' consistently performed better than 'punishment only', while rehabilitation-only packages performed the worst. When it comes to community sentences and diversion, the public is mostly supportive; their biggest concern is not leniency but underfunding and ineffective delivery by overstretched public services.

C H A PT E R 0 4 CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS 

Summary of recommendations for politicians, policymakers and campaigners 

This report concludes that rebuilding trust demands accountability that cuts both ways: for people who commit crime to be held to account for their actions, and a justice system that's held to account for honest and effective delivery. Our research suggests the public is less divided than political debate often implies – and political pointscoring on crime risks obscuring the common ground that does exist. Seven recommendations follow, for policymakers and campaigners in criminal justice: 

1. Ensure consequences and public safety are the foundation – reassurance here is what creates permission for bold action on rehabilitation and prevention. 

2. Focus on accountability and responsibility to reach across divides - responsibility is the clearest common ground, while punishment is a popular but more divisive frame. Policies which recognise this will win broad support. 

3. Restore visible consequences for prolific and low-level crime – everyday crime that visibly goes unaddressed is driving the confidence crisis and needs urgent action. 

4. Improve communication and honesty with victims and the public – say what sentences mean, follow through, and tell victims what happened in their case. 

5. Strengthen and amplify community justice – make non-custodial sentences more robust, more visible and clearly evidenced; scepticism is mostly about the system’s capacity to deliver, not leniency.

6. Make recovery from addiction central to tackling prolific offending – getting the balance of consequence and high-quality treatment right for this group is where the public's demand for 'punishment plus' can work in practice. 

7. Develop a cross-party 10-year plan for justice – politicians should respond to public frustration by working together across parties on a long-term approach to fixing the criminal justice system: a plan built on pragmatic 'common ground' solutions.

The Job Used to Have Integrity

As news comes in of the latest derisory pay offer - with strings of course - anger is spreading within the ranks ahead of the Napo AGM next week and there's serious talk of strike action. We've been here before of course over recent years, but things are a bit different now because many of the traditional 'vocational' cohort have left and been replaced with newer recruits with very different views on the job and their approach and loyalty to it. I saw this yesterday:-

"I don't get this argument, 20 years ago it worked. The world has changed in 20 years, adapt. Sure, the current OFPS is a shambles, but we live in a different world and let's be honest, we treat most criminals like victims and completely ignore actual victims of crime.

Clearly a 2 stage Probation is needed, help those who want help and give longer sentences to the problematic cases who bung up the justice system. Accountability is long gone and we seek to blame anyone but the individual."

I'm increasingly coming to the view that if government will not listen to evidence and argument about the probation service because of the political risks that even Andy Burnham has been persuaded precludes investigation and the previously promised independent Review (The Labour government committed in its 2024 general election manifesto to carry out a strategic review of probation governance and evaluate the benefits of devolved models), then maybe it might only take a catastrophic collapse instead to prompt any action. Even the public are getting tired of the "£700 million" and "1,300 new officers" bullshit responses to all questions because there's a huge hole in the bucket with more staff exiting than arriving. 

With all this in mind, lets take a look at what officers were saying 10 years ago in the Guardian. Of course many things have changed, but does anyone seriously think things have improved?   

'The job used to have integrity': readers on Britain's probation services

We asked those working in probation services across the UK to tell us how they have been affected since the 2014 privatisation

An official review into the failing performance of the government’s privatisation of the probation service, has been called for by justice secretary Liz Truss.

The probation service was split in 2014 into 21 private community rehabilitation companies (CRCs) and a public National Probation Service (NPS), replacing the former 35 probation trusts. Truss told MPs on Tuesday that the review into the performance of the privatised probation companies would be finished by April and would include measures to improve the service. The announcement came after highly critical reports by the chief inspector of probation, Dame Glenys Stacey, found companies struggled to deliver the supervision of 250,000 offenders a year.

We asked people working in probation services in the UK for their views and experiences. From low morale among staff to excessive case loads, and unsuitable risk assessments, here’s what some of them said.

Working for the publicly owned NPS: ‘Staff have no faith in leadership’

The probation trusts we used to have were rooted in localism and worked closely with partner organisations such as the police, social care and the health service. But all those relationships have been put under strain by the arrogant attitude emanating from Whitehall. Staff still believe in the job they do but have no faith in leadership.

The recent staff survey information indicated that just 3% thought that the NPS had made improvements - I think that says it all. As we’re such a small organisation we won’t get the headlines that problems in the prison service get but if things go wrong with us, the consequences for the public could be even greater.

Neil

‘I suffered burnout and am now on unpaid leave’

Nobody is receiving the service they should and it has become too difficult to do a good job. People are leaving and sickness levels due to stress and depression are high - it is not uncommon for people to cry at their desks.

I have been qualified as an officer for 11 years and have a range of experience, from prison work to managing a team of probation officers. However, I had a period of sick leave due to depression and am now on unpaid leave. Direct line managers and colleagues were generally supportive but despite that I have suffered burnout. I am now travelling around Europe in a motorhome with my children!

Alison

Public protection within the NPS: ‘Staff are inexperienced, inadequately trained and very poorly paid’

We’re supposed to offer a service where high risk offenders (while on licence) are directed to reside in places where they can be monitored before being released into the community, but it’s staffed with people who are inexperienced, inadequately trained and very poorly paid. How does that facilitate public protection?

It’s been awful from the word go but I wanted to stick it out and learn something new. I’d never worked in probation before. However after almost ten years I handed in my resignation on Monday. I’ve learnt a great deal. I’ve really enjoyed the work and helping people change their lives is great. Human behaviour is very interesting and although the public might not understand probation and what it does (which is probation’s fault) all of these offenders have been victims at one time too. Society is very ill. A philosopher once said: ‘Society gets the criminals it deserves,’ and that it does.

Simone

‘Excessive case loads are putting public protection at risk’

I have been a probation officer for 11 years and supervise male offenders predominately for domestic violence offences. Before privatisation I worked in a team of 11 and had a case load of between 40-50 offenders. Now I am in a team of 7 and have a caseload of 70.

I am supposed to assess their risk and compile a community sentence plan (this is where we look at the needs of the offender and work to improve their situation whilst reducing their risk. For example someone who becomes violent when drunk will need alcohol intervention as well as help addressing the reasoning behind violence such as power and control, or anger management). In the current political climate many offenders have mental health issues and there is no longer any provision for this issue as the CRC has disbanded the mental health cohort. We also find many of our clients have housing issues and benefit sanctions.

Before privatisation we used to see offenders weekly for a minimum of 16 weeks and each session would last at least a minimum of an hour. In doing so we would build a positive rapport and a thorough analysis of the offender, their needs and their risk. Now we have too many offenders and not enough time. I see my offenders on average for 20 minutes once a month. There is no minimum requirement and our managers encourage us constantly to see them less and sign post them more which is a false fallacy as community services are scarce and stretched.

Public protection is at risk here with excessive case loads but no one is monitoring this and managers do not care. We are robustly managed to hit targets but are totally missing the point. I want to resign. My job has become a tick box exercise. The people I see are damaged and often dangerous, with violent backgrounds or mental health issues and need support.

David

Custody within a CRC: ‘There have been a number of totally inaccurate and inappropriate risk assessments’

I’m a custody probation officer and my job is effectively the ‘motto’ of probation: protect the public, rehabilitate the offender, and enforce the law. Public protection means assessing the risks (of harm and re-offender) of any particular prisoner. Rehabilitate the offender (ideally) means ensuring they receive the most appropriate work to address their offending. Enforce the law means ensuring an offender (whether on a community order or on a prison licence) abided to his or her conditions.

Prison officers are few and far between, so we have to find one who has time and energy to unlock a prisoner so we can do some work. In the past, a prisoner making a request would have it dealt with appropriately. These days, I could receive umpteen emails, phone calls or being collared while out and about the prison, to tell me a prisoner needed to speak to me.

With regards to CRCs - half the time we don’t have up-to-date contact information, so cannot phone or email an outside officer for whatever reason. There have been a number of totally inaccurate and inappropriate risk assessments.

Lots of people who do front-line work are having long periods of sick leave. If these stressed people stay in their jobs, they’re not going to be as effective as they should be, or once were. The whole system is collapsing and we’re just letting it happen.

Nemo

Enforcement within a CRC: ‘I have given up trying to defend the indefensible’

We have lost experienced officers who would rather take redundancy than work in a job they are now ashamed of. I prosecute breaches - when anyone bothers to take any action - and am constantly having to try and explain to the courts why offenders have not been seen for months. I have given up trying to defend the indefensible. If victims of crime knew that even the paltry sentences handed down are not even carried out, how do you think they would feel? The government tells us crime is going down (which is nonsense), people just do not even bother to report it.

Taylor

Working in a senior attendance centre for a CRC: ‘I was transferred in 2014 and am yet to have any job specific training’

I have been in my current role for 12 years but directly under government bodies, and was transferred to a CRC in August 2014. My role is predominantly working face to face with low to medium risk service users and ensuring they report regularly to the centre. Myself and other colleagues have yet to have any job specific training other then a few hours being shown a few key things on their database. I have received no training in relation to health and safety. I have very little contact with supervising officers to find out how their service users are complying with their orders, and there are so many probation officers with unsafe case levels to manage.

As for the companies interest or obligation for my welfare, it is practically nonexistent. I have had one appraisal six months after I transferred, and three different line managers! I have now been told that redundancy for me is very likely, as they are attempting to make what was once a thriving sentencing option into a skeleton service.

Sophie

Victim services within a CRC: ‘Victims are lost in the system and the reason why offenders are on probation is forgotten’

If you are a victim of crime you would like to believe that the offender will be held to account and required to complete the sentence set out at court. This is not the case - because we work in a target driven culture. The emphasis is to get the offender through the order so it can be viewed as a successful completion - and to achieve this probation officers are expected to do whatever they can. So in reality there are no national standards, you cannot breach anyone and you can’t recall anyone - offenders rule the service.

Previously an offender could have two missed appointments before they would be in breach and taken back to court now offenders get through their orders hardly setting foot in an office. Telephone calls are now classed as appointments, and any requirements such as programmes are overlooked, if they don’t want to do it then on the whole they don’t have to. We are expected to do anything and overlook everything in order to get a successful completion. The word public protection used to be the core of probation but now it’s not even considered.

The job used to have integrity, but now we are at the mercy of people who don’t actually care about victims or potential victims. Instead they are lost in the system and the very reason why offenders are on probation is forgotten.

Emmy

Working in resettlement in a CRC: ‘Before privatisation I would have been supervised by managers’

I am a probation practitioner which involves risk assessment, and going out to prison wings to interview prisoners for accommodation, benefits, finances, relationships, health and wellbeing, and behaviour. We then action the issues they have, always bearing in mind the risk posed to the public. As you can imagine some prisoners have a multitude of issues. We then have to try and find the allocated officer in the community, which is difficult now as splitting the service has made this a very tiring and arduous task.

Before the split I would have had the support of managers including supervision. Now it is nonexistent and we are expected to run innumerable caseloads. We have to offer the above support services knowing they are not working. We have been de-skilled as officers due to not having support with what we are supposed to be delivering in custody, such as interventions. We are not coping with the changes that the government have imposed and hand-in-hand with the current state of the prison, police and our service, I am fearful of the future. I am afraid for the public given that prisoners are leaving without appropriate services in place, with one of the worst hit areas being mental health. I am very aware of people leaving custody with no support because there is none.

DP

Support from the courts: ‘Clients are released with nothing and appear back in court for food theft’

I work in a criminal court team. I write sentencing reports, cover criminal sentencing courts and provide information to the courts about any current cases. I interview individuals and then provide a proposal for sentence. I am supposed to look at risk levels and ways to reduce reoffending, ways to rehabilitate and ways to keep known persons and the public safe. This is nigh on impossible when we don’t even know what privately run companies are actually providing. Our team has had seven different managers over the last two years. Staff moral is at an all time low.

We basically lie when proposing sentences in our reports. We tell judges and magistrates that particular lines of work will be done when in reality, clients are never seen and go weeks without appointments. Drug and alcohol services are nigh on useless and it takes weeks to set up any type of prescription for them. Clients are released with literally nothing and nowhere to go and then appear back in court for shop theft of food - what a surprise.

Louise

Evidence v Politics

For me, the recent discussion thread has basically confirmed that sadly there's no way out of our 'doom loop' because Andy Burnham has fallen for the accepted mantra that there's too much political risk associated with being seen to be 'soft' on crime. This seemingly accepted view has obviously been a huge success with significantly higher prison numbers year on year, massive recall figures, increased re-offending rates and vast public expenditure on prison building programmes. All while every part of the criminal justice system is in crisis and virtually every probation area rated as unsatisfactory, or worse. But amazingly, while levels of crime have fallen dramatically over recent decades! So, lets remind ourselves of a few things. This paper from 2020:-    

Evidence versus politics in British probation

Highlights

• Twenty years ago, the Probation Service in England and Wales was widely regarded as world-leading.
• Since then it has been weakened by a series of politically driven and poorly evidenced changes.
• A badly flawed and ideologically driven privatisation programme implemented in 2015 has done serious damage.
• The recent decision to end this failed programme is an opportunity to redesign better.

At the beginning of this century the Probation Service of England and Wales (these two countries have separate Governments but form a single jurisdiction for criminal justice purposes) was regarded as one of the strongest and most advanced in the world. Twenty years later it finds itself under-resourced, understaffed, organisationally fragmented and partly demoralised, with little idea how it will look or how it will be run a couple of years from now. This is largely due to a series of decisions taken by politicians which were (believe it or not) intended to improve the Service, but which were not adequately informed by evidence or by an understanding of practical realities. The story of how this happened is an object-lesson in how not to do criminal justice reform and is summarised here in the hope that it may act as a warning to other jurisdictions.

To understand what went wrong, and what might be done about it, we need to look a bit further back, and my starting point is the development of the Welfare State in Britain after the second World War. Probation services in Britain were well established by then, and like other welfare services, they had good prospects for further development. Max Grünhut, a German lawyer and criminologist who escaped from the Nazi regime and established the teaching of criminology at Oxford, wrote ‘Probation is the great contribution of Britain and the USA to the treatment of offenders. Its strength is due to a combination of two things, conditional suspension of punishment, and personal care and supervision by a court welfare officer. With the growing use of probation, social case work has been introduced into the administration of criminal justice … ’ (Grünhut, 1952, p. 168). A few years later Leon Radzinowicz, another refugee from Nazi domination of Europe who founded the Cambridge Institute of Criminology, wrote ‘If I were asked what was the most significant contribution made by this country [i.e. England] to the new penological theory and practice which struck root in the twentieth century … my answer would be probation’ (Radzinowicz, 1958: x). In addition to such expert endorsements, probation services were well respected and an integral part of both the developing social work profession and the criminal justice system. They were run by County-level committees which consisted mainly of magistrates, giving the main users of probation a stake in its success and a good understanding of how it worked. Chief Probation Officers played a significant role in social work's professional organisations, and expansion and development continued fairly smoothly until the 1970s. Even the proliferation of negative or discouraging research findings about the capacity of different sentences to reduce offending (for example, Martinson, 1974) did not significantly undermine probation in Britain, as it developed a new and useful mission as the provider of alternatives to custodial sentences. Governments were keen to encourage this for financial reasons. In this way the Service largely avoided the cuts in public services which were imposed by a Conservative government during the 1980s.

1. Populist punitiveness versus ‘What Works’

The tide began to turn in 1993. A Conservative Minister, hoping to achieve popularity through a display of toughness, declared to his party's annual conference that ‘prison works’, signalling an end to ‘alternatives to custody’. The Probation Service, under considerable political attack, needed a new way to present its role, and in due course its leaders (particularly the Chief Inspector of Probation, Graham Smith) launched the ‘What Works’ initiative to develop the Service's effectiveness in reducing reoffending (Underdown, 1998). By this time the ‘nothing works’ consensus of the 1970s was being replaced by new research which showed that some ways of working could have a positive impact on offenders' behaviour. Probation leaders and researchers were strongly influenced particularly by Canadian studies of effective rehabilitation (for example Andrews et al., 1990) and by British psychologists who disseminated similar ideas (such as McGuire, 1995). Money from a new Government of a different political colour enabled the establishment of ‘Pathfinder’ projects to develop and evaluate new methods, with a particular (though not exclusive) emphasis on cognitive-behavioural group programmes, and for a while at the end of the last century and the beginning of this, England and Wales were seen as global leaders in a very ambitious and comprehensive ‘What Works’ exercise. Gerhard Ploeg, a leading figure in Scandinavian probation, told the Confederation of European Probation that ‘The Probation service in England and Wales has always been in the vanguard in these developments, and many other European countries are watching it like a hawk, ready to accept that which seems to be working and to criticise that which isn't’ (Ploeg, 2003, p. 8).

Unfortunately the results of the ‘Pathfinders’ were not as good as probation's leaders hoped (Raynor, 2004). Over-rapid and top-down centralised implementation did not give probation staff time to understand and adapt: many of the new methods eventually became established, but this took at least twice as long as the three-year period allowed for the Pathfinders to prove themselves. In addition, political changes were reinforcing central Government control over probation, so that probation policy became more politicized and local influence and control, particularly by the Courts, was diminished. A new Criminal Justice Act in 1991 had redefined probation as a punishment in its own right (no longer Grünhut's ‘conditional suspension of punishment’) and in 2001 the Service became the National Probation Service, run from London. This also meant it was very visible to London-based politicians, and vulnerable to politicians of both major parties who wanted to be seen as ‘tough on crime’. In 2004 the Probation Service was merged with the larger and wealthier Prison Service to form the National Offender Management Service, which in theory might have led to better integration of offender management across the criminal justice system but in practice meant that the central administration of probation was dominated by officials who understood the needs and practices of prisons better than they understood probation.

2. Evidence versus delusion

Practice in the meantime had become dominated by risk assessment and risk management, with some officers having to spend more time on their computers than with the people they were supervising, and with a new official focus on enforcement as a priority. The evidence-base of practice remained primarily psychological, and there was less time to address social circumstances and social needs or to link people into the other services from which they could benefit. Probation officer training had been disconnected from social work training. However, the biggest changes were yet to come, as a new Conservative-led Government looked for opportunities to reduce social spending and to marketize public services by moving them into the private for-profit sector. A new Government Minister, Justice Secretary Christopher Grayling, was a particular enthusiast for privatisation and saw this as a way forward for probation. There was, in fact, no evidence to suggest that this was a good way to run community corrections in Britain, or that this might be profitable for the private companies jostling for a slice of the criminal justice pie. The Minister was encouraged to pilot the proposed arrangements but stated that there was no need to do so. This egregious example of evidence refusal was motivated by blind faith in markets and a right-wing Conservative tradition of scepticism about State-funded public services, and in 2014 seventy per cent of the Probation Service's work was handed to private companies, some with little criminal justice experience (Raynor, 2020).

After implementation in 2015, it quite quickly became clear that the private companies (known as Community Rehabilitation Companies) were in difficulty, and a series of inspections by the independent Inspectorate of Probation consistently showed them to be performing considerably worse than that part of the Service which had remained public. The companies had exaggerated what they could offer, and only a high degree of magical thinking by politicians could explain their confidence that the new arrangements would work. Before long the companies were trying to maintain profitability by making about a third of their staff redundant, leading to over-large caseloads handled by often inexperienced people. In short, although some innovations were interesting, overall the private companies damaged the services they claimed to be able to improve, leaving them in ‘a worse position than they were in before the Ministry embarked on its reforms’ (Public Accounts Committee, 2019 summary: 1). Eventually, after four years of bad results, politicians had to recognise their mistake. The decision has now been taken, by a new Justice Secretary, to terminate the contracts of the private companies and to re-unify probation as a public service. This is already happening in Wales, and England is following.

It is, of course, encouraging to see a bad policy decision reversed by considering the evidence; this does not always happen. However, the new Probation Service faces a considerable task of reconstruction and recovery, and discussions are still continuing about exactly how it should be organised and managed. Many commentators favour a greater degree of local involvement in governance with the restoration of some judicial input, not just central control by civil servants in London. In addition, practitioners and their managers need to be able to focus on the development and use of evidence-based skills, informed by what we already know about how to promote rehabilitation and desistance from offending. The coronavirus pandemic has shown that Government spending on public services is necessary and unavoidable, and there is less political clamour to shrink the State and hand over services to private enterprise. However, the post-Covid world will be short of money, and criminal justice will have to compete with other strongly justified demands for public expenditure. Perhaps the most important lesson learned from the rise and fall of British probation is that there is no magic bullet to bring about a step-change in the effectiveness of probation services: development needs to be gradual and incremental, and informed at every step by evidence and evaluation rather than ideology.

Peter Raynor

Swansea University 2020

Political Risks

Yesterday was interesting. Having brought myself up to speed by re-visiting his extensive website and learning of his proposed research project not succeeding, I had the opportunity of a chat with former chief officer and HMI Andrew Bridges. It struck me that it had been a brilliant opportunity to try and influence a change in direction at a time when an imaginative political appointment had been made in the shape of James Timpson. 

The rejected Proposal for an Experiment in Upside-Down Management in Probation

From April to December 2025 most of my ‘spare’ time was taken up in putting together a ‘Proposal for an experiment in upside-down management in Probation’ to the National Research Committee of the Ministry of Justice, together with a linked application to undertake a PhD with the University of Greenwich for this purpose, and also writing an app which would be a key component for implementing the ‘experiment’. The proposal was rejected (for a second and final time) in December 2025.​

The whole idea behind the Proposal comes directly from my Modern Probation Theory (MPT). The reason I made the Proposal that year was that Lord James Timpson had been appointed the Minister for Prisons and Probation in July 2024, and that he and his father had described the way they ran the Timpson business as being an instance of “Upside-down Management”, describing an approach that I saw as strikingly similar to MPT. I felt that, if I was ever going to have the chance to demonstrate MPT, now was the time – and I suggested trying it with a small group of volunteer Probation practitioners, in an area where the Regional Probation Director would welcome it. (I had one definite Director, and potentially two more, who said they were interested in trying it, partly because they could see that for practitioners it would both save their time and yet provide focus.)

I was not at all impressed with the letter declining the Proposal. If it had simply said that senior managers had concluded that the Experiment was too difficult or simply not wanted, I could have respected such an operational decision that was theirs to make – I could certainly understand that there were potential “political risks” that they might reasonably be unwilling to take. Instead the letter listed a number of misunderstandings and post hoc rationalisations about the nature of the research proposal, highlighted what they thought would improve it, but denied me the opportunity to attempt that. I was not completely surprised by the outcome, since I had already feared from my earlier in‑person meeting with the Minister that he personally would not be actively supporting it as I had hoped.

Andrew Bridges​

I well remember Timpson's Bill McWilliams Memorial lecture in Cambridge failing to live up to expectation and being a great disappointment. I guess we will never know exactly why, but I strongly suspect he quickly came up against what our fundamental problem all along has been, that of 'political risk'. So, seeing as I know this blog has been helping train AI in the form of Large Language Models for some time, I thought I'd use it:-

Does probation pose political risks? 

The probation and early prison release crisis in England and Wales creates severe political risks for the government, as systemic strains damage public safety and invite heavy criticism from watchdogs, unions, and opposition politicians.

Key Political and Operational Pressures

Early Release Backlash: The government's plan to release around 4,500 prisoners early (serving one-third of their sentences) to relieve overcrowded prisons (running near 98% capacity) has sparked fierce political backlash. Opposition figures, such as Joy Morrissey MP, have argued that the early release scheme endangers the public and puts vulnerable victims—particularly domestic abuse survivors—at risk.

Watchdog and Union Warnings: Martin Jones, the chief inspector of probation, warned that severe officer shortages mean criminals freed early face an increased risk of reoffending, including serious crimes like murder and rape. Meanwhile, the probation union Napo has threatened industrial action and declared a vote of no confidence in management, stating that staff operate at over 126% capacity in some regions.

Public Accounts Committee Scrutiny: The UK Parliament Public Accounts Committee stated that the Probation Service is near collapse, having met only 7 of 27 performance targets last year while managing record recall populations and a 21% staff vacancy rate.

Blame Shifting Across Parties: Political debate frequently splits along partisan lines, with critics pointing to long-term systemic erosion, historic prison closures, and previous privatization experiments, while current ministers argue they inherited a broken and overstretched justice system.

So AI, did probation always pose political risks?

No, probation did not always pose significant political risks. For nearly a century following its late 19th-century origins, probation operated under a low-profile "welfare and rehabilitation" ethos that insulated it from the political crosshairs. It only transformed into a highly volatile political risk in the late 20th century due to shifting penal philosophies, centralisation, and the rise of "tough on crime" populist politics.

The Era of Low Political Risk: "Advise, Assist, and Befriend"

When formalised in jurisdictions like the UK (via the Probation of Offenders Act 1907) and the US (spreading rapidly in the early 1900s), probation was viewed essentially as a humanitarian extension of social work or religious missionary efforts.

The Welfare Philosophy: Early probation focused on a mandate to "advise, assist, and befriend" the individual. Because the prevailing social consensus leaned toward rehabilitation, reform, and addressing the root causes of crime (like poverty or alcoholism), probation was a quiet, uncontroversial alternative to costly and overcrowded prisons.

Local and Judicial Control: For decades, probation services were managed locally, often directly under the supervision of local courts and magistrates. Because it was decentralized and largely invisible to the national press, politicians rarely faced scrutiny or blame for the behavior of individuals on probation.

The Shift to Political Volatility (1970s–1990s)
The political environment surrounding probation changed drastically due to a perfect storm of ideological and systemic shifts:

The "Nothing Works" Doctrine: In the mid-1970s, criminological research (most famously Robert Martinson’s 1974 study) popularized the idea that rehabilitative efforts had no statistical impact on reducing recidivism. This stripped probation of its scientific and moral immunity, leaving it exposed to political assault. 

The Rise of Populist Punitiveness: By the 1980s and 1990s, politicians in both the US and the UK realized that campaigning on a "tough on crime" platform was highly effective. Probation was recast by critics not as a humane intervention, but as a "soft" option or an evasion of justice.

Redefinition as Punishment: To survive politically, governments actively stripped probation of its social work identity. Laws like the UK’s Criminal Justice Act 1991 legally redefined probation as a punishment in its own right, shifting its primary objective from welfare to "public protection," "risk management," and strict "enforcement".

Centralisation and Media Visibility: National governments centralized probation services under federal or state executive branches (such as the creation of the National Probation Service in England and Wales in 2001). While this intended to standardize practice, it stripped away local judicial shielding. Consequently, whenever a high-profile "Serious Further Offence" (SFO) occurred, the systemic failure was dropped directly at the doorstep of the ruling political ministers.

Today, probation is highly politicized because it operates under a risk-averse, highly audited framework where any failure by a person under supervision can trigger immediate media backlashes and threaten ministerial careers.

How can probation avoid political risks?

To avoid political risks, probation services must balance the systemic pressure of penal populism (the political demand to be "tough on crime") with evidence-based public protection. Because probation operates out of the public eye, it faces severe political risk when high-profile "Serious Further Offences" occur, frequently leading to knee-jerk legislative overhauls or privatization attempts.

The primary political risks facing modern probation services center on being blamed for failures in public safety, being forced into rigid, bureaucratic monitoring metrics that erode professional discretion, and coping with sudden policy shifts like emergency early-release schemes that strain existing resources.

1. Establish Strict Risk-Management Thresholds

Define Clear Acceptable Risk Limits: Probation leadership must align with the Ministry of Justice and government oversight bodies to set transparent thresholds for acceptable operational risk. This shifts accountability from individual officers to a mutually agreed-upon systemic framework. 

Utilize Reflexive, Dual-Method Risk Assessments: Combine algorithmic and actuarial assessment tools with qualitative, clinical judgment from seasoned staff. Algorithmic systems alone can replicate racial biases, which creates a separate political risk regarding civil rights and systemic discrimination. 

Avoid the "High vs. Low" Risk Dichotomy: Politically, funding often follows high-risk offenders, leaving "medium-risk" cases under-supervised. Statistically, a significant portion of serious further offences are committed by individuals initially categorized as medium-risk. Dynamic risk models must continuously evaluate shifting life factors like unstable housing or sudden job loss.

2. Protect Operational Capacity Against Structural Whiplash

Resist Politically Driven Reorganizations: Over the last decade, probation services have suffered from continuous structural changes driven by ideology—most notably the failed part-privatization in 2014 ("Transforming Rehabilitation") which had to be fully reversed in 2021. Maintaining a unified, stable public service delivery model helps buffer frontline workers from shifting political winds. 

Mandate Safe Case-to-Staff Ratios: Political risks spike when understaffed, poorly compensated, and overwhelmed probation officers miss critical warning signs. Demanding institutional guardrails that tie maximum caseload limits to recruitment targets protects public safety and insulates the agency from systemic failure.

Secure Resourced Backing for Emergency Release Schemes: When governments use early-release schemes to manage prison overcrowding, probation becomes the political scapegoat for community anxiety. Service leaders must secure firm funding commitments (such as technology investments or localized restriction-zone mapping) prior to absorbing accelerated caseloads. 

3. Build Multilateral Accountability and Partnerships

Utilize Multi-Agency Public Protection Arrangements (MAPPA): Broaden accountability by co-managing high-risk, violent, or terrorist offenders through formal partnerships with local police, health authorities, and the prison service. Sharing risk governance prevents probation from bearing exclusive political liability if an individual reoffends. 

Enforce Swift and Consistent Sentence Violations: Maintaining the confidence of judges, magistrates, and the public requires clear, transparent enforcement rules. When probation demonstrably enforces court orders swiftly and firmly, it protects itself from accusations of being "soft on crime".

Change the Public Narrative: Shift away from a purely punitive rhetoric or a purely social-work lexicon, both of which are politically polarizing. Instead, frame probation through the lens of economic and social utility—demonstrating how effective rehabilitation directly reduces the billions spent annually on the cycle of reoffending.

Another Voice

"Whether they come here or not, there are plenty of people speaking, researching and writing about what probation is, what it should be and what needs to change. We have no shortage of voices, ideas or evidence. The irony, though, is that some of the strongest voices can be heard when people are on the frontline or in the earlier stages of academia, yet far fewer seem to hold on to those same principles once they climb the greasy promotion pole.

I remember reading Helping, Holding, Hurting: A Conversation about Supervision co-authored by Kim Thornden-Edwards and Fergus McNeill. The article*, written somewhere between being a probation manager or a director, makes a strong case for protecting the human relationships, professional judgement and intuition at the heart of good supervision, rather than allowing rigid, tick-box compliance to dominate practice.

Those are important ideas. The question is what happens to them when people move from writing about probation to leading it. There is an uncomfortable disconnect between some of the things people have argued for academically and professionally, and what practitioners experience on the ground today: severe staff shortages, high vacancy rates, unmanageable workloads and warnings of the need for “urgent, focused action” from the Chief Inspector of Probation.

Perhaps the problem isn’t that probation lacks people with something worth saying. Perhaps we have plenty of them. The question is whether those in positions of influence are still prepared to listen to them — and, more importantly, act on what they are saying."

Anon

*Abstract

This article begins with an overview of some of the late Bill McWilliams's key contributions to probation research and scholarship, focusing in particular on how his work helps us think about how people experience supervision, and about how the practice of supervision should be conceived and constructed. In the sections that follow, three of the co-authors respond to these ideas from their different perspectives as service user, as frontline probation officer, and as probation manager. In the conclusion, we summarise the discussion by focusing on the role of values, of relationships and of evidence in the reform and development of probation.

--oo00oo-- 

"Give the probation officer the autonomy to trust in their own skills, and allow trusting relationships between the probation officer and the people they work with to develop."

I think the above from regular contributor 'Getafix is as good a sentiment as I've seen on here in a long time and it got me pondering. Given the recent lively discussion about practitioners not being listened to, I decided to revisit a past contributor, the former Chief Officer and HMI Andrew Bridges*. He continues to maintain a comprehensive website covering his career, practice and policy proposals and I could not help noticing the following as part of his submission to the House of Commons Select Committee last year:-

"Research from the last 50 years (at least) shows that there are no magic bullets to stopping people from reoffending, but, when well-motvated staff are enabled to use their creativity and initiative, they can influence individuals who have offended to change their behaviour and thus make a small but significant improvement to overall reoffending figures."

The submission is substantial and wide-rangning and well worth reading in full, but as a taster this from the beginning gives an indication of his direction of travel:- 

"What am I saying?

I will largely confine my evidence to Probation specifically, because I expect politicians to find it too difficult to move to a rational policy of making less use of prison. It seems to me that the political imperative to be seen to be tough on crime and to protect the public appears to trump the evidenced analysis (that no doubt others will also submit) that our present excessive use of prison is poor value for money.

I argue, in contrast, that a major “Refocus” is possible specifically for Probation, even in today’s political climate. I do not seek yet another restructuring, but instead I make the case for a coherent strategy, together with some intelligent rationalising of post-custody licences and community sentences.

However, the remedy that would not have the intended helpful effect would be to develop the idea of so-called “tougher” community sentences. Instead we need a comprehensive ‘Probation Refocus’ that would replace the existing top-heavy cumbersome management with a much more ‘bottom-up’ approach to managing Probation work, to liberate its creative potential. Even with Probation’s very limited resourcing this would enable the additional necessary changes to post-custody supervision and community sentences to have the desired helpful effect. I outline these additional ‘necessary changes’ further below."

It's interesting to note that this submission, along with a well-argued research proposal, were during the tenure of Lord Timpson as Justice Minister when there was some optimism that his 'bottom-up' business management style might signal similar moves within the Department. Sadly, this was proved to be unfounded and indeed the political enthusiasm for both tougher community sentences and greater imprisonment appear undiminished. Additionally, the new Labour government have showed no appetite to follow through on their Manifesto promise of a thorough independent Review of probation.

*Other contributions can be found here and here.

Guest Blog 112

Who is listening to who?

Prison overcrowding, probation capacity, tagging, victims, AI and being “tough on offenders” — there is so much to take on board that my head is going to explode. I have completed the e-learning and learned the “new ways of working”, but I’m not quite in the zone of “new probation” yet.

I have been reading this blog forever, and it has become a source of therapy and support. The last few weeks have become intense once again. The changes being imposed on the service have created a flurry of activity, both within and in the media. What saddens me is the apparent absence of real discussion within the profession. There does not seem to be any space where we can properly discuss the impact of these changes, talk openly about what they mean for practitioners and “punters”, or propose better ways of doing things.

I cannot help but hark back to the history of Advise, Assist and Befriend, which has been discussed so often on this blog, or the historic trust placed in probation officers. The difficulty is that we all know the journey that followed, through the degradation of probation qualifications, then NOMS, Trusts, privatisation, nationalisation, unification and reset.

I sometimes wish a real probation leader would appear, someone who could help light the way. I do not particularly care whether that is Napo, the Probation Institute or something else, as long as they genuinely speak for probation and create a credible space for the profession to have a reputable voice and future.

There are already many voices out there, calling for a return to social work, for the rehabilitation of probation and for actively renewing probation. There is discussion on hope, burnout and fatigue. Even questions about who should take responsibility for prison overcrowding, early release and the impact these pressures have on probation services.

The worry: When history looks back, will this decade’s response be any better than the last? We have objected to the implementation of parts of this latest sentence act, which is no different to the probation history I’ve already described. Even if we delve into extreme pre-history, when previous generations faced prison hulks, a notorious government response to prison overcrowding during the eighteenth century, or transportation to Australia. Whatever the outcome, we the people are the ones that live and work with the consequences.

Of course, nobody is suggesting sending anyone to the other side of the globe, well not unless the pint-swigging nasty party takes root, but the “tough on offenders” rhetoric remains the same. We need no reminder that there are practitioners, academics and pracademics doing important work to understand and protect our honourable profession. If anyone needs further convincing, a quick search of the Probation Institute reveals many; practitioners sharing experiences about how probation operates in the prison environment, practitioners sharing innovative approaches to working with young adults and creating toolkits, practitioners discussing how community service can work better, and multiple practitioners trying to help us better understand much of what we do.

For those working in leadership, policy units and workforce planning, finding and considering this kind of information is surely part of the job. The leaders and policymakers have good ideas, but if there are better ways of doing things it’ll be lost if we do not have a credible forum for discussion. We might even avoid remaining perpetually in crisis, simply by taking notice of the risks being identified?

The fear: If “they” can do away with the WMT, ignore the unpaid overtime and hold-up decent pay, then is there any hope they’ll listen to the practitioners? But do they want to listen to those who scrutinise the new changes, oppose a UK Corrections and Aftercare Service, and challenge reliance on dashboards and metrics? We need a probation service that listens to its workforce to meet its true aims, helping people lead offence-free lives, primarily focused on changing individual circumstances and behaviour for the better.

The problem is that this service has become very good at creating new policies, new models, and new ways of working, while becoming less good at listening to the people who have to make them work. There are practitioners across the country who understand what helps people change, what gets in the way, what creates unintended consequences, and what could be done differently. So the question is not what the future of probation should look like, but who should get to shape it. Because if nobody is listening to the practitioners, then what exactly are we reforming probation for?

I cannot answer this question, and none of us can. Ironically, as I got to the end of typing this post and switched from watching the Justice Minister on the news to an old black-and-white western, I heard a phrase that we could perhaps apply to every Justice Minister from Grayling to the present day:

“Never trust the eyes of a man running away.”

Anon

Guest Blog 111

Rhetoric v Reality

I write this from a position that perhaps doesn’t fit comfortably into the current political narrative. I am a probation practitioner. I am also a victim of crime.

So when the Government tells me victims are “front and centre” and that we now have the “toughest supervision in British history”, I want that to be true. But my professional experience makes me deeply concerned about the gap between the rhetoric and the reality.

I know what public protection looks like from the other side of the desk. It is rarely a slogan. It is having enough time to notice something has changed, join information together, recognise an escalating pattern, make the home visit, speak to police or children’s services, ask another question and act before another incident creates another victim.

Technology can assist with that. It cannot replace it.

And this isn’t simply a frustrated workforce saying so. On 24 September HM Inspectorate of Probation reported that persistent staffing shortages and workforce instability were directly affecting the quality and consistency of risk management. In 54% of inspected cases, critical information was not sufficiently interrogated, analysed or translated into robust risk-management activity. Days later, the electronic-monitoring inspection warned of a “false sense of assurance” if technology was not matched by effective professional practice. Then Government announced the “toughest supervision in British history”.

Please reconcile those things.

As a victim, I do not want a false sense of assurance. I don’t want to hear that somebody is being monitored if there isn’t sufficient professional capacity to understand and act upon what that monitoring reveals. And I don’t want victims used to justify increasingly restrictive measures while the professional infrastructure required to make those measures protective is struggling.

As a practitioner, I worry that probation is increasingly being redesigned around how many people the system needs us to absorb rather than what effective supervision actually requires. Please do not mistake control for public protection, surveillance for supervision, contact for intervention or administrative compliance for effective probation.

I don’t simply want the person who harmed me punished. I want fewer people harmed. That means meaningful rehabilitation matters to me too. Work around domestic abuse, drugs, housing, mental health, relationships and behaviour matters. Professional judgement matters. Having enough time to know the person you supervise matters. Victims and rehabilitation are not opposing interests. Effective rehabilitation is victim protection when it prevents the next offence.

So by all means tell me how many people are tagged, how much money has been invested and how many staff have been recruited. But also tell me whether practitioners have enough time to do the work properly, whether experienced staff are staying, whether workloads are manageable and whether the quality of risk management is improving.

You cannot solve a prison capacity crisis by quietly creating a probation capacity crisis. And you cannot protect victims by weakening the professional service upon which so much of that protection depends.

I say that as somebody delivering probation. I also say it as somebody who knows what being a victim means.

If victims really are “front and centre”, listen to this one.

Anon

The Reality

The clueless new Justice Minister Alex Norris is clearly following his minders instructions at the MoJ and HMPPS. This from the big release day October 1st:- 

Toughest restrictions ever imposed on offenders on licence

Offenders leaving prison from today will be monitored under the toughest supervision in British history, as new powers to restrict their movements come into force.

• World-first restriction zones will keep offenders in areas just a few miles wide
• Bans from pubs, clubs, football matches and public events
• A record number of offenders are being tagged, as Government rolls out biggest ever extension of tagging
• Victim-focused approach to justice will see national helpline for victims and trauma-focused local support services

Offenders leaving prison from today will be monitored under the toughest supervision in British history, as new powers to restrict their movements come into force.

The tough new rules mean the prison gate is no longer where punishment ends, creating a prison in the community to protect the public and victims.

For the first time anywhere in the world, new restriction zones will tightly control the movements of the highest-risk sexual and violent offenders - confining many to an area just a few miles wide, keeping them away from those they have harmed and allowing victims to rebuild their lives without fear.

The biggest ever expansion of electronic monitoring in British history is also being rolled out with a new presumption that offenders will be electronically tagged and monitored when they leave prison. New technology rolling out this year will give probation near-live access to tagging data, helping probation staff spot breaches and act quickly when offenders step out of line.

Cracking down further still, offenders can also now be banned from pubs, clubs and public events like football matches to prevent disruption and harm to the community. From next year, the government is also launching random drug testing for thousands of offenders.

Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice, Alex Norris, said:

"Today we are introducing the toughest ever range of tools to control prison leavers and better protect the public.

We understand the anxiety victims face ahead of offenders’ release dates, but the greatest danger to victims would be prisons running out of cells for dangerous criminals which was the crisis this government inherited.

Our plan will make sure this never happens again by building 14,000 prison places while subjecting offenders to the toughest ever controls – leaving them nowhere to hide and under no doubt that we are watching them."

Unfortunately for him this reality came out from HMI Probation on September 24th:-

National findings: Dynamic Inspection of Public Protection in the Probation Service

HM Inspectorate of Probation has published its national findings following a review of public protection measures delivered by all 12 regions of the Probation Service across England and Wales.

Martin Jones, Chief Inspector of Probation, said: “Frontline probation staff are working hard to keep communities safe, often in very difficult circumstances. However, public protection work was not being delivered consistently well enough to provide the assurance that victims, communities and partner agencies were entitled to expect.

“Persistent staffing shortages and workforce instability, combined with inconsistent information-sharing with the police and children’s services, meant that practitioners did not always have what they needed to identify, understand and manage risk effectively. As a result, opportunities to recognise patterns of harmful behaviour, safeguard children, protect victims and respond to escalating concerns were too often missed.”

Findings

• Vetting delays remain a significant barrier to recruitment, hindering the timely filling of vacancies and, in some cases, causing successful candidates to withdraw before appointment.
• Increased workforce instability, and decreased resilience across probation staffing, is directly impacting the quality and consistency of risk management practice; these are longstanding problems, and recruitment shortfalls and staff shortages do not simply mean a busier workforce, they contribute to a heightened risk to public protection.
• Information-sharing with the police has improved, but in almost one in five cases (18 per cent) information received about domestic abuse was of insufficient quality to be meaningful in assessing risk; information-sharing with children’s services remains a more significant and persistent weakness, with information of insufficient quality to inform risk assessment in nearly a third of relevant cases (31 per cent).
• Even where information was available, practitioners did not always make effective use of it: in more than half of cases inspected (54 per cent), critical information was not sufficiently interrogated, analysed or translated into robust risk assessment and management activity.
• There is currently no agreed national strategy setting out overarching principles for how probation should work with the police and children’s services, meaning individual Probation Delivery Units are left attempting to solve the same shared problems in isolation.
• Public protection outcomes were consistently strongest where regions and Probation Delivery Units had the flexibility to use their initiative and apply locally innovative solutions, within a clear national framework.

Mr Jones added: “Our findings show that regions cannot resolve these issues alone. National action is needed to stabilise the workforce, strengthen information-sharing with the police and children’s services, and support practitioners to make full and confident use of the information available to them. We also need the right responsibilities sitting in the right place: clear national consistency where it matters most, alongside room for regions to use their initiative, where our evidence shows the best outcomes are delivered. If our recommendations are adopted, the foundations for sustained improvement will be in place.”

And then by happy coincidence this came out with more reality just before the big release on Thursday:-

 

Electronic monitoring in practice: Early Report Briefing from HM Inspectorate of Probation and HM Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services

HM Chief Inspector of Probation, Martin Jones CBE, said:

“The findings of our inspection are clear: electronic monitoring is expanding rapidly, but the systems, processes and frontline practice needed to make it effective have not kept pace. Until those issues are addressed, the criminal justice system risks relying on a technology whose potential is not being fully realised.

“There is a real danger that electronic monitoring creates a false sense of assurance if the technology is not matched by effective professional practice. Expanding tagging programmes without addressing their weaknesses risks overpromising and underdelivering on public protection.”

HM Chief Inspector of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Service, Michelle Skeer OBE QPM said:

“In the cases we examined, alleged breaches of electronically monitored bail conditions did not consistently lead to structured consideration of risk to victims, witnesses or the wider public. Poor record-keeping, information-gathering and analysis made it difficult for forces to understand either the demand generated by electronically monitored bail or the effectiveness of their response”.

--oo00oo--

I note a reader and contributor has added the following:-

Notes to Editors:

A selection of SCS staff responsible for this shitshow include:

• Antonia Romeo, now head of the country's civil service
• Amy Rees, now Chief Executive of Homes England
• Jo Farrar, now Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Justice
• Phil Copple, who baled out last year, now describes himself as a 'prisons & probation operations expert'
• Mc Ewen's export has been in post for a year
• There's supposed to be a Chief Probation Officer, but no-one's seen or heard of her for nearly 3 years

Finally, we would all do well to recall this posted on Twitter recently by former Prison Governor John Podmore:-

While Andy Burnham is busy writing the next Labour Party manifesto he should reflect on the last one : “Labour will conduct a strategic review of probation governance, including considering the benefits of devolved models.”

So, How's it Going?

There’s an enormous part of today’s story that seems to be getting lost in all the coverage about early release.

The headlines are understandably focused on how many prisoners are being released and whether probation has sufficient capacity to manage them. But 1 October isn’t simply an early-release date. A whole series of operational changes are landing in probation at the same time: OFPS, new tiering arrangements, Supervision Packages, the Progression Model, changes to licence supervision and all the processes sitting underneath them. And some of those changes create work before they create any of the capacity they are supposed to release.

Take Supervision Packages. Existing cases can now have a package tier identified, but during this transition period an OASys review is required to actually move a case into its Supervision Package and allocate the appointments. Regions are apparently being asked to prioritise particular reviews until a future digital change automatically transitions cases that haven’t already moved across.

I’m not convinced every PP yet appreciates the potential significance of that. It is very easy to hear “new tiering” and “Supervision Packages” and assume the system simply calculates something in the background. But if reviews are required during this interim period, that represents potentially significant additional practitioner activity across an already enormous existing caseload.

And an OASys review isn’t just pressing a button. If it is going to mean anything, somebody has to look properly at the case, consider what has changed, review risk and needs and make sure the assessment actually reflects the person being supervised. Otherwise we are simply generating another administratively compliant document to make the new system work.

That work lands alongside everything that was already there. Existing appointments still happen. New court orders still arrive. People continue to be released from prison. Risk changes. Safeguarding concerns emerge. Recalls happen. Enforcement happens. Assessments and reviews already due still need completing. And now practitioners have to understand and implement an entirely new architecture for supervision while doing all of it.

This is why I don’t think we’ll understand the impact of 1 October by counting how many people walk through the prison gate today. Watch what happens over the days, weeks and months that follow.

Watch caseloads as courts continue sentencing and prisons continue releasing. Watch the number of assessments and reviews practitioners are carrying. Watch how much additional work is generated simply by transitioning the existing caseload into the new arrangements. Watch what happens to appointment lengths, recording, risk work and the time available for actual supervision.

Because there is a rather extraordinary contradiction here. We are introducing changes partly on the promise that they will create probation capacity, while relying upon an already overstretched workforce to provide the additional capacity required to implement them. And once again, the question nobody seems particularly interested in answering is the most basic one:

Where are the practitioner hours supposed to come from?

That, rather than the number released on day one, may turn out to be the real story of 1 October.

*****
Even with the early release scheme there is over 80,000 people in prison. The crown Court backlog stands at over 80,000 cases too. Probation is supervising over 240,000 people. That is the equivalent of all the number of Crown Court backlog cases and the total prison population combined plus another 80,000, and there is more people going to prison through reall then are being sent there by the courts! Surely the answer is not how many can be released early from custody, but how can we get people to exit the CJS as early as possible? I think the universal imposition of post sentence supervision is one of the major contributors to the state of the CJS today. The capacity crisis is not just about prisons, it's the whole of the CJS thats bursting at the seams.

*****
Getafix raises what may be the bigger question underneath all of this. We keep talking about the prison capacity crisis as though probation exists somewhere outside it, waiting to receive whatever solution is devised. It doesn’t. Probation is part of the same system and is carrying an extraordinary volume of people in its own right.

The latest published figure is actually over 258,000 people under probation supervision. Put that alongside a prison population of more than 85,000 and a Crown Court open caseload of more than 80,000 and perhaps we need to stop talking about a prison capacity crisis and start talking about a criminal justice system capacity crisis.

And recall surely has to be part of that conversation. In January–March this year there were 13,193 licence recalls and 12,977 releases from custodial sentences. Those figures aren’t directly opposite sides of the same equation, but they illustrate the extraordinary churn now taking place between prison and the community.

So what exactly are we trying to achieve? If somebody leaves prison, enters an overstretched Probation Service, receives increasingly rationed contact, struggles with housing, drugs, mental health, relationships or whatever else brought them repeatedly into the system, breaches or deteriorates, is recalled, occupies a prison place, is released again and comes back to probation — where exactly is the saving?

We seem obsessed with finding ways of moving people around an overloaded criminal justice system rather than reducing the number of people who need to remain in it.

That is why the prevention argument matters so much. Success surely isn’t getting somebody out of prison slightly earlier so another person can occupy the bed. Nor is it keeping somebody technically compliant with probation for as long as possible. The real success is helping somebody reach the point where they no longer require prison, probation, police, courts or endless commissioned interventions at all.

And Getafix’s point about post-sentence supervision deserves proper examination in that context. If supervision is genuinely reducing reoffending and protecting the public, demonstrate it. If particular forms or lengths of supervision are instead increasing the opportunities for breach and recall without producing a corresponding rehabilitative benefit, we ought to be prepared to examine that too.

Because there is something fundamentally circular about responding to prison overcrowding by releasing people earlier into an overloaded probation system, then recalling large numbers of people back into the prisons we’re desperately trying to empty.

Perhaps the measure we should become genuinely obsessed with isn’t how quickly we can move people through the criminal justice system, but how successfully we can help them leave it.

*****
So its now just after 6pm & all I've heard on various news channels ALL DAY is "prisoners walking free", "victims are terrified", "prisoners set free by Labour", "Probation have had £700million to assist them".It's all utter bollocks. Not one report that I've heard has offered any sort of assessment, context or factual analysis - not even Casciani on the beeb, who repeated the £700million mantra, the additional numbers of staff and the amazing new hi-tech tags.

Dominic, everyone - it's all fucking lies. None of what this (or any previous) govt is saying about justice, jails or probation is in any way based in reality. It's political fluffing, prepping the public for the unholy fucking that's heading our way... "at pace", no doubt! They - the politicians & the advisers & the whitehall moneypits - haven't got a fucking clue what to do.

Bellend Norris - a man of many years experience of the justice system? No! - had the brass neck to say: "we've been preparing for this day for the last two years." BULLSHIT, you utter arse.

If only for once in their terribly comfortable lives would these wet farts slide down from their ivory chamber pots & see what's really happening, hear it, smell it... feel the fear, the despair, the pointlessness of their empty words about "seven hundred million".

Sorry for the many expletives, Jim, but today has been a calamitous shitfest of utter fuckwittery. The Grand Shafting (I liked that term, thanks) & the CRC debacle were mostly hidden from public gaze. Today's headline blog, I think, neatly sums up how the X Factor had her dabs all over the scene of so many crimes. They were NOT crimes of passion, but crimes against COMPASSION.

As an old skool PO, I'd love to know why. What was the motivation to cause so much damage & pain to so many people, particularly probation staff & those subject to supervision, but also the £billions of public funds re-directed away from public service provision & into the pockets of fatcat multinationals & their shareholders? It must have been one hell of a trauma to want to hurt so many so badly!

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Anyone else noticed the complete bait and switch they've done with OASys reviews? Everyone is now being expected to review their entire caseload.

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That comment about OASys reviews has just made my blood boil. Whether reviewing an entire caseload is the national expectation or something being interpreted differently locally almost misses the point. Why, after the endless communications, briefings, guidance, presentations, cascades and mandatory learning we have been bombarded with, are practitioners apparently still discovering the scale of what is actually expected of them on the day it goes live?

We have been absolutely drowning in information. Emails about emails. Guidance explaining guidance. PowerPoints. FAQs. E-learning. Briefings. Cascades. Yet somehow something as fundamental as the amount of reviewing required to get existing cases correctly tiered and onto the appropriate Supervision Package has not landed clearly with the people who actually have to do it. And if significant numbers of existing cases now require reviews, when exactly are we supposed to do them? Seriously. When?

The appointments are still in the diary. People still need seeing. New cases are still being allocated. Courts haven’t stopped sentencing. Prisons haven’t stopped releasing. Recalls, safeguarding, MAPPA, enforcement, risk management, home visits, referrals, recording, assessments and everything else haven’t conveniently disappeared while we implement the new model. So where are these extra hours coming from?

I am becoming genuinely furious with this constant assumption that practitioner capacity is infinitely elastic. Another requirement arrives and somehow we are simply expected to absorb it. Then another. Then another. Nothing meaningful comes off the other side. Apparently there is always another little bit of us available to squeeze. 

What are they trying to do, break us? Because I genuinely don’t know how much more people are expected to absorb before somebody at the top accepts that there are only so many hours in a working day and only so much pressure human beings can carry.

And please don’t tell us we have been “prepared”. Completing an e-learning package is not capacity. Receiving a cascade is not capacity. Reading another 30-page document is not capacity. A 98% completion rate on mandatory learning does not magically create the practitioner hours necessary to implement what people have been trained to do. That distinction seems to have been completely lost.

I can already imagine the assurance going upwards: staff briefed, tick; learning completed, tick; implementation commenced, tick; Progression Model successfully launched, tick.

Meanwhile at practitioner level the real question will be: how the hell am I supposed to do all of this as well? And this is only day one. That’s what people outside probation need to understand. The danger was never that the service would dramatically collapse at 9am on 1 October. Practitioners will do what they always do: scramble, prioritise, stay late, worry, improvise and somehow keep the plates spinning.

It’s the days, weeks and months after today that concern me. Because the courts will keep sentencing, the prisons will keep releasing, new work will keep arriving and all of this implementation work will be sitting on top of the caseloads people already had. You cannot keep solving a capacity crisis by taking more capacity from the people who have none left.

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Something else troubles me reading these comments. Look at what this is doing to us as a workforce. When people are under relentless pressure for long enough, empathy starts disappearing not only from the organisation but sometimes between colleagues. Someone is struggling and instead of asking what has happened to make an experienced practitioner reach this point?, it becomes well I’m managing, why aren’t they? That is a very dangerous culture for probation.

This work already asks us to carry things most people outside the job never see. We hear traumatic histories, make decisions involving risk and people’s liberty, deal with crises, worry about victims, worry about the people we supervise and occasionally go home wondering whether we’ve missed something important. There has always been pressure in probation. But there is a difference between a demanding professional job and an environment in which people are repeatedly prevented from doing that job to the standard they know it deserves. I think that’s the bit we don’t talk about enough.

It’s not simply being “too busy”. It’s knowing the home visit would be useful but having three other things that have to be done. Knowing somebody needed longer than the appointment you could give them. Knowing an assessment deserved more thought. Knowing you should chase something up and watching another urgent task land on top of it. You constantly make choices about what won’t get your time.

For people who came into probation because they actually care about doing the work well, that takes a toll of its own. And then scarcity starts turning practitioners against one another. Who has the easier caseload? Who isn’t pulling their weight? Who gets protected? Who works from home? Who leaves on time? Who is off sick? Who has managed and who hasn’t?

Meanwhile the much bigger question quietly disappears: why are highly trained professionals being placed in circumstances where doing the job properly has become something they have to fight to find time for? That’s why some of these accounts of people finally leaving and feeling an enormous weight disappear are so sad. We aren’t just losing a number from a staffing spreadsheet. We’re potentially losing experienced people who once cared enormously about this work.

A service can recruit another trainee. Replacing years of judgement, confidence, relationships, local knowledge and experience is considerably harder. And if the people who remain eventually protect themselves by caring a little less, giving a little less and emotionally detaching from what they cannot possibly fix, perhaps nobody should be surprised. You can't indefinitely run a profession on people’s goodwill and then wonder where the goodwill went.