Lets Re-invent the Wheel

“what about this wheel thingy? It sounds a terribly interesting project.” “Ah,” said the marketing girl, “well, we’re having a little difficulty there.” “Difficulty?” exclaimed Ford. “Difficulty? What do you mean, difficulty? It’s the single simplest machine in the entire Universe!” The marketing girl soured him with a look “All right, Mr. Wiseguy,” she said, “you’re so clever, you tell us what colour it should be.”

Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

--oo00oo--

Right from the beginning of this endeavour I have written extensively on the importance of the PSR, 

The end of the PSR is Nigh

Death of the PSR

Folly of PSR Demise

When Is a PSR Not a PSR?

March of the FDR

Would You Adam and Eve It!

PSR Special

PSR At Last Lamented

MoJ Admits PSR Problem

but it seems as if those clever people in charge at the MoJ seem to take ages to join up the dots:- 

The impact of oral and fast delivery pre-sentence reports (PSRs) on the completion of court orders

1.1 Background 

A pre-sentence report is advice given to the court following the facts of the case, expert risks and needs assessments, including an independent sentencing proposal and additional relevant information. They must be as objective as possible and exist to assist the judiciary with sentencing. 

The number of pre-sentence reports written in England and Wales has decreased in recent years – from 211,494 in 2010 to 103,004 in 2019.This was an area of concern in the 2020 white paper, A Smarter Approach to Sentencing, which stated that “The purpose of a pre-sentence report (PSR) is to facilitate the administration of justice, and to reduce an offender’s likelihood of reoffending and to protect the public and/or victim(s) from further harm. A PSR does this by assisting the court to determine the most suitable method of sentencing an offender (Criminal Justice Act 2003, section 158)”. 

The paper proposed that “further work is undertaken to build the evidence base on the impact that a PSR has […] on offender outcomes, sentencing behaviour and the efficient administration of justice”. Following this, a PSR pilot began in March 2021. Separately, this report examines the impact of a PSR oral or fast delivery report on the reason that a court order (or sentence) terminated. This analysis specifically looks at adults sentenced to a Community Order or Suspended Sentence Order (with requirements) in England and Wales in 2016. 

1.2 Key findings 

The overall results show statistically significant evidence that those who received a PSR oral or PSR fast delivery in 2016 were more likely to successfully complete their court order, compared with a group of similar offenders who did not receive a PSR. In particular: 

• 80% of those who received a PSR fast delivery in 2016 successfully completed their court order. This is higher than for similar offenders who did not receive any type of PSR (73%). 

• 73% of those who received a PSR oral in 2016 successfully completed their court order. 

This is higher than for similar offenders who did not receive any type of PSR (68%). These impacts on completion of court orders are based on estimates of what would happen if instead of receiving a PSR oral or fast delivery, the case had not received a PSR. This analysis includes PSRs prepared for both magistrate and crown courts. 

The results of this analysis should not be directly compared to termination outcomes in other analyses or to figures such as national averages due to the use of a time-bounded sample, and the propensity score matching (PSM) technique used to ensure otherwise dissimilar groups were comparable. In addition, the results for PSR fast delivery and PSR orals should not be directly compared. 

The results of this analysis should not be regarded as definitive; it is intended to provide initial evidence of the impact of PSRs and so only looks at the reason that a court order terminates as an outcome. The limitations of this study are discussed in section 5.1 alongside suggestions for areas that could be valuable to explore in greater depth. However, these findings increase the evidence on the effectiveness of PSRs and therefore it can be recommended that oral and fast delivery reports are requested and delivered to increase successful termination of court orders.

4. Results 

The analysis found statistically significant evidence that an offender sentenced in 2016 that received a PSR fast delivery or PSR oral was more likely to successfully complete their court order and less likely to terminate early for failure to comply with requirements or conviction between 2016-2019, compared with a group of similar offenders which did not receive a PSR – see the main results in Appendix E. 

4.1 PSR Fast Delivery 

• ~80% of those who received a PSR fast delivery in 2016 successfully completed their court order. This is significantly higher than the comparison group (7 percentage points higher) which comprised similar offenders to those who received a PSR fast delivery but did not receive a PSR. 

• ~11% of those who received a PSR fast delivery in 2016 terminated their court order early for conviction of a further offence. This is significantly lower than the comparison group (4 percentage points lower) which comprised similar offenders to those who received a PSR fast delivery but did not receive a PSR. 

• ~9% of those who received a PSR fast delivery in 2016 terminated their court order early for failure to comply with requirements. This is significantly lower than the comparison group (3 percentage points lower) which comprised similar offenders to those who received a PSR fast delivery but did not receive a PSR. 

4.2 PSR Oral 

• ~73% of those who received an oral PSR in 2016 successfully completed their court order. This is significantly higher than the comparison group (5 percentage points higher) which comprised similar offenders who did not received a PSR. 

• ~15% of those who received an oral PSR in 2016 terminated their court order early for conviction of a further offence. This is significantly lower than the comparison group (2 percentage points lower) which comprised similar offenders to those who received a PSR oral but did not receive a PSR. 

• ~13% of those who received an oral PSR in 2016 terminated their court order early for failure to comply with requirements. This is significantly lower than the comparison group (2 percentage points lower) which comprised similar offenders to those who received an oral PSR but did not receive a PSR. 

Please note the analysis of PSR oral and PSR fast delivery should not be directly compared as the matched comparison groups contain different offenders with different characteristics. Therefore, it cannot be concluded that fast delivery reports were 7% more likely to terminate successfully than oral reports, although the relative efficacy of fast delivery and oral PSRs is of interest. 

5. Discussion 

These findings demonstrate that the requesting of a PSR oral or PSR fast delivery is related to the successful completion of a court order, and therefore it is recommended that these reports are requested and delivered. 

Additionally, these findings support the wider work across the MoJ to increase the instances of advice being given to court in the form of a PSR. 

This study does not consider the influence of a PSR report on the sentence handed down. As PSRs typically propose a sentence, the extent to which, if at all, the advice of the PSR is implemented and further work to explore whether these findings are impacted by the PSR advice being followed would be useful. 

While in Section 3.3 Assumptions, it was considered that further data linking (e.g. to extracts from OASys and the PNC14) might reduce sample size and bias the dataset towards more complex cases, this assumption could be tested. Making further “presentencing” variables available for review/matching would enable the goodness of match between the treatment and control groups to be verified or improved, and facilitate further analysis of the relationship between sentence completion and sentence characteristics, and the impact of a PSR on these characteristics. 

Additionally, whilst the groups receiving PSR oral and PSR fast were different in some ways, in other characteristics, such as gender, they were similarly distributed. It would be useful to consider whether the PSR report has the same statistical significance across all different groups. 

Research on the quality of a pre-sentence report was undertaken in 2020, which questioned whether PSRs provided sufficiently analytical and personalised (to the service user) advice, in order to aid with the court’s decision making (HM Inspectorate of Probation, 2020). The report considered “standard” (these can take up to 15 working days to complete, and are used for serious cases involving high complexity or serious sexual or violent crime), “short format” (fast delivery) and oral reports, and found that 97% of standard delivery reports, 82% of the short format, and 65% of the oral reports were sufficiently analytical and personalised to the service user (although it is noted that only 30 (4%) of the reports available were standard delivery reports; 535 (67%) were oral and 237 (30%) were short format). This report was broadly supportive of the HMPPS reforms promoting the use of PSRs, and indicated that fast delivery PSRs might offer a necessary increase in analytical depth relative to oral PSRs. However, as noted before, the dataset used in this study contains no information on the quality of each report, and the oral and fast delivery cohorts considered by this study are not directly comparable. This suggestion would therefore require further investigation, e.g. by matching cohorts between PSR types. 

This study considers only the reason for court order termination. While the successful completion of a court order is desirable and indicates no reoffending during the period of the sentence, it is not a direct proxy for reoffending (arguably the most desirable outcome) or for other outcomes that might be considered markers of “success”. The evidence base for PSR reports would be augmented by investigation into the relationship between a case that receives a PSR in court and further outcomes related to the offender, for example whether they attended their initial meeting with a probation officer, reoffended (following the expiry of the court order), had suitable accommodation or employment post-sentence.

All So Very Predictable

Preparing and writing pre sentence reports for court used to be an absolutely key part of a probation officers job, but it's been steadily down-graded. Here we have an article from the Probation Institute magazine on the subject and to be frank it makes for depressing reading because it was all so very predictable:-

How are pre-sentence reports working today?

The relationship between courts and probation holds the key to tackling the over-use of harmful short-term custody and reducing reoffending. In June 2018, Justice Secretary David Gauke MP called for short-term custody to be used only as “last resort.” But if we are to make this aspiration a reality, we need to ensure that judges and magistrates have confidence in probation’s delivery of community sentences as they represent the only realistic alternative in many cases. 

The Centre for Justice Innovation works to promote community sentences as an alternative to custody, and to understand the reason why their use has fallen by 24% since the start of the decade, exploring the way that presentence reports inform sentencers’ perceptions of probation. Pre-sentence reports (PSRs) are a key point of contact between sentencers and probation. They provide judges and magistrates with expert assessments of the risks posed by an offender and the needs driving their offending, and recommend a sentence option which protects the public and supports rehabilitation.

By reviewing the available data and conducting interviews and workshops with practitioners, we have built up a complex picture: one of a system that has been buffeted by a range of policy decisions, but also one where creative and innovative thinking on the ground is finding workarounds to some of the structural challenges. 

In policy terms, clearly the headline issue is the Transforming Rehabilitation reforms which erected a divide between courts and the organisations responsible for delivering the majority of the community sentences they impose. But alongside this radical shift, we have seen an increased emphasis on timeliness in the management of courts. While this is, in many ways, a laudable goal it has had its own impact on the work of probation in courts. And all of this change is occurring at a time when austerity is forcing every part of the justice system to struggle to maintain basic services with limited resources. Taken together, these factors have formed the backdrop for a substantial shift in how pre-sentence reports are delivered. 

The changing delivery of presentence reports 

In our analysis of data on pre-sentence reports, we found two key trends: a significant reduction in the use of pre-sentence reports, and a change in the way they are delivered. The fall in the number of pre-sentence reports is stark. We have gone from 185,000 in 2012/13 to only 124,000 last year: a fall of almost a third over a period when the number of convictions has remained relatively stable. This fall has been seen in both magistrates and crown courts (though the drop in the former is a little steeper). It’s worth noting, however, that these statistics don’t count cases where previous PSRs are re-used, which may exaggerate the size of the change, but nonetheless it seems significant.

Perhaps more striking, though, is the change in the way that reports are delivered. The National Probation Service’s E3 model set ambitious targets for increasing the proportion of PSRs delivered orally, reducing the use of written fast delivery reports (FDRs) and, in particular, the most comprehensive Standard Delivery Reports (SDRs). In the three years since the targets were introduced the use of oral reports has doubled – going from 27% of all reports to 59%, while SDRs have fallen dramatically from 22% to only 3%. In magistrates’ courts, in particular, the SDR is almost unheard of, representing less than 1% of all PSRs.

In investigating the impact of these changes with probation officers, we found some interesting messages. Firstly, and perhaps most surprisingly, the majority of practitioners we spoke to felt that the oral format was working well for the majority of cases. New arrangements with partner agencies such as police and social work departments to obtain background information and the “safer sentencing” focus on the issues pertinent to sentencing decisions were seen as working well, and both officers and sentencers valued the opportunity to discuss the report in the courtroom. However some long-standing officers did note that the limited recording of oral advice was undermining the traditional value of the PSR as a starting point for sentence planning.

Probation officers were more concerned about the reduction in SDRs and, in particular, whether FDRs were being used inappropriately in some complex or traumatic cases. They noted that the guidance around when to use an SDR was restrictive and reported that they felt discouraged from using their professional discretion to go against that guidance. The key challenge was seen as workload: while FDRs and SDRs were often delivered in a similar number of calendar days, courts staff were expected to complete an SDR with only a half day of work. Probation officers told us that working on this volume of difficult cases was leading to burnout in members of court teams and potentially undermining the quality of advice.

The content of pre-sentence reports 

The probation officers we spoke to offered a mixed set of views on the content of PSRs since the reforms. In terms of offender assessments, the consensus was that the system was working well – or at least as well as it ever had, given long-standing complaints around the suite of assessment tools in use. However, some did stress the difficulties of establishing a rapport with an offender in the short interval allowed for an oral report. 

There was more concern about the quality of recommendations of community sentences. Many of the officers we spoke to expressed real concern that they lacked the information about CRC services that they needed to be able to make detailed and robust proposals which can command the confidence of sentencers. This picture varied significantly across different CRCs however: some CRCs had provided expanded rate cards that offered detailed service specifications, while in other areas courts staff had never seen any rate card at all. Some officers also noted that the design of the Rehabilitative Activity Requirement (RAR) placed further limits on how far they could be specific about the way that an offender would be supported on a community sentence – a concern shared by many sentencers. 

Sentencers, in particular, also noted a fall in the use of treatment requirements in community orders. This is backed up by the statistics: the proportion of orders containing drug rehabilitation requirements and mental health treatment requirements has fallen by half since their peaks earlier this decade. In part, this is likely to be caused by the well-documented cuts to treatment budgets6. However, some practitioners also suggested that treatment requirements were being displaced by the RAR, either because it requires less pre-sentence assessment, or (less cynically) because it allows a better integration between treatment and other forms of support.

How can we improve pre-sentence reports? 

Our research suggests that while some areas are working well, recent policy changes have had some negative impacts on the delivery of pre-sentence reports which may be undermining sentencers’ trust in community sentences. Probation officers and sentencers who took part in our research have highlighted particular issues around the assessments of complex cases, the production of detailed recommendations for community sentences and the use of treatment requirements which all seem to have suffered. 

However, participants also highlighted innovations which they saw as having the potential to address these issues. Some of these focus directly on improving sentencing such as the Embedded CRC model in use at Teeside magistrates court where a CRC Probation Service Officer (PSO) is housed with the NPS court team to provide information on CRC service provision. Another promising example is the five-site Community Sentence Treatment Requirement Pilot which seeks to increase the use of those requirements via new resources for on-the-day assessment and enhanced provision in the community. 

Other strategies focus on improving sentencers’ broader knowledge of community sentences such as in Lincolnshire where the NPS and CRC have collaborated to provide magistrates with high quality training including opportunities to meet with a range of probation staff including former service users. Participants were also supportive of models of problem-solving courts where sentencers conduct regular reviews of offenders under probation supervision, which they felt could reduce reoffending as well as increase sentencer trust.

However, while we believe that these innovations can improve pre-sentence reports, we must observe two caveats. Firstly, many of these will require some investment. While the cost is likely to be less than the savings we could achieve through meaningful reductions in custody, we cannot pretend that improvement can be delivered for free. Secondly, many of these ideas are work-arounds to problems created by TR’s break-up of probation trusts. Repairing the damage to sentencer trust will be much easier if we use the opportunity of the end of the current round of CRC contracts to heal the rift in our probation service. 

You can sign up to receive a free copy of the report when it’s released at http://justiceinnovation.org/mailing-list/

Stephen Whitehead 

Head of Evidence and Data Centre for Justice Innovation

PSR At Last Lamented

Whilst we await the MoJ announcement as to how the TR omnishambles is going to be fixed - and note it's to be made as Parliament goes on its summer holidays next week until September - here we have the Centre for Justice Innovation getting worried about the demise of the PSR.

Clearly they don't read this blog because we've been discussing the topic for years and  predicted what would happen as a direct result of:-

• OASys and the infamous 'generate PSR' button 
• the refusal to allow proper adjournments for a professional piece of work 
• the downgrading of the task by allowing PSO's to prepare 'on the day reports' 
• allowing HMCTS, MoJ and NPS to view PSR preparation as 'delaying speedy justice' 
• the dead hand of civil service culture
• a fundamental failure by all to appreciate what a vitally important sentencing tool a full PSR is if prepared by qualified and experienced staff 

I suggest the author of this report would do well to peruse the archives including:-

Death of the PSR
Folly of PSR Demise
When Is a PSR Not a PSR?

--oo00oo--

The full report can be found here. I've not copied the graphs and have removed references:-    

The changing use of pre-sentence reports

Summary

As part of our work to understand why the number of community sentences – community orders, suspended sentence orders and other similar disposals - has fallen by 24% over the past ten years in England and Wales, we are examining the relationship between the courts and probationary services, with a particular focus on the National Probation Service’s work in courts.

In this interim analysis, we present emerging findings from the national data on the use of pre-sentence reports (PSRs) to see whether changes in their use have impacted on the use of community sentences. Sentencers are expected to obtain a PSR before passing any community sentence (other than a stand-alone unpaid work requirement) or any custodial sentence (except one where custody is the only option).

We have found that between 2012-13 and 2016-17:

• There has been a 22% fall in the number of new PSRs produced. This fall means that there has been an increase in the number of sentences passed (both community sentences and custody) where no new PSR has informed sentencing; 
• There has been a significant change in how PSRs are delivered to court, with an increasing proportion of PSRs delivered orally rather than in writing; 
• While the number of PSRs has fallen, where they are used, the likelihood that sentencers follow the recommendations in the report has increased slightly (by 4% since 2012/13); 
• Because cases with PSRs are more than ten times more likely to receive a community sentence, falling numbers of PSRs is strongly linked to the decline in community sentences; 

Our modelling suggests that if the number of PSRs had remained stable that there could have been 33,000 more community sentences a year.

These emerging findings open up a range of further questions: What is driving the fall in new PSRs? How is advice being provided in cases which don’t have them? And ultimately, what is making sentencers less likely to use community sentences when they don’t have pre-sentence advice?

We are exploring these issues with practitioners, in advance of our final report, due in the September 2018, but we invite practitioners and experts to get in touch and help us explore these questions.

Background to this briefing

The Centre for Justice Innovation is working to identify ways to improve the use of community sentences – community orders, suspended sentence orders and other similar sentences. Community sentences have been shown to be significantly more effective than short term custodial sentences in reducing reoffending. We are therefore concerned to note that there has been a 24% decrease in the number of community sentences in England and Wales over the past ten years, with much of the decline occurring since 2011, while other UK jurisdictions have maintained or increased their use. While it is difficult to say exactly what is causing this trend, our previous work on this issue suggests that it does not seem to be the result of falling case volumes nor is the decline a result of a changing offence mix. Whilst clearly, community sentences will not be right for every offender, we are concerned that there are some offenders currently receiving either fines or custodial sentences who would benefit from the combination of support and accountability offered by a community sentence.

Based on our research to date, we believe that there are a range of policy and practice choices, some recent and others long-standing, which have impacted on the relationship between courts and probation and that these are a more likely explanation of the falls in the use of community sentences. This paper, therefore, examines the relationship between the courts and probation, with a particular focus on pre-sentence advice provided to sentencers by the National Probation Service (NPS). It uses national data from a range of sources to examine how the provision of this advice has changed since 2012-132.

Pre-sentence reports

Pre-sentence reports (PSRs), give judges and magistrates an expert assessment of the risk posed by an offender, the factors which lie behind their offending and the strengths that they can draw on to move away from crime. They also provide an opportunity for the NPS report writers who produce them to make a sentence recommendation. This expert assessment is vital in effective sentencing: evidence shows that finding the right intervention can help a person move away from crime while the wrong one can actually increasing the chance of reoffending. Sentencers are expected to obtain a PSR before passing any community sentence (other than a stand-alone unpaid work requirement) or any custodial sentence (except one where custody is the only option).

Finding 1: The total number of pre-sentence reports produced has fallen by 22% over the last five years. 

As figure 1 demonstrates, only 144,000 PSRs were delivered in 2016-17, compared to 184,000 in 2012-13, a fall of 22%. 

This decline has been broadly consistent across all offence groups. This decline in the number of PSRs used is striking given that overall numbers of sentences passed remained stable over this period. It is not clear what the reason is for this, though one possible contributor may be the new NPS policy of reusing existing PSRs for subsequent convictions up to a year after the report was first submitted. However, the trend predates the introduction of this guidance.

Finding 2: More custodial and community sentences are being made without the advice of a pre-sentence report. 

Sentencing Council guidance provides sentencers with some flexibility about when they need a PSR but sentencers are generally expected to use a PSR before passing any community sentence (other than a stand-alone unpaid work requirement) or any custodial sentence (except one where custody is the only option). Yet, with the numbers of pre-sentence reports falling, a greater proportion of community and custodial sentences are now being passed without the benefit of a new pre-sentence report.

Finding 3: Oral pre-sentence reports have nearly doubled in the last two years, while both forms written reports have fallen sharply over the same period. 

As well as providing a new definition of PSRs, the 2003 Criminal Justice Act also removed the requirement for them to be delivered to courts in writing, opening the door for the development of a format for the oral delivery of reports. Today, the NPS uses three different report formats: oral and written FDRs (both of which are usually delivered on the day) and standard delivery reports (SDRs) (delivered after an adjournment which is used to obtain additional information). 

As figure 3 illustrates, the use of oral FDRs has nearly doubled, from 29% of all reports in 14-15 to 57% last year. Written FDRs have fallen by a quarter, from 53% to 39% and SDRs have fallen from 19% to only 4%.

Finding 4: These changes in how reports are delivered to court are the result of intention policy and practice changes, most importantly the NPS’ E3 National Operating model and its targets. 

These changes in report formats have driven by the introduction of targets for the use of PSR formats. New operating guidance on the use of different PSR formats was set out in the NPS’s 2016 E3 National Operating model and an accompanying probation instruction. The model introduced new national targets for the use of different PSR formats. Oral FDRs were to be increased to 60% of all reports, while written FDRs and the most time-consuming SDRs were to be reduced to 30% and 10% respectively.

It should not be assumed that the growing use of oral FDRs is, in itself a cause for concern. The E3 model includes a range of innovations which seek to ensure that report writers can access all the relevant information in time to produce on the day reports and a recent inspectorate review found that more than 90% of the Oral FDRs in their study were of sufficient quality to inform sentencing. 

However, the very low use of SDRs, which is currently less than half of the 10% target, does imply that more comprehensive assessments are being used only in a very limited number of cases. This does at least beg the question of whether all the information which would be relevant to sentencing is being presented in every case.

Finding 5: The likelihood that sentencers follow probation recommendations (the concordance rate) has increased slightly (by 4% points). 

Unlike their counterparts in other UK jurisdictions, pre-sentence report writers in England and Wales include a recommendation of what, in their view, is the most appropriate sentence option. As figure 7 shows, the past five years have seen a slight increase in the proportion of PSRs recommending community sentences, from 89% in 2012-13 to 91% in 2016-17. 

Whether the sentence passed by the court is concordant with recommendation of the PSR recommendation is a key metric of a PSRs’ effectiveness. Figure 4 shows that there has been a slight increase in concordance rates, which have risen from 68% to 72%. 

This has been accompanied by a fall in rates of “uptariffing” (sentencers imposing a more punitive form of sentence than the one recommended by probation) which has fallen from 26% to 19%. Rates of “downtariffing” (sentencers imposing a less punitive form of sentence than the one recommended by probation) have increased slightly, from 68% to 72%.

Finding 6: Oral fast delivery reports have consistently had the highest concordance rates of all PSR formats over the period. 

Figure 6 sets out concordance rates for the different PSR formats. It shows that concordance with Oral FDRs has been consistently higher than with other formats over the past five years. This difference is likely accounted for by the tendency for longer-format reports to be used in more serious cases as concordance rates are consistently lower for more serious offence groups.

Finding 7: There has been a small increase in the proportion of PSRs recommending community sentences. 

Within that group, there has been a significant trend towards the recommendation of suspended sentences and away from community orders. Suspended sentences have increased from 15% to 31% of all recommendations, while community orders have fallen by almost exactly the same amount, from 76% to 61%. In other words, suspended sentences have displaced community orders in PSR recommendations on almost one-for-one basis.

Finding 8: Rates of community sentences use in cases without new PSRs have fallen.

Cases where there is a PSR have always been far more likely than cases without one to result in a community sentence. This is to be expected: as a group these cases represent an offence mix and offender profile that are seen as appropriate for a community sentence. In many cases, the request by the court for a PSR is to determine what type of community sentence is passed, rather than whether one is passed. 

Figure 8 shows the proportion of PSR and non-PSR cases that receive community sentences. Community sentence usage in PSR cases has risen slightly from 75% to 79%. However community sentences usage in non-PSR has fallen by more than a quarter, from 5.6% to 4.3%. This fall is striking. Over the past five years, as we have seen a reduction in the number of PSRs requested by the courts, we should expect to see more sentencing cases where a community sentence is appropriate fall into in the non-PSR group and, therefore, see a greater proportion of non-PSR sentencing cases result in a community sentence. The fact that there has been a decline in the use of community sentences in the non-PSR group suggests the possibility that not having new PSRs is associated with a reduction in these cases’ likelihood to receive a community sentence. 

Finding 9: The reduced use of pre-sentence reports seems to be a significant driver of the declining use of community sentences. 

Figure 9 shows how the make-up of the community sentence population has changed since 2012-13. It shows that, the majority of the decline in community sentences (a little over three quarters) has occurred within the cases which have new PSRs. Given that, as noted above the proportion of this group getting pre-sentence reports has not changed, the key factor here is the shrinking size of this group. 

Our modelling suggests that, if new PSRs were still being used as commonly as they were in 2012-13, and if community sentence rates within those two groups were unchanged, then we would see an extra 33,000 community sentences a year, reversing around 85% of the decline since 2012-13.

However, we would urge caution when interpreting these findings. The data alone does not speak to the causes in falls in PSRs or the causal relationship between PSRs and the use of community sentences. It could very well be that PSR use has declined because sentencers are less likely to consider a community sentence, rather than the other way around. It should not be assumed that increasing the number of PSRs will necessarily result in an increase in community sentences. Nonetheless, we can infer a relationship between these two factors.

Conclusions and questions

The statistics presented above tell a complex story about the relationship between changing use of PSRs and the declining use of community sentences. However, we can draw a number of tentative conclusions.

First, we can see that PSRs continue to recommend community sentences, and that those recommendations continue to carry weight with sentencers. In cases with new PSRs, reports are actually slightly more likely to recommend community sentences and sentencers are slightly more likely to follow those recommendations meaning that the use of community sentences in these cases is actually up.

Second, we can see that the way that pre-sentence advice is delivered has changed significantly. There are fewer new PSRs being produced each year, and far fewer of those are written. While the NPS has put significant effort into procedures to ensure the quality of pre-sentence advice under the new regime, such as the effective proposal framework to support more robust recommendations, the development of new procedures to facilitate timely access to information and new approaches to updating older PSRs, this nonetheless amounts to a significant reduction in the volume of pre-sentence advice produced.

Third, we can see that the falling use of community sentences seems to be related to two factors: the increasing proportion of cases receiving no new pre-sentence report and the declining use of community sentences in those cases.

However, as always, the statistics only tells part of the story. We find ourselves with many questions to answer before we can have a full picture of the causes of declining community sentences – or the approaches which can reverse that decline. In particular, we wonder:

• Why is the use of pre-sentence reports declining? Is it driving the reduced use of community sentences, or being driven by it? 
• How prevalent is the re-use of existing PSRs? How far is it contributing to declining numbers of new PSRs? Where it occurs, how are recommendations made? How is advice in these cases being recorded? 
• What factors are driving sentencers’ reduced use of community sentences in cases where there is no new PSR? There is much discussion of declining sentencer confidence, but what does this mean and what is driving it? How does sentencers’ interaction with probation, and in particular their reliance on breach hearings to obtain a picture of offenders’ post-sentence progress impact their perceptions? 

Answering these questions will require the expertise of those closer to the sentencing process. Therefore we invite all those with insights – whether probation officers, sentencers, researchers or policymakers – to help us find the answer.

Lets Look at E3 (3)

Chapter 2 Courts

2.1 What does the model look like now? 

Following Transforming Rehabilitation the NPS has continued to provide a service to the courts but has felt the pressure of the new demands of providing a service to the CRCs and in particular the introduction of the Risk of Serious Recidivism (RSR) tool and Case Allocation System (CAS) processes. Changes to speed up court processes have also impacted on expectations of probation. 

Whilst the former trusts all provided court services (as per the specifications), the NPS inherited many different ways of delivering them and a wide range of costs. In some former trusts the work was largely delivered on the day in court by PSOs whereas others relied heavily on POs preparing reports away from court. The range of what is delivered (SDR, FDR, Oral), differing court team grade mix and variations in cost per report are significant. 

The E3 Court delivery proposal originates in the work led by the NPS Deputy Director for Courts and the Courts Strategy and Operations ACO group, to create a national model for court work delivery following the creation of the NPS. 

2.2 What do we want the future model to look like? 

The main objective of this set of proposals is to take the best of what is done in the NPS and to create a court delivery service aligned to the courts reform programme (and the NPS contractual requirements) which is known for its quality, reliability and value for money. 

We will continue to offer the same services to courts but do so using our resources more efficiently and effectively, and in a more consistent manner across England and Wales.

This will mean dedicated court teams doing the work that flows from their court, delivering as many reports as possible on the day, mainly delivered by appropriately trained PSOs. Reports will be delivered to a consistently high quality and in a format commensurate with their complexity, with SDRs reserved for those including assessments of dangerousness.

CRCs will receive their allocations on time, enforcement and report writing practice will be consistent across the NPS and variations will reflect only local geography. 

The Courts Strategy and Operations ACO group wanted to explore using the model for report delivery in Wales as a potential national approach. There is evidence that it offers excellent performance with on the day reports nearing 90%, largely written by PSOs. This suggests excellent value for money and a good fit with Transforming Summary Justice. Colleagues in Wales are satisfied that the quality of reports is good. 

The Courts Strategy and Operations ACO group also wished to explore the model for enforcement practice in London which manages enforcement through a hub supported by dedicated administrators. This was in response to the need to create a national model to replace a variety of legacy trust arrangements. The driver for this was the view that this would lead to improved quality and efficiency and probably a reduction in costs. There is, however, an acceptance that some areas of England and Wales are better suited to a hub approach than others and we recognise that geographical challenges will need to be considered.

The E3 proposal concludes with an exploration of removing the management of courts from the LDUs and keeping it within a separate divisional line management. This was a response to the view that without this the courts would always struggle to deliver best practice, potentially under-resourced and lacking the resilience to deal with staffing gaps or spikes in workload. 

2.3 End state proposals 

There are eight proposals within this work package, as follows: 

2.3.1 Dedicated court services teams will prepare all the PSRs requested in the courts they service and will conduct all the enforcement work of their court. 

The proposal will allow for the development of improved report writing, with appropriate and consistent advice and prepared at the most efficient level. The teams will be backed by dedicated administrators. The proposal is dependent upon the NPS obtaining sufficient space in court, the realisation of the Digital Courts programme, as well as access to appropriate IT and information from other agencies. NPS senior and local managers will continue to work with our criminal justice and other partners making the case for our requirements and ensuring that it is understood that without these we will be constrained. 

It is recognised that there is a risk that staff in court teams could become detached from the LDU and could find it difficult to move back to offender management but the risk can be mitigated by consistent and appropriate mobility expectations across the NPS, as referenced earlier.

The proposal is that court teams will prepare all reports and will rely on information from Offender Managers as they prepare reports on known offenders in NPS and the CRCs. There are good arguments for and against this, but a focus group of NPS operational courts staff did not support the alternative of Offender Managers in the NPS writing pre-sentence reports on these cases, instead preferring that Offender Managers prepare progress reports which they then pass to the court team. 

2.3.2 Our ‘customer’, the Courts is clear that they wanted to deliver a higher proportion of same day delivery reports. 

The NPS has thus far not set a target for the proportion of court reports to be completed on the day. The proposal is that, the challenges notwithstanding, there should be an NPS target. So we propose that we should aspire to 90% of all reports to be short format and on the day, (70% oral, 20% written) with only the remainder remitted as Standard Delivery Reports. (It is recognised that this is ambitious, more so for some divisions so this is an endstate target and would be unlikely to be realised before April 2017). 

• In the short term it is proposed that 75% of reports should be short format and prepared on the day, (55% oral, 20% written) with 10% of reports remitted as SDRs and the remaining 15% short format reports prepared later 

To achieve these targets effective local systems to provide required information in a timely manner will be essential.

2.3.3 The maximum number (likely to be up to 75%) of reports will be prepared by PSOs. 

We therefore propose that appropriately trained PSOs will form the majority of staff within the court teams, with PSRs reserved to POs only in certain specified circumstances. Clearly in some parts of the country this is already in place and is working well. Indeed it is the practice in Wales which combines excellent on the day productivity with extensive use of PSOs (with a PO backup) on which this proposal is based. 

In some parts of the country it is POs who are principally in court and the suggestion that court teams should be predominantly POs was considered. It was rejected because Wales offers a very persuasive, cost-effective model based on PSOs delivering good quality work, allowing them to exercise their skills to the full. 

PSOs will use their skills properly, working to the maximum of their role boundary. This will allow the focus of POs to be on the more complex work. However it is recognised that in some divisions not all PSOs have the skills to deliver the work envisaged. 

Our initial review of the PSO job description and role boundaries supports the view that this proposal is achievable. 

The proposal will require a period of adjustment to allow some PSOs to be trained and develop the necessary experience to operate in this new context. For some divisions, a re-profile of the workforce will also be necessary. PSOs will prepare reports on a wide range of cases. They will not be expected to complete reports on sex offenders and we will not require them to write reports on domestic abuse or high risk and complex cases until they have been trained to do so.

2.3.4 Administrative hubs will be created for courts. 

The Court Strategy and Operations ACO group was keen to explore how the administration of court work could be delivered more efficiently given the changed and increased volume of NPS work at court. The original proposal was that administration for court work would best be provided through a hub. 

What is now envisaged is not a physical hub but one which is virtual and possibly combined with other areas of activity. It is suggested though that this proposal should be deferred until later so that the NPS can respond to later developments with the digital courts without a second wave of major disruption to the administrative staff who support court work delivery.

2.3.5 Streamlining RSR/CAS. 

The proposal is that the process of determining whether an offender should be allocated to the NPS or the CRC and of notifying colleagues in prison about this should be streamlined. This is a complex issue and the ideal resolution will allow staff to complete the RSR as quickly and efficiently as possible, reducing double-keying and duplication but allowing CRC and prison colleagues to get the information they need in time. 

The RSR is a predictor based on the most current and relevant research into future behaviour. It was originally intended to be used not just for allocation but also for ongoing risk assessment. E3 has been considering ways in which the process could be made more efficient while still providing sufficient information to allocate cases. No final decisions have been made. The types of options being considered are:

• Reviewing the format of the risk assessment in the CAS 
• Reducing the information required in cases that are automatically allocated to the NPS 
• Reconsidering when the static and dynamic versions of RSR should be used We will continue this work collaboratively with colleagues across the system recognising that any decision to change arrangements may impact on others. 

2.3.6 Effective proposal framework. 

To support the development of consistent good quality reports we propose that the NPS will develop an effective proposal framework to be used by staff preparing reports. This will be based upon the work developed by Commissioning Strategy Group (CSG) on effectiveness, build upon existing proposal frameworks and will support demand management strategies.

2.3.7 Divisional enforcement hubs. 

It has been proposed that enforcement activity will be grouped into divisional hubs supported by specialist teams including enforcement officers. This role, covering all magistrates’ enforcement work across a division could produce efficiency of process and scale, particularly in a metropolitan area. 

In some rural areas due to travel distance and the lower volume of enforcement cases, generic court teams are arguably best placed to manage all work flowing from court including the administration of enforcement work. Part of the proposal is to have administrative hubs (either virtual or physical units) to act as a single point of contact for all divisional enforcement work. However, changes resulting from digital courts may mean hubs are not fit for purpose in future and would need to be changed soon after their inception. 

The NPS needs to examine whether other administrative work could also be undertaken from a hub, making the hub more resilient.

Pilots have been established in the North West (NW) and North East (NE) divisions. The NW pilot has an administration hub and enforcement officer role, a model which has worked well in London for some time. The NE pilot has administrative hubs with a generic court PSO role undertaking enforcement in courts, a rural model. The pilots are still in their early stages and evaluation is not yet complete. 

While the outcome of the pilots is not yet clear this is not yet a confirmed proposal but it is included for information. The E3 board will review the outcome of the pilots before making a final decision about whether or not this should be a formal proposal. Meanwhile, the work being undertaken to review job descriptions will include the Enforcement Officer role. As stated earlier, there is currently a variation in the pay “banding” of Enforcement Officers with some at pay band 3 and others at band 4. Our view is that the Enforcement Officer role can appropriately be undertaken by band 3 staff. This is subject to the review of the job description and the job evaluation process. 

2.3.8 A review of the management structure for courts. 

There has been discussion about arrangements for the management of courts and specifically an option that courts could be led by a dedicated Head of Function outside the LDU/Cluster structure. The rationale for this consideration is that it will ensure centrally agreed strategy and policy is implemented quickly and consistently across the country and is not vulnerable to local interpretation or local resource pressures. 

This could improve the resourcing of court work and management, and allow managers to move resources within the court work function, without relying on local LDU/Cluster offender management staff. In theory this is possible now but in practice does not happen.

This model does though risk detaching LDUs from their courts so they will be unable to draw on court staff when under pressure (and vice versa). Using the resource flexibly may be challenging over large geographical areas. External dependencies (e.g. offender management in custody review, court closures) may impact on court structures and spans of control and significant changes to NPS governance structures now may be premature.

This option is being piloted in the North West as is the alternative model in the South West and London (in effect the status quo). By January 2016 the interim results of the NW pilot of this model will be available. It is recommended that following this there will be a further review and the option will either be confirmed as a proposal or withdrawn. 

2.4 Impact on service delivery 

Our approach is consistent with commitments being made by all Criminal Justice partners to improve speed and quality of delivery. 

Preparing more reports on the day depends on getting the information the officer needs to make an informed judgement about risk and a professional proposal. This enables us to protect potential victims and to support the delivery of speedy justice, something cited frequently by victims as important. This is a particular issue in domestic abuse cases. 

We will continue to work with the police to make sure that court teams are able to get the information they need (on the day) to prepare reports. We appreciate that safeguarding information is difficult to get on the day in most areas but it is rarely crucial to the sentencing decision.

Our proposals mean that the skills of PSOs will be fully used, while utilising POs for those reports that only they can prepare. The proposals will improve NPS productivity and fewer people will be sentenced without reports. Clearly this requires having enough appropriately trained PSOs in each division (see below). 

We believe that dedicated court teams will provide an improved service and relieve the burden on field teams by preparing reports as efficiently and effectively as possible. We will need to guard against the risks that staff in field teams lose their PSR writing skills and become less familiar with court processes and that the court staff become detached from the field and find it hard to return to offender management work. 

A national proposal framework (evidence-based) will support the delivery of a consistent, effective and efficient service in court across England and Wales. 

2.5 Impact on staff 

These proposals will have the greatest impact upon PSOs. To deliver more reports they will need to undertake training (beyond what is in the current VQ3 qualification) so that they are able to conduct risk assessments (including on domestic abuse cases) and are able to complete OASys. There is the potential for some modules from the forthcoming Community Justice Learning programme (which will replace the PQF) to meet this need. This is something which is being explored further.

The complement of PSOs varies significantly across the NPS divisions and some may need to increase the number of PSOs to implement our proposed new way of working. Given that the NPS is not using PSOs as fully as possible and there is considerable pressure on POs, these proposals will benefit both grades of staff allowing PSOs to fulfil their potential and POs to concentrate on the work that only they have the qualification, training and skills to deliver. 

Excellent administration will underpin the successful delivery of the proposals and while it is possible to implement some administrative changes for enforcement (virtual hubs where these do not exist already), it would be a mistake to engage in major administrative change now, before the impact of digital courts is clear. In the next phase of E3 an administrative review will be needed to reshape how and what we do to work alongside the changed court service. 

2.6 Conclusion 

We believe these proposals will enable the NPS to continue to provide the level and quality of service required by courts and CRCs within the financial and staffing resources available to us.

(more to follow)

PSR Special

It all started with a casual throwaway line in Saturday's blog post:-

Finally, I continually hear depressing news regarding increasing numbers of judges who are willing to sentence for quite serious matters without the need for full probation reports. The Recorder of a major northern city apparently feels there's no problem and it's much quicker and cheaper to weigh off a manslaughter charge on an FDR. It's so short-sighted and unprofessional. I cannot help but wonder if we've been wasting our time over the years and if they ever really understood the purpose of a full PSR.......   

I share your concerns vis a viz full PSR and wonder where we are going with this trend? I was passing through a Court last week and was told that the Judge is now sentencing without ANY report!

It's quite clear where it is going...removal of reports altogether. It was proposed a long time ago and is not far off being implemented. The removal of legal representation and then the pre sentence report...all part of a plan..the rise of the rich and the punishment of the poor.

I'm not so worried about FDRs as long as they are done on an adjournment, in fact I have seen some better, more detailed FDRs than full reports. It's the oral reports based on short interview with defendant in court with limited CPS papers & no Children's Services or police checks. Someone the other day said that DV was the fault line running through TR & I couldn't agree more yet some courts are requesting & getting oral reports in DV cases. This is so, so wrong & colleagues in NPS should be refusing to do them in any case where there is a victim at risk of harm. 

Under TR unless checks are done or diversity factors such as mental health or learning disabilities are picked up at PSR stage the chances are they never will by CRC. And the reality is that in an interview in court, generally under 30 mins, checks won't be made & diversity won't be explored.

A little bit harsh on those of us in CRCs!! We're still perfectly competent members of staff, you know. I would agree that failure to pick things up at PSR stage makes life for supervising officers significantly more difficult, however. We are getting an increasing number of cases through with reports that have significant gaps in them, many of which are resulting in wholly unsuitable orders being made.

Male with mental age of 8 sentenced to Supervision and ASAR requirement (alcohol module) - sentenced via FDR - should be interesting!!!!

Sorry I didn't mean to infer that CRC colleagues weren't up to the job far from it! My concern is in the point you make about inappropriate orders being made such as someone with a learning disability being placed on a group or domestic abuser simply being given stand alone UPW with no opportunity to address offending behaviour. Also I am well aware that some of the new CRC will push to have service users pushed off to voluntary sector or for reductions in reporting requirements to reduce costs & Max profits. If diversity issues aren't flagged up at PSR it makes it more likely the incorrect order will be made or leave the CRC, at best, playing catch up.

For cases where custody's inevitable I've always scratched my head at wondering what the point of a 3 week adjournment was apart from giving Judge background information on the defendant and background on the circumstances surrounding the offence. I always thought that we were duplicating the defence barristers work. So, I can see the point of these types of cases not having a report. With regards to FDRs on all other cases I'd say is hit and miss. I'm coming across a lot of 'skeleton tickbox' type ones and to me they're a bit pointless. 

Surely the essential point of the full PSR is to bring a probation officer's expertise and analysis to the party, and which gives perspectives which invariably the defence solicitor and barrister will not have picked up on. I've lost count of the times I've had to lead them by the hand and point out factors they've missed that could be used as mitigation for example. Learning Disability is something that often gets missed in my experience, and mental health issues. 

Then there's the role the report plays in informing the prison and subsequent probation staff about the person in order to assist sentence planning. Finally, as you say, information regarding the offence and helping to put that into the context of the person and the reasons for the offence commission.

The trouble is a lot of this was clearly far too nuanced for judges who seem have got it into their head that the PSR was a defence document designed to try and argue against custody and therefore wasn't necessary if custody was going to be inevitable. And before anyone says what about OASys - you know my views on that pile of useless crap! (JB)

All I can think of is that defence reps don't pick up on things, then that is not Probation's problem and like you said we're not here to mitigate for them. Why are we doing their job? The judges have sentencing guidelines so again, no reason for Probation to get involved in that and I had a short intake of breath when you suggested that the PSR could be of benefit to prison staff for sentence planning - there are OMs inside who should be doing that - why should a field team OM or court PO write a report to help inform sentence planning when the person is going to be sitting in prison for +12mths, prison should be doing it surely? The courts is one area I do think Probation could be a bit leaner staff wise and I appreciate I'm probably in the minority with this.

"Why are we doing other peoples jobs?" It's a good question, but I've been doing just that ever since I started out as a green probation student on a practice placement! I've always seen my job as a PO as applying sticking plaster to try and repair damage and failings everywhere, for the benefit of clients and on behalf of the state. A sort of catchall service of last resort. (JB)

The point about a PSR is that if done well it captures the situation before the defendant's uncertainty is removed by the sentencing decision and especially the details - length - financial orders - conditions of supervision. And not just the defendant's attitude but that of those closest to him and sometimes the wider supports, such as an employer.

In some cases it will make not a jot of difference to a sentence - but it might identify some feature that is immediately relevant post sentence, such as the practical - elderly parent needing to have care provision, dog, children and more. Then there are psychiatric situations, it maybe that there are grounds for a forensic psychiatric report that are not obvious but make all the difference in the long run. Then there are the things like vulnerability to suicide so that immediate steps can be taken to alert those who can minimise the risk.

Then, of just as a great a value is the immediate post sentence interview - the attitude on first discovering the actual sentence and the difference between the attitude when the situation was uncertain, of defendant and those closest.

It maybe rare to get good opportunity to do it all but when it happens it can be vital to the relationship between the client and the whole probation service and especially the one to one relationship. That stuff is MOST relevant in custody cases when parole is under consideration.

That some have posted here that it is unnecessary is sadly revealing about the style of probation now practiced and accepted as good enough in some places. I suspect the deterioration in this aspect of the work is partly responsible for the increased suicide numbers in prison I stress partly - other things are always more relevant, because if a probation worker did not detect a high risk, somewhere else in the chain of reception someone should have had the opportunity to tease out a higher suicide risk - if they interview properly - hopefully the old - 'you're not thinking of doing anything silly' type questions - that I heard when working in a prison are no longer asked?

I was nodding all the way through reading through this. You are right. I trained in 2005 through DipPS route which is much later than a lot of my colleagues. But reading through some of the other comments today about not needing PSRs it leaves me wondering have things really changed so much in the last 10 years? I'm feeling very old. And sad.

PSRs - the most important document in the world of probation. That was how I was introduced to report writing in 1992. My apprenticeship In the profession began as a Probation Officer's assistant. One of my earliest tasks was to read every report prepared for the court on my MPSO (money payment supervision order) duty days. Later I was asked to help with the gatekeeping of Crown Court reports (as proofreader). Those experiences ensured my depth of knowledge. When I trained, sponsored by the Home Office, report writing skills were revered and central to the role, i.e psr, parole, deferred sentence, etc. Judges AND magistrates (lay & stipendiary) read and acknowledged the contents of reports. Often I was asked to attend to speak to a report in both court settings, being quizzed in open court by judges about my proposals on numerous occasions as they worked towards their decisions. Equally I could find myself in chambers with a judge & both barristers, being offered a cup of tea & being asked to explain my thinking for a particularly radical or uncommon proposal.

Those were the days when probation officers were respected professionals. Sadly those days are long gone. I agree with much of what you say on the PSR issue. Standard PSRs are incredibly important for more serious offences, and certainly for complex offenders, and over the years I have spent much time liaising with relevant partners in order to produce a thorough and comprehensive report. I always explained to offenders that the report aimed to be objective, and was intended to assist the Court in the sentencing exercise. Unfortunately, many report writers have tended to argue unrealistically against custody in the proposal, hence the perception amongst many players in the court process that the PSR is a second tier defence.

The assumption made is that all reports were arguments against custody. Some of the best & more complex reports I ever read were acknowledgements that jail was all but inevitable, nevertheless offered several pages of insight, observation & suggestion as to how that jail term might usefully be spent - I think its now labelled 'sentence planning' - with ideas as to what might happen post-jail. Nothing new under the sun, its now been fragmented into a series of computer based codes and tickboxes designed by logarithms & formulae & 1s & 0s. 

The guidance was to offer the Courts alternatives to custody, not to argue against custody, particularly if custody was inevitable. The report content was to provide objective analysis and offer suggestions towards the possibility and viability of reducing the risk of continued offending. The report was read by the person it concerned, consequently the content could and did have considerable impact on their response and subsequent ' engagement 'with the sentence. Now many reports are subjective, ridden with all the negatives the interviewer could 'identify' from the interview. Every possible 'risk' extrapolated, every 'deficit' highlighted. Proportionate sentencing proposals an apparent mystery.

I had the impression from an anon comment in a recent post that to current court staff their role was about second guessing what Mags might be thinking and making proposals accordingly. Is there no challenging of Mags thinking nowadays and getting sentences down tariff? As an old dinosaur PSR writing was the best part of the job for me. Of course you have to acknowledge cases where custody is likely, but a good report can often affect length of sentence, or on occasion lead to a judge taking a chance on a non custodial disposal. Good, persuasive report writing seems to be an increasingly lost art. 

Information that I heard about from someone is that one and a half hours is the allocated time allowed for fast delivery reports. A ridiculously small amount of time as in many areas OASys generated reports are the exception rather than the rule. Most report writers would spend at least five hours on an FDR from reading CPS, researching past response to supervision, reading previous reports, liaising with other agencies etc. The real issue is that if, as a report writer, you spend longer than an hour and a half in total you don't get and credit on the current work load management tool. 1.5hrs is totally unrealistic. 

Oral reports are being done in one hour fifteen minutes, including interview and delivery, it can be done as the court team manager attests...it is however a tick box report with no annotation.

All that's happened is that the full assessment process has moved from pre to post-sentence. The majority of this work will have to be undertaken by CRC colleagues given the way probation has been split. Frustrating for clients who previously would have spilt all about their lives to the PSR author. So they do a bit at court, a bit at induction and then more at the first interview with their supervising officer. Life used to be so simple when you carried on working with those clients that you'd interviewed for a PSR. How would we feel if we kept being pushed from pillar to post before being settled in a relationship with a line manager for example? The system developed in probation which I joined thirty plus years ago is so client unfriendly.

I wrote extensively on the subject of PSR's in the early days and plucked the following from the archives:-

Wednesday, 15 September 2010

The end of the PSR is Nigh

One of the most enjoyable and satisfying parts of the job used to be writing court reports. When I started they were called Social Enquiry Reports, but they were renamed Pre Sentence Reports some time ago. The astute will not have failed to notice the use of the past tense. The concept is quite straight forward - following a guilty plea or finding of guilt, the sentencers request a probation officer to interview the defendant, assimilate all rel event information and provide in written form background information about the defendant, their current situation, the circumstances of the offence and most importantly a suggestion as to possible sentence and with reasons. The probation officer has a privileged opportunity of speaking directly to the sentencers from an independent viewpoint and as such can be extremely persuasive in being able to influence the eventual outcome. Not surprisingly therefore this has always been seen as a key skill and most officers take enormous pride in producing high quality reports that result in courts following their recommendations. In the past it was felt to be good practice to attend court in person with either a controversial, unusual or brave recommendation in order to be able to re-inforce it on oath if necessary. Sadly, hardly any of this is true nowadays.

Several years ago I was offered the opportunity of moving out of a field office and into a Court Officers post. Many, including myself, felt that this meant being put out to grass, but I needed a break from the front line and I was flattered when management said they wanted 'a safe pair of hands; someone who looked smart and could talk whilst stood on their feet'. It didn't take long to discover just how far the art of PSR writing had deteriorated. On a daily basis I found myself having to try and explain, correct and apologise for colleagues poor quality work. How could this have possibly happened? To a large degree, but not completely, the answer is OASys - the all-singing, all-dancing universal offender assessment tool. Unbelievably nowadays this mammoth, brain-numbing, 90 page computer form is required to be completed before the magic button 'prepare report' is pressed. Yes, modern-day PSR's are computer-generated, so it really shouldn't be that surprising if many of them are unintelligible, riddled with repetition and impossibly 'cranky' sentences. Old timers like myself gave up long ago trying to edit the result into something readable and just throw the whole lot away and start again. More recent officers say they haven't got the time, and to be honest why should they if the system is that crap? What beats me is how did any intelligent human being think that this was a good way to write a report for court? As an aid to sentencing, I think the days of the PSR are numbered. Not surprisingly, the 'authors' never seem to show up at court either. Me? - I do on occasion, just out of sheer devilment.