Is There Hope?

To be perfectly honest, I'm having trouble finding much in the way of hope right now for the future of our once gold standard and respected probation service. It's pretty clear it cannot survive as an agency for good under HMPPS and civil service control. In Clash of Cultures  I've already sought to highlight how the dead hand of government control have already conspired to throttle innovative and successful charity initiatives such as Circles of Support and Accountability and the Safer Living Foundation by witholding funding.

I worry about the future for the charity-owned and managed independent Approved Premises sector, reliant as they are upon HMPPS contracts and funding. Interestingly, I've recently become aware of one way to avoid HMPPS and MoJ completely and that is to find a wealthy and well-connected benefactor, such as Lady Edwina Grosvenor. Wikipedia confirms "She is a founder and a trustee of the charity The Clink, and founder of the charity One Small Thing. She is the sister of Hugh Grosvenor, 7th Duke of Westminster."

When you only have a few minutes with a person you can still make a difference.

One Small Thing’s vision is a justice system that can recognise, understand, and respond to trauma. Our mission is to redesign the justice system for women and their children, which has led us to open our residential community Hope Street. We also facilitate trauma-informed and gender-responsive programmes for the justice and community sectors.

Our name reflects the value of small acts – empathy, compassion, respect – and their combined power to make a big difference to the individual - and to society as a whole.

Hope Street: Frequently Asked Questions About One Small Thing 

1.What is One Small Thing and what is it trying to achieve? Hope Street is being developed by the charity One Small Thing. One Small Thing’s vision is a justice system that can recognise, understand, and respond to trauma. Our mission is to redesign the justice system for women and their children. We have three work strands: 

Redesign the way the justice system responds to women and their children in a way that can be replicated and scaled nationally. 

Educate prison residents to understand how trauma can affect them and equip them with the skills to respond; and train frontline staff to understand and respond effectively to trauma and adversity. 

Influence politicians and policy makers to encourage culture change across the justice system and the people who work within it. 

2.Who is involved? One Small Thing is a charity led by CEO Claire Hubberstey. The charity was founded by Edwina Grosvenor who is the Chair of Trustees. One Small Thing involves a number of leading advisers and experts in the area including Dr Stephanie Covington.

3.When was it set up? One Small Thing has been leading trauma informed work in the UK for eight years, and became an independent charity in 2018 (registered Charity Number 1180782). One Small Thing is a registered company limited by guarantee (Company No. 11516337). 

4.How is it funded? One Small Thing is supported by several generous funders, donors and philanthropists, and through its training offer. 

5.What is One Small Thing’s relationship with the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) and organisations like the Prison Service, the Crown Prosecution Service, the Police and other stakeholders involved in the justice system? One Small Thing is a separate and independent charity committed to working with Government and partners across the sector to make a positive difference. We work with the MoJ to support and improve the justice system and make it more effective. Through our policy and influencing work, we respond to and challenge national policy and systems where relevant. Improving the justice system requires input from a wide range of stakeholders. We work with stakeholders at all levels in pursuit of our mission to redesign the justice system for women and their children. We take a collaborative approach and recognise the benefits of multi-agency involvement.

6.What is Hope Street? One Small Thing has built Hope Street, a residential community for women and their children in Hampshire. Hope Street pilots a new approach to working with women involved in the justice system. From within a healing, trauma-informed, residential environment, women and their children have access to a range of specialist support including mental health, domestic abuse and substance use services. At Hope Street women have access to: 

• A safe, 24 hour staffed residential Hub, purpose built and specifically designed to create a trauma informed and trauma responsive environment for women and their children 
• Individually tailored programmes designed to enable women to address a wide range of issues in their lives that have resulted in them becoming involved with the justice system 
• Eleven move-on supported Hope Houses for women leaving the Hub in preparation for return to their own home 
• Ongoing outreach community-based support for women and their families once they have returned to their own home.

Hope Street is also for the local community to access a community café space and group activities. As well as the improved wellbeing of women and children, and benefits to the community, by working with women to rebuild their lives, we will also see a reduction in crime and reoffending. 

7.Why is it needed? Research has shown that 72% of women entering prison in England and Wales to serve a sentence have committed a non-violent offence They have invariably been victims of life-long neglect, abuse and disadvantage with a third having been in care as children. 60% of women receiving short prison sentences are mothers: their children then end up in care and they lose their homes.

After a short sentence, of only a few weeks, they are left with no family and no home and in a much worse situation, compounded by the trauma of prison and with little support to assist them in rebuilding their lives. A gender-specific and community-based alternative is needed if we are to create a more effective, successful and supportive pathway for women. The core and root issues addressed with a trauma informed approach ultimately means better outcomes for women and their children. Hope Street is backed by the evidence and is in line with Government policy: In June 2018, the Government’s Female Offender Strategy identified four strategic priorities: 

• fewer women entering the justice system; 
• fewer women in custody, especially on short-term sentences; 
• more women managed in the community successfully; 
• better conditions for women in custody. 

In June 2019 the Farmer Review for Women was published, and throughout the report there is huge emphasis on the urgent need to deliver a viable alternative to custody for most women who commit non-violent crimes but who invariably end up in our prison system. 

8.How is what you are providing different to the Governments planned Residential Women’s Centres (RWCs)? Plans for the Government’s Residential Women’s Centre released so far suggests it will be run by Probation and accommodate all women who would have been sentenced for 12 months or less. The provision will be short stay accommodation with a 12-week course. Hope Street is different because:

• The Government’s residential women’s centre is proposed to house women who would have gone on to receive a short custodial sentence. This misses a large group of women. Women will be able to stay at Hope Street instead of being unnecessarily sent to custody on remand prior to sentencing, if they are eligible for release from prison but this is not possible due to lack of accommodation, or so they can complete community service with somewhere safe and supportive to stay. We know 20% of women in prison are on remand3 and in July 2021 77% of women leaving the largest women’s prison in England and Wales faced homelessness.
• Hope Street will include a network of housing, Hope Houses, across Hampshire, allowing us to support many more women and over the long term rather than for just a 12 week period. 
• Services will be run by One Small Thing as an independent charity. This means that our priority can be the women we support rather than meeting any external targets. Women from minoritised groups who may have distrust of Government services, can be reassured that we are independent. By taking a positive, compassionate and trauma-informed approach, the aim is to achieve better outcomes for women, their children and society. 

9.Who is it for? Hope Street aims to be a community-based alternative to women receiving short custodial sentences, being unnecessarily imprisoned on remand or released to homelessness. Most women being sent to prison are without question some of the most disadvantaged in our society, have not committed violent offences and are not a risk to society: 

• Most women entering prison to serve a sentence (72%) have committed a nonviolent offence. 
• More women are sent to prison to serve a sentence for theft than for violence against the person, robbery, sexual offences, fraud, drugs, and motoring offences combined. 
•  51% of women were sentenced to six months and 64% of women were sentenced to 12 months or less April to June 2021.  
• More than 17,500 children were estimated to be separated from their mother by imprisonment in 2020. 
• Nearly 60% of women in prison and under community supervision in England and Wales are victims of domestic abuse. This is likely to be an underestimate because many women fear disclosing abuse.  
• Nearly half of women reported needing help with a drug problem on entry to prison—compared with nearly three in 10 men.
• Women are much more likely than men to self-harm whilst in prison. In 2020, women made up 22% of all self-harm incidents despite making up only 4% of the prison population.

10.Why Southampton? Of the 877 women arrested in Hampshire between 1 st November 2018 and 31st October 2019, 33% were from Southampton. Women from Southampton who receive a custodial sentence are sent out of area, often more than 60 miles away from their home, making it very difficult for their children and families to visit them. It therefore makes sense to prioritise Southampton as the preferred location for the Hope Street Hub because it has the greatest need. This is a significant region and it is not well-served at present, so there is an opportunity to make a positive difference. 

11.Who runs it? Hope Street is run by a team that will include a range of multi-disciplinary practitioners, colocated staff from a range of other agencies and partner organisations. The Hope Street team work closely with the council and health services as well as other voluntary sector agencies to ensure effective multi-agency working. We work in partnership with other local specialist services, to draw on their skills and expertise and to avoid duplication. We have extensively discussed our plans with both the statutory and voluntary services in the area. We deliver 1:1 support and group activities to women on Probation as part of the Hampshire Probation contract in partnership with the charity Advance and have built up strong local working partnerships through this work.

12.How do you provide for women with children? Hope Street provides family accommodation for women with their children wherever it is deemed appropriate following assessment to do so. We have flats that can accommodate women with their children at the Hub and provide play and support services for children on site. 

We know that maternal separation is traumatic for children and causes stress and trauma, which in many cases has a life-long impact. By removing the trauma of separation, the mental health and well-being of children are not put at risk. Keeping families together where it is in children’s best interests, is enshrined in UK law and is something we are proud to champion.

The offer of a safe residential option where children can continue to live with their mothers and be supported as a family will enable the courts to make better sentencing decisions and contribute to the aim of breaking the cycle of intergenerational trauma and vulnerability. 

We assess, with social services and other agencies, whether a woman who is eligible for Hope Street has dependent children who should accompany her. Subject to assessment and capacity, we will accommodate whatever number of children we need to, subject to having space, and will provide onsite childcare facilities to look after them while she is undertaking her treatment or training programmes. 

13.How many women will Hope Street support? The Hope Street Hub can accommodate up to 24 women – plus children - at any one time in shared flats. When including the network of Hope Houses, our ambition is that Hope Street Hampshire will accommodate 124 women and their children, with another 500 women accessing services on a day basis. 

14.How much will it cost? Constructing the centre has cost approximately £7.5m with around £3m per year needed to cover the operating costs across the Hope Street Hub and housing pathway. The costs were modelled on other public services and come in significantly less, for instance than a residential facility in the NHS. We estimate one year’s support to cost a quarter of what it costs to send a women to prison for 12 months. Hope Street aims to significantly reduce the overall cost to the public purse by addressing the root causes of the issues the women face, equipping them with skills and giving them an opportunity to build a new life and take a productive role in society.

15.Who is funding Hope Street? Hope Street is being made possible thanks to the generous support of our funders, major donors and philanthropists. We are in the process of securing the capital cost for the site and build plus 5 years running costs.

16.What taxpayer money is involved in building Hope Street if any? No taxpayer money is involved in the capital cost of the Hope Street Hub being established in Southampton. 

17.Where is the Hope Street Hub site? We have a site in Southampton situated in a community of other service providers and which is close to public transport.

18.What consultation have you undertaken? We have consulted with those with lived experience, members of the local and county council and local stakeholders in order to help us shape the Hope Street Hub so it can be a truly valuable community resource serving the needs of women and children affected by and at risk of trauma. The development of Hope Street has evolved over a number of years and has involved a range of experts, service providers and women with lived experience. 

19.What about neighbours directly affected? Our aim for Hope Street is that it is an asset to the local community and involve neighbours in accessing its facilities. The planning application process involved consultation with all directly affected and an invitation to submit views as part of the consultation process. We constructed the Hope Street Hub as considerately as possible and keep interested parties up to date on developments. 

20.What does the Hub look like? Who has designed it? The development of Hope Street has involved long term planning involving scoping out of the project, design principles and work on site specific design. After a thorough tendering process involving a range of local architects we appointed SNUG to work with us and in collaboration with Focus Design and Harris Bugg Studio to deliver an integrated healing environment. All have track records of collaborative and sensitive approaches. The Hope Street Hub is filled with natural light and greenery to create a calming and inspiring environment that allows for private reflection, healing and recovery as well as shared experiences. 

21.What is special or bespoke about the design? The Hope Street Hub is the first of its kind in the UK being specifically designed with women to meet the needs of women and to be trauma informed in both design and build. The design of the building is sympathetic to its locality and embodies the values of One Small Thing by promoting an environment through its design principles that enables compassion, understanding, respect, equality and justice. As a community asset, the Hope Street Hub hosts a community café and group activities such as keep fit classes

Hope Street was created along gender-specific and trauma-informed principles. This aims to recognise that the women who will be resident have experienced severe trauma, often since early childhood, and that this trauma needs to be addressed if the individual is to be able to achieve profound and long-term change to their lives. 

22. Is the Hub open? The Build is now complete and Hope Street's Official Opening by HRH The Princess of Wales took place at the end of June 2023.

Probation's Journey Continues

Extracts from the first part of the latest Academic Insights paper 'Professionalism in Probation' has produced some very interesting responses, so here is the second and final extract. 

2.3 Towards a relational future for professionalism: opportunities and challenges 

In 2018, just four years after Transforming Rehabilitation was implemented, the Government announced yet more probation restructuring. Initial plans for the next iteration of services retained a commitment to a ‘mixed market approach’ (MoJ, 2018, p.3), with the Government pledging to work with CRCs to renegotiate contracts. However, after a consultation (MoJ, 2018), a subsequent response (MoJ, 2019), and several (draft) target operating models (HMPPS, 2020a, 2020b, 2021), it was announced that offender management would return to the public sector – a decision influenced in part by the Covid19 pandemic. Probation was unified in June 2021: CRCs were terminated, with services divided between 12 regions and housed within the Civil Service. The Chief Inspector of Probation has warned that while unification ‘is not a magic bullet for improving performance’ (HM Inspectorate of Probation, 2020a, p.8), structural reform can provide the stability from which to rebuild. In this sense, it offers opportunities for the future of professionalism, but also challenges. 

Among the challenges for probation as services are unified is the recent uptick in punitive rhetoric. For example, in September 2020, a white paper entitled A Smarter Approach to Sentencing (MoJ, 2020a) mostly contained ‘tough’ measures, including longer sentences for a variety of offences. As a result, changes to sentencing, alongside plans to increase police numbers and a prison building programme, have led the Ministry of Justice (2020b) to predict that the prison population could rise to 98,700 over the next six years. The likely impact of such punitive discourses on probation caseloads poses both organisational and individual challenges. At the level of the organisation, appeals to ‘tough on crime’ initiatives undermine public confidence in community sentences, for pro-punitive sentiments mean that probation services can struggle to gain credibility (Robinson et al., 2012). Probation staff, meanwhile, may experience difficulty in (re)articulating and realising a distinct ideology of service if individual caseloads increase – especially from within the Civil Service, if these values conflict with Government policy (Carr, 2020). 

Caseload pressures can also be exacerbated by the challenges of recruitment and retention. A survey of 1,534 probation staff conducted by HM Inspectorate of Probation (2022, p.15) as part of their most recent annual inspection of services revealed that about half (51 per cent) thought their workloads were ‘not so manageable’. Additional funding was allocated to recruiting 1,000 staff onto the Professional Qualification in Probation in 2021, the training pathway to become a probation officer, with another 1,500 in 2022 (HM Inspectorate of Probation, 2022). However, lengthy vetting procedures, the time taken to train new staff, and increasing resignations (HM Inspectorate of Probation, 2022) suggests that the benefits of recruitment and (re)professionalisation strategies will take time to realise. The role of the staff-client relationship in supporting desistance is salient within the probation literature (McNeill, 2006; Weaver, 2011); hence, it is crucial that staff, as the service’s most valuable asset, are the subject of ongoing investment. If, as argued above, professionalism in probation refers to a way of organising work according to knowledge, discretion, and the opportunity to realise distinctive, people-centred identities, then reduced caseloads and the greater provision of training can enhance professional skills and afford the space to deploy and reflect on such expertise. 

Key to the plans to develop professionalism in probation is the creation of ‘an independent statutory register for probation professionals’ (MoJ, 2019, p.4), with the intention of (re)forging a common identity among all staff. This seeks to better recognise probation work as a profession, building upon similar proposals by HM Inspectorate of Probation (2019a) to bring the service into line with other certified professions, such as medicine. The register will mandate professional training, ensure that clients and the public are protected from gross negligence via debarment (MoJ, 2019), and provide ‘access to high-quality, practical learning resources that… support day-to-day tasks’ (HMPPS, 2020c, p.9). While, at the time of writing, there has been little progress on the professional register, it provides an ideal resource through which to (re)establish a clear ideology of service. Here, Canton’s (Academic Insights paper 2019/02) analysis of the European Probation Rules (EPR) provides a framework within which to develop the professional register. Articulating values grounded in human rights and the minimisation of harms, he contends, is at the core of the EPR. Making such values explicit through the professional register can serve to instil a common identity among probation staff that was fractured by Transforming Rehabilitation. 

And yet, while attempts ‘to improve… professionalisation’ (MoJ, 2020a, p.63) through appeals to its ideal-typical tenets have thus far been presented as vital to the future of the profession, McNeill (2019, p.145) states that an exclusive focus on staff betrays a ‘tunnel vision in the supervisory imaginary’. He argues that the development of new ways of working ‘begin in the wrong place’ (McNeill, 2006, p.45) if the focus is on practice rather than how individual change occurs. As probation scholars have argued, professionals do not ‘own’ the process of desistance (Albertson et al., 2020); rather, its ‘rightful owners [are] victims, offenders and communities’ (Maruna, 2006, p.24). Relevant persons other than professionals can thus play a meaningful role in decision-making. This is supported by recent research which indicates that services can be improved if we enable meaningful citizen participation. HM Inspectorate of Probation (2019b) argue that service user involvement in service provision benefits staff by providing insights into how clients experience probation. Greater involvement in, and co-production of, services is a way to ‘democratise engagement with service users’ (Weaver, 2011, p.1045): learning about clients as individuals rather than cases, as one member of staff put it, enabled him to ‘see the person behind the risk’ (HM Inspectorate of Probation, 2019b, p.15; emphasis in original). This suggests that probation professionals have an important role to play in reinforcing a sense of belonging in clients through a focus on collaborative relationships. 

Restorative practice could represent a framework through which probation can better embed partnerships ‘between the state and individuals, victims, families and communities as co-producers of justice’ (Weaver, 2011, p.1048). Indeed, restorative theories around conflict ownership and the notion of justice as identifying and meeting stakeholders’ needs (Christie, 1977) correspond closely with the literature on the desistance process (Maruna, 2006; McNeill, 2006). Marder (Academic Insights paper 2020/04) notes that restorative practice comprises:

 • values – including stakeholder participation, the goals of addressing and repairing harm, and a focus on cultivating positive relationships 

• language – open, non-judgemental questions, encouraging emotional expression and reflection 

• processes – including circles, family conferencing and mediation, through which the values are enacted. 

Marder argues that better integrating a restorative culture within probation would ‘actively build positive relationships with and among colleagues, clients and the community [and] enable those who hold a stake in a given issue to participate voluntarily in dialogue and decision-making around that issue’ (Marder, 2020a, p.4). As the 2018 Council of Europe framework on restorative justice states, restorative practice has a wide range of applications across probation (Marder, 2020b). In this way, it holds significant potential for building relationships with victims and communities, promoting multi-agency work, and healing internal divisions (Tidmarsh and Marder, 2021). 

That probation ‘services are part of an ecosystem which is… suffering from declining investment’ (HM Inspectorate of Probation, 2020a, p.6) heightens the need for ‘co-productive’ approaches – defined by Bovaird (2007, p.847) as: 

‘the provision of services through regular, long-term relationships between professionalized service providers (in any sector) and service users or other members of the community’. 

Such an approach is supported by Rule 12 of the EPR, which states that probation services ‘shall work in partnership with other public or private organisations and local communities to promote the social inclusion of offenders’ (c.f. Canton, 2019, p.7). Relational approaches that involve people on probation, such as restorative practice and co-production, have the potential to expedite the acquisition of pro-social and non-criminal identities (Weaver, 2011). Unification provides an opportunity not only to re-centre probation as a public sector profession underpinned by knowledge and expertise, but also to build professional networks in the community. Here, the provision of time and training can enable staff to develop the links which can help them to realise a client-centred ideology of service. 

Perhaps the most promising initiative which emphasises the benefits of involving external stakeholders in service design and delivery is that of ‘community hubs’, introduced by some CRCs as a way to support multi-agency working with local health and welfare organisations. They are an innovation that staff and service users have generally received positively (HM Inspectorate of Probation, 2020b). Community hubs thus illustrate probation’s potential for co-production, as the connective tissue that binds together different social spheres and the communities they represent (Senior et al., 2016). Albertson et al. (2020, p.6) suggest that the range of actors involved makes hubs ‘well placed to affect structural impediments to desistance at the nexus of community, society and the individual’. Desistance literature emphasises not what is done to an offender in the course of a criminal justice sanction, but rather, the importance of acquiring positive internal narratives (Maruna, 2006). Remaking the temporal-spatial and relational boundaries of probation practice by promoting ‘enabling’ structures can thus hasten the ‘discovery’ of agency (Albertson et al., 2020). 

Unification, therefore, offers an opportunity to build on best practice. Investment in staff should be at its core: 

• providing the foundations for upskilling professional knowledge and expertise  

• improving autonomy to work with people on probation and build community links 

• helping to develop the ability to reflect critically on practice. 

A clear focus on enhancing the tenets of professionalism identified in this paper can thus help to rebuild an identity and culture within probation which is relational, collaborative, and, above all, person-centred.

3. Conclusion 

After years of instability within probation, the potential for some stability as a result of unification is welcome. Transforming Rehabilitation has brought many of probation’s underlying issues to the surface; its essence (Senior et al., 2016), if not lost altogether, has been further tainted by the logic of competition and profit. The ‘national service of second chances’ (House of Commons Hansard, 2020), as the Shadow Secretary of State for Justice recently described probation, itself requires a second chance. Most staff within the new probation body will likely welcome the changes, while remaining anxious about the future (HM Inspectorate of Probation, 2020a) – especially, as Carr (2020) has observed, from within the unfamiliar institutional environment of the Civil Service. 

The next iteration of probation should be reconstructed around the professionalism of its staff, its most valuable asset, with the goal of building and maintaining a wide ‘network of relationships’ (Dominey, 2019, p.284) at its core. A renewed focus on ‘professionalism’ is rooted in a recognition of the need to re-professionalise staff through knowledge, education, and training, and to engage them in an evidence-base. The benefits of this strategy will take time to realise, particularly because it takes place against an all too familiar backdrop of punitive criminal justice rhetoric and projections that prison populations will continue to increase (MoJ, 2020a, 2020b). A likely increase in people on the probation caseload could further hinder professional autonomy and an ideology of service. It is thus vital that further recruitment enables staff to spend more time with people on probation and to reflect critically on their practice. This, alongside resources like the professional register, can help to re-emphasise shared values and create a positive service identity into which new staff can be socialised. 

Greater co-production with external stakeholders, too, can underpin a relational basis for a new ‘professionalism’ – one that respects the service’s unique history and culture while emphasising its contemporary relevance as a social, legal and moral arbiter between people on probation, the state, victims and communities. This collaborative, bottom-up focus on relationships, between and among people on probation, communities and professionals, clearly overlaps with restorative practice (Marder, 2020a). Indeed, the new probation body could explore dialogic and restorative models to negotiate a new culture to which all staff buy-in. With sufficient institutional support and investment in the wider social infrastructure in which the service operates, probation staff can pursue a professionalism which is grounded in ‘thick’ (Dominey, 2019) relationships that help the new service to recapture its legitimacy.

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Mention of 'relationships' here takes me right back to the beginning of this blog and something I published in 2010 'It's the Relationship Stupid' and re-visited in 2017 'Nothing New'. I understand recently-departed Chief Probation Officer Sonia Flynn will be undertaking work on setting up the Professional Register as part of the Probation Workforce Programme.

So, How Did It Go?

With the dreadful 'Probation Day' thankfully out of the way for the second year, it's probably as well if we have a look at the recent assessment of 'Project Reunification' by the rather grandly-titled Institute for Government. We're only at stage one remember and there's almost certainly a whole lot more pain and angst coming down the line for a beleaguered service that many would say is rapidly becoming increasingly dysfunctional. Of course it was a world-leading Gold Standard service only a few years ago and before the politicians got involved.      

Reunification of probation services

Introduction In 2019, the government announced it was bringing the management of medium- and low-risk offenders in England and Wales back in house. The decision followed extensive criticism of the decision to outsource these services in 2015 and is the fourth major restructuring of probation services in 20 years, two of which have taken place in the last eight years alone. This case study looks at the Ministry of Justice’s (MoJ) preparations for the reunification of services and their transition back into the department, highlighting successes, challenges and areas of focus for the longer-term improvement of probation services.

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Leadership and engagement 

With real problems associated with TR, having the right programme leadership for reunification was an important decision. Whether by design or not, the two most senior leaders responsible for the programme – SRO Jim Barton and director general Amy Rees – were both involved in TR. Learning from its failures no doubt coloured their approach – particularly with respect to engaging providers, as we discuss further below – and helped avoid a repeat of many of the same mistakes. In addition, their understanding of probation systems, processes and culture played a notable part in helping the programme navigate a complex landscape. 

A consistent theme during our research interviews was MoJ’s commitment to open dialogue and engagement. This included visits to providers, forums with staff and regular communications, all with the aim of making the changes as smooth as possible for staff and providers alike. With more than 7,000 staff across 54 affected organisations, the programme could not have been delivered effectively without a relentless focus on business change and an approach that was inclusive, bringing together the diverse stakeholders. The programme benefited from the fact that, unlike TR – which was almost universally unpopular from the off, being literally and figuratively divisive – unification was a change that many across the probation sector wanted to see. They were therefore more responsive to MoJ’s efforts to communicate and engage. Notwithstanding this, and some mixed feedback from HMIP’s survey, it is clear that MoJ set out with a genuine intention to put engagement at the centre of its programme. Its choice paid dividends. 

CRC innovations 

A key concern of providers when reunification was announced was that the innovations developed by CRCs would be lost. These concerns were valid, given the relatively limited autonomy in the civil service. And, to some extent, they turned out to be well founded – but not in the ways expected. 

The decision to jettison innovations such as case management systems was as much attributable to the tight timetable as to the restrictions of the civil service. The programme SRO acknowledged that these could have been integrated had there been more time, though this could have been a lengthy process. As it was, the need for speed meant taking a more rudimentary approach, and the path of least resistance was followed. Further, some of the innovations that were kept were largely serendipitous. For example, contact centres in Norfolk were retained partly because the contracts were too complicated to unpick in the time available. 

Overall, despite the clear commitment of MoJ to a ‘merger’, it was probably inevitable that the cultures and working practices would lean towards the NPS rather than the CRCs, as the Probation Service, like the NPS, would be in the civil service. 

Commissioning of services 

The central commercial decision for MoJ was its commissioning mechanism. It put effort into ensuring there was strong, early engagement to generate an active market of potential providers. However, despite representations to the contrary from providers, its Dynamic Framework was complex and made it difficult for smaller providers to qualify. As a result, some gave up trying to qualify, while others had to divert front-line resources to the tender processes, impacting front-line services. The approach was partly attributable to the need for speed. Faced with a challenging timetable, MoJ opted for a procurement approach that was in keeping with previous, large commercial arrangements that better suited large national providers, rather than developing a new approach that would have better supported smaller and local providers. MoJ also opted not to use grants, a key demand of the voluntary sector, for essentially the same reasons. 

Both these decisions were incorrect. More focus from the start on whether the Dynamic Framework was proportionate and fit for use by all participants would have saved time on communications and engagement as the process developed, and would have delivered a more diverse, engaged market of providers for Day 1 services. 

Richard Oldfield’s report on the Dynamic Framework, coupled with feedback, has resulted in MoJ now developing criteria and guidance on the use of grants, in partnership with Clinks. MoJ also told us that, despite challenges with the Dynamic Framework, 74% of contracts on Day 1 went to voluntary, community and social enterprise organisations. This has since grown further, and the Dynamic Framework is subject to ongoing review and refinement. 

Workforce management 

MoJ’s core message to staff was that the change was a merger, not a takeover. With TR still casting a shadow over reunification, this was the right approach. But MoJ’s desire to ‘live and breathe’ this motto, while admirable, led to difficulties. 

An early decision was to carry out a job evaluation and grading support (JEGS) exercise: a process by which each new post’s grade in the Probation Service was assessed independently. While this undoubtedly reinforced the message that the Probation Service was, essentially, a new organisation being built from scratch, it did lead to unpredictable outcomes, with some CRC staff matched into roles at grades lower than expected. This, in turn, would leave some staff on lower pay after the three-year pay protection agreed for them in the National Agreement with Probation Trade Unions came to an end. Similarly, the emphasis on a new corporate identity led to some staff having inflated expectations that unification would make an instant and tangible difference to their work, when the reality was that these changes were simply a first step. While MoJ was generally excellent at communicating throughout the process, it could have better managed expectations about the immediate impact the transition would have on working conditions and service performance. 

A recurring theme in our research into the reunification of probation was the high volumes of cases CRC staff had to deal with post-unification. CRC staff arrived having to hold on to their existing cases until a new IT system could be developed to accept them. This lack of new, integrated IT capability on Day 1, rendered impossible by the aggressive timetable, was sub-optimal. It led to unnecessary pressure on some staff and this, in turn, likely coloured the perspectives of those who already felt ‘second class’. Staff shortfalls contributed to the caseload pressures, too. CRCs were required to freeze recruitment for up to three months prior to unification to minimise the overhead of onboarding and then transitioning further staff. While understandable, this led to critical gaps in the workforce. 

The future 

The probation reform programme will be formally wound up at the end of 2022. But the longer-term programme of work to improve the performance of probation services has only just begun. The structural changes of 2021 are the platform on which deeper and difficult changes will be built. That will be a lengthy journey. 

Transition highlighted several themes that will play an important part in that journey. For MoJ’s long-term ambitions for probation to be successful, the following areas should be focussed on. 

Operational performance 

A central criticism of TR was the poor performance of CRCs. Although performance improved over time in some CRCs, TR could not completely shake the perception of poor service delivery. 

Current probation performance is ‘not great’ with four ‘Inadequate’ and two ‘Requires Improvement’ Inspectorate reports. To some extent, this is to be expected, given wider public service performance27 (post-Covid-19, in particular28), existing challenges in probation and the post-transition bumps. But the success of unification will ultimately be judged by the performance of the new Probation Service. Without swift action that leads to better services, the reform programme risks being added to the long list of unsuccessful historical restructures. 

Recruitment 

By June 2022, 1,518 new probation officers had been recruited, but staffing numbers still remain below target: as of May 2022, there were 1,106 vacancies across the Probation Service.29 The government aims to recruit a further 1,500 officers in 2022/23. If it meets this target, it will be fully staffed. But this does not allow for staff attrition or increased demand on probation services. Sustained investment is needed in the years to come. The government previously announced an additional £155m for probation services, which, while helpful, may not be sufficient given the competition from other public sector employers, such as the police and Border Force, as well as the pressure from staffing groups to increase pay in line with high levels of inflation.  

The government’s recent announcement of an arbitrary reduction of the Civil Service by 91,000 will also make it more difficult – though not impossible – to secure the necessary agreements to recruit the necessary numbers beyond 2022/23, particularly after having already absorbed over 7,000 CRC staff. 

Cultural integration 

MoJ’s tagline for the unification of probation was that it was a ‘merger, not a takeover’. But mergers require cultural and contractual cohesion. MoJ is still in the process of trying to harmonise the terms and conditions for some 700 staff who worked for parent companies or subcontractors. This will be an important step towards proper workforce integration, without which true transformation and effective delivery of probation services will be difficult to realise.

The Need For A Better Plan

Even though the Probation Service has pretty much disappeared from public view behind the Civil Service wall of bureaucracy and secrecy, those in the know are fully aware that things are not at all in good shape. Effectively, there appears to be tacit agreement between key stakeholders to just cover their ears and shout 'la la la la la' as loudly as possible and hope everything will be just fine. 

Unless something serious happens, I don't think this situation will alter any time soon, but in the meantime it's interesting to see that the the Centre for Crime and Justice Studies, even though not mentioning probation directly, is giving some serious thought as to the whole criminal justice landscape and the mess it's currently in:-     

A few weeks back, we published an article on our website by Whitney Iles, Khatuna Tsintsadze and Charlie Weinberg, the latest in the ‘critical care’ series they have been writing for us.

In the article, they criticised what they called “performance activism”, a tendency in the voluntary sector towards lots of activity, but “very little change on the ground”. While we don't really achieve anything, they argued, we are left “feeling good about our efforts”.

One of the things I have been wondering in the last few weeks is whether, in criminal justice, performance activism is itself a symptom of a frustration with the inertia of current criminal justice policy-making, its ‘stuckness’.

The prison system appears mired in almost permanent crisis. The police face a major crisis of trust. The court system is wrestling with an enormous backlog of cases. Injustices such as unfair joint enterprise convictions, the Imprisonment for Public Protection sentence, or racism throughout the justice system, are sometimes acknowledged. But nothing seems to change. Months may pass; the same issues, the same basic problems, remain.

Unsurprisingly, many of us probably feel trapped by the monotony of repeated criminal justice failure, unsure how, or if, we will ever escape it. A flurry of activity, even if it achieves little, can feel better than no activity at all.

I and colleagues at the Centre work are currently working on a new organisational strategy, to help guide the direction of our work through to our 100th anniversary in 2031. As part of that, I've been thinking about the problems of performance activism, and what might be behind it.

I've written this short piece to start bottoming out these issues. I'd be interested in any thoughts or reactions.

--oo00oo--

How do we escape the monotony of repeated policy failure? How do we instead do something genuinely new and transformative?

Consider the Prisons Strategy White Paper, published in December 2021, in what already feels like a different time.

It promises more prisons, on top of existing plans to expand current capacity to around 100,000 places. “We need a pipeline of accommodation beyond our current build programme”, the White Paper states, “and we will begin preparatory work... to set ourselves up for future expansion”.

There’s nothing particularly new here. In modern times, relentless prison growth has been the monotonous background noise of prisons policy since the eve of the Second World War, as I explained in this Prison Service Journal article from a few years back.

Its effect has been to scupper progress on meaningful reform. Whatever the merits of a number of other proposals in the Prisons Strategy White Paper – improving prison education, doing more to get ex-prisoners into jobs, and enhancing resettlement support, for instance – they will likely be negated by growing prisoner numbers.

A couple of weeks ago, Whitney Iles, Khatuna Tsintsadze and Charlie Weinberg wrote about “performance activism”, a symptom of a “lack of long-term thinking and political bravery”. With performance activism, we see “very little change on the ground”, while we are left “feeling good about our efforts”.

Current responses to initiatives such as the Prisons Strategy White Paper – talking up the perceived positives, while discretely shaking our heads about the obvious negatives – risks falling into this performance activism trap, I think.

Some might argue that this is what you get when too many grant funders favour short-term ‘impact’ over long-term ambition, and commissioning models reward nimble public relations, while punishing principled public challenge. I have much sympathy with such views.

But it also reflects the lack of long-term thinking that Whitney, Khatuna and Charlie wrote about, which all too-often leads to organisations falling into one of two, equally problematic, positions.

First, in seeking to influence the policy process, and to demonstrate impact, we can too readily accept the problem as defined by government, offering ‘solutions’ that tend towards reproducing in the present, and into future, the failed policies of the past. When this happens, we end up being defined in. We become part of the problem we claim we are trying to solve.

Alternatively, in seeking to escape the monotonous circularity of policy failure, we might too easily reject the grind of day-to-day influencing. This can result in powerful critiques and inspiring visions. But they are often critiques and visions easy to dismiss as utopian, and equally easy to ignore. This is the problem of being defined out. We stop having anything useful to contribute to the discussion.

What it means to navigate a course between these two, equally unhelpful, positions, to make possible an escape from the monotony of repeated failure, is something I and colleagues at the Centre are exploring, as we finalise a new strategy for the organisation.

In the context of the Prisons Strategy White Paper, it means, I think, developing coherent and credible alternatives to the seemingly relentless drive to ever more prisons, and charting a path to the world as we might wish it to be, while taking seriously the realities of the world as it is.

Richard Garside

Rhetoric and Reality

Channel 4 news has for me always stood out head and shoulders above other news providers and of course it's no great surprise that it's attracted the ire of the Tory party for doing its job so diligently. I note Kathy Newman has decided to expand on the piece the other day about a rehabilitation charity closing housing provision due to government funding cuts. It's a familiar pattern of course, but somewhat at odds with party political rhetoric:-   

Boris Johnson’s crime slogans might win votes, but taxpayers will foot the bill if offenders end up on the streets

Six houses in southern England have for more than four decades provided a home for thousands of the most vulnerable people. Vulnerable, and dangerous. Because the houses run by a charity – Change Grow Live – have offered accommodation over the years for around 2,000 former prisoners who have committed serious offences.

But on Friday, as my colleague Jackie Long reported on Wednesday’s Channel 4 News, those houses will close their doors. The charity blames funding cuts. They’ve been bankrolled by West Sussex County Council since 2003, but with central government grants cut by 38 per cent in real terms over the decade to 2019, the money has run out. For four months, Change Grow Live has funded the housing project itself. But now it can do so no longer.

By an unfortunate quirk of timing, this comes in the same week that the government announced its blitz on crime. On Wednesday, the Ministry of Justice also announced that criminals would be guaranteed accommodation when they left prison as part of a £20m plan to reduce reoffending.

It sounds like a good idea, but according to Change Grow Live, it’s a “quick fix”. The charity warns that without a long-term, well-funded solution, ex-offenders are more likely to end up on the streets – where they could pose a threat to the public – or back in jail, where they’ll end up costing the taxpayer more.

“Beating Crime” risks being little more than a slogan if the criminal justice system in its entirety is under-resourced. This journalist-turned-prime minister is, like a hack on a deadline, a true pro at coming up with an attention-grabbing phrase. His critics fear it’s the details that sometimes elude him.

Boris Johnson certainly captured the headlines with his pledge to make ex-offenders join “fluorescent-jacketed chain gangs”, or slap GPS ankle tags on burglars. But it’s hard to treat either policy as ground-breaking when both have actually been announced or trialled years ago. Labour tried the hi-vis jackets in 2008 and abandoned it after the offenders were abused by members of the public. The expansion of electronic tagging was first announced in 2011, and was originally supposed to have been rolled out across England and Wales in 2019. This week’s announcement was scaled back to just 19 police force areas.

And what’s underpinning these eye-catching pronouncements? Across the criminal justice system – police, courts, prisons and probation – years of spending constraints are now beginning to be reversed. But those at the sharp end say budget cuts of such magnitude should never have been made.

There has been a tacit – though not public – admission that cutting 20,000 police officers since 2010 was a mistake. The prime minister says the government is now half way to restoring those numbers, but when I asked the policing minister Kit Malthouse if the original cuts had been an error, he cited financial pressures at the time. It’s telling that despite the huge burden of pandemic debt, the government now sees fit to make the investment.

On prisons and probation, too, ministers insist they’re starting to boost expenditure, though the details are murky. The Ministry of Justice saw spending fall by 25 per cent between 2010 and 2020. Prison and probation minister Alex Chalk was unable to tell me on Channel 4 News on Wednesday whether the promise of an extra 2,500 probation officers restored the numbers cut since the Conservatives came to power, nor how much lower probation funding was now than then. He was, he said, “99 per cent sure” it was higher.

And while Johnson waxed lyrical on “chain gangs”, I didn’t hear him explain how he planned to clear the record crown court backlog of sixty thousand cases – a relic not just of lockdown constraints but budgetary ones too, leading barristers say. Nearly two decades ago, when I was still a newspaper hack myself, I remember the then Tory shadow home secretary Oliver Letwin setting out a big new idea on law and order, and a startling break from the party’s “prison works” policies of the Thatcher era. He wanted to end what he called the “conveyor belt” of criminality.

It didn’t win the Conservatives power. And perhaps that’s the point. No doubt the hi-vis jackets and the ankle tags will be popular. But will they stop people re-offending?

And if that doesn’t give you pause for thought, consider this: a year in one of the houses run by Change Grow Live costs £18,000. A year in prison costs £44,000. Put like that, the failure so far to address long-term under-investment in the criminal justice system could end up becoming a greater burden to the taxpayer in the long run.

Cathy Newman presents ‘Channel 4 News’, weekdays, at 7pm

--oo00oo--

The origins of Change Grow Live will come as no great surprise to probation officers of a certain vintage because such initiatives were commonplace during the enlightened times when magistrates ran the probation service, not politicians:-

A pattern and a plan

We got our start back in 1977, when a group of magistrates in Sussex noticed a pattern. They saw people going to prison, being released with no home to go to, re-offending and being sent back to prison, over and over again.

So they decided to do something about it.

Recognising that homelessness was the basis for the pattern, they pooled their resources and bought a house. From there, they started offering accommodation and support to people leaving prison. They called their charity the Sussex Association For The Rehabilitation of Offenders, or Saro for short.

Seeing the whole person

In those early days, volunteers did all the work. They saw their approach had a big impact, so they opened more houses across Sussex to support people leaving prison.

They also noticed that drugs and alcohol played a role in the cycle of homelessness and offending. So they started to look for ways to provide support with those issues too. It might sound obvious, but taking a holistic approach that looked at everything going on in someone’s life was pioneering.

It proved to be just what people needed. To keep up with the demand for our services in the 1990s, we merged with other local organisations, including a domestic violence charity and a residential rehabilitation unit, and hired our first paid members of staff.

We also started a groundbreaking project: Get It While You Can. One of our members of staff - who started out using our services - had a great idea to put peer support workers in police custody rooms. The thinking was that right after someone’s arrested is the ideal time to get support. We also thought speaking to someone who’d been through similar experiences would help them see that there was a path forward.

It was an innovative, effective idea. It wasn’t the norm to make a connection between drugs and crime, use early intervention or peer support, but it worked.

Going nationwide

Get It While You Can was so successful that we wanted to roll it out nationwide and help as many people as possible. But the name ‘Sussex Association For The Rehabilitation of Offenders’ didn’t feel right now we weren’t just operating in Sussex. It was time for a change, so we chose a new name: Crime Reduction Initiatives.

As we started running projects across the country, we noticed another issue that was playing a role in the cycle of drug addiction and crime. People couldn’t get access to drugs like methadone fast enough to help them tackle their addiction, and that made it harder for them to make the changes they wanted to see in their lives. We developed new ways to make access to treatment quicker and better, like in-house prescribing, day programmes and counselling services.

Becoming Change Grow Live

In 2012 we merged with Sova, another charity working to help people change their lives and fulfil their potential.

Around the same time, we also noticed another change in our service users. We saw that more and more of the people we were supporting hadn’t committed a crime. Our name - Crime Reduction Initiative - was a barrier, because they felt like our services weren’t for them.

So in 2016 we changed our name again, to Change Grow Live. We took the name from the phases of our recovery programme: foundations of change, foundations of growth, foundations of life. It showed how we worked and helped tackle the stigma around seeking help.

2017 was also a year of change and growth for us. A charity called Lifeline was in crisis, and the vital services it ran were at risk of closing. We stepped in and took over some of those services to keep them running for their users.

The future

Since we first started, one goal has driven everything we do: to make a difference in people’s lives. That’s still what drives us now. We know that what we do works, so we want as many people as possible to benefit. That’s how we’ll make our vision - to change society for the better - a reality.

Independent Voices

There's now less than a month to go before the probation service effectively disappears completely from public view behind a civil service wall of tight information command and control. We've all become pretty much used to Napo effectively disappearing from the stage, staff are increasingly unwilling or feel unable to speak openly and once proudly independent campaigning voices become silenced, either through contracts, personnel changes or some form of pressure either implied or explicit. The tumbleweed is on the horizon even here, but before it takes over fully, lets continue to highlight whatever independent voices remain. Here's 'Getafix and then the outgoing Frances Crook of the Howard League:-         

"Man down the pub tells me that in my area the 6 current accommodation workers are being slashed to 1 under the new contract and will hold 'group' sessions instead of 1-2-1's. Not sure how that will provide the same level of service, or cover any diversity or vulnerability issues."

The above comment from yesterday reminds me that Ad Action pulled out from the original TR bidding process for this very reason. Working one to one wasn't a profitable option for their bid partners. Groups got bums on seats, more people, more money, and really that was what the endeavour was all about.

I'm minded too of St Mungos, (who's staff are currently on strike) where their contract to help homeless people came at the cost of having to share information and data with immigration services and the Home Office.

I'm reminded too of the work programme, where many charities took the King's shilling, and whilst vehemently opposed to benefit sanctions, were required to report claimants they engaged with to the DWP leading directly to sanctions.

I also remember the gagging clauses imposed on them, which for many charities left them unable to lobby on their own causes.

When it comes to service delivery there's a huge void between delivering on a social value ethos and a corporate delivery model. It has to be a conflict of interest, and I fear the third sector may suffer some considerable reputational damage from their involvement in this.

I find it very distasteful that even Clinks are using phrases such as 'supply chains'. They are of course referring to people, not Fair Trade coffee bean. Can a charity really remain a charity with its own personal ethos and mission statement when it becomes a member of state agency? What exactly will the Kings Shilling cost them in the end? Could they see their future CEOs being selected for them by the likes of Maximus or Seetec if they're all involved in the same markets?

I think the risk of reputational damage and loss of independence is massive for the third sector in this venture. They cried foul after being used as bid candy for TR, but I'm inclined to think they may live to view that as a lucky escape from which they'd wished they'd learned some lessons.

'Getafix

--oo00oo--

Frances crook writing for Politics Home:-

Fewer arrests would ease the strain on our over-burdened probation service post-Covid

The last decade has been tumultuous for probation in England and Wales. A service that had operated well for more than a century was torn into fragments in a disastrous part-privatisation.

Performance declined sharply and public confidence ebbed away as high-profile failings and parliamentary inquiries made the headlines. Companies went bust. Demoralised staff watched on as systems were scrapped and maps redrawn. And then came the pandemic.

As the country went into lockdown in March last year, this was a service already under tremendous strain. About a quarter of a million people were under probation supervision, and a research bulletin published that month by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Probation revealed that less than half of staff believed they had manageable caseloads. A lack of suitable accommodation meant that one in six men, and one in five women, were leaving prison with nowhere to live.

These challenges grew more acute as the realities of the pandemic became clear. Additional funding was found for emergency accommodation, but face-to-face monitoring was pared back to comply with government social distancing guidelines. Supervision over the phone became the norm and support services that probation relies upon, such as mental health and drug and alcohol provision, were reduced. Unpaid work and attendance at courses dropped dramatically.

Many children under supervision had no education or training. Doorstep visits, emails and phone calls replaced face-to-face meetings, while children without access to the internet found it particularly difficult to receive regular contact.

All these changes, and the backlog of cases that has grown as a result, have heaped more pressure on staff who are about to see their working practices alter once again. The failed Transforming Rehabilitation experiment introduced in 2014, which split probation in two and placed much of the work under the responsibility of private companies, has been scrapped. In its place comes a reunified model to be delivered by the public sector.

The Howard League opposed Transforming Rehabilitation from the start and campaigned for the reunification of probation. The new model is undoubtedly a step forward although, as it will be delivered through Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service, the charity remains concerned that it will not give probation the independence it needs from Whitehall bureaucracy. These arrangements will become increasingly important if, as seems likely, the service is asked to supervise more people. The government’s plans to recruit more police officers and inflate sentencing, twinned with the impact of lockdown on relationships and employment, will only add to the strain.

Prevention is always better than cure, and so the focus now must be on taking measures that stop people being swept into the criminal justice system in the first place. We can reduce crime and ease the burden on probation – as well as prisons – if we divert people with difficulties to services that can help them, rather than arresting them and bringing them into a system that is overstretched.

This is why, throughout the pandemic, the Howard League has continued to work with police forces to reduce arrests of women and children. By promoting good practice and encouraging officers to use their professional discretion, we have helped reduce arrests of children by more than 70 per cent over the last decade, giving hundreds of thousands of boys and girls a brighter future. We are trying to match this success with women and hope this will provide a template for doing the same for men.

This is the innovation we need to see to help a reunified probation service meet the challenges ahead.

Frances Crook is chief executive of the Howard League for Penal Reform

The Voluntary Sector View

Now the winners have been announced, here's what the voluntary or third sector thinks as voiced by their cheerleader Clinks:- 

What part will voluntary organisations play on the first day of the new probation service?

The reformed and reunified probation service will launch on 26th June. Today, Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) has announced which organisations have been successful in bidding for contracts to provide resettlement and rehabilitation services to support people under the new model. The contracts are separated into three categories: Accommodation; Education, training and employment; Personal wellbeing; and Women – specialist holistic service to support women under probation supervision.

These services have been commissioned through the Dynamic Framework. When the reforms were announced the Secretary of State reiterated commitment and recognition of the voluntary sector’s role in delivering rehabilitation and resettlement services, highlighting that our sector has “some of the best experience, innovation and skill to tackle these issues.”

Reading the list of organisations given contracts, it seems that this commitment has been realised. 88% of lead providers are voluntary sector organisations and approximately two thirds of the contract values have been awarded to voluntary sector organisations. This is a significant and positive change from the current model – our #TrackTR research found that the voluntary sector was under represented, under pressure and under resourced.

Limited role for small and specialist organisations

However, scratch under the surface and it’s clear that, while voluntary sector organisations make up a significant number of those who will be delivering these services, the commissioning process has failed to draw upon the vibrancy in our sector and the range and breadth of services it provides. The voluntary sector working in criminal justice is made up of approximately 1,700 organisations who are predominantly small, local and specialist. But across 110 contracts to deliver rehabilitation and resettlement services there are only a small number of lead providers – just 26, of which 23 are voluntary organisations.

Across the full supply chains for these contracts there are a total of 81 organisations, 73 of which are voluntary organisations. Over half of those organisations have an income of over £1m. If we compare this to the criminal justice voluntary sector as a whole, only 27% of organisations generate an income over £1m and 29% of specialist criminal justice organisations have an income of less than £100k.

As we know, racially monioritisd people are disproportionally represented among those under probation supervision and a recent HMI Probation report said probation must reset and raise the standard of work with racially minoritised people. Whilst we are pleased to see some organisations led by and focused on racially minoritized people in supply chains, there are only three. It is clear that these organisations are not being fully utilised to meet the needs of these people. We are also very concerned that none of the lead providers of services in Wales are Welsh organisations and only three such organisations have a place in supply chains.

It is extremely disappointing that the results of this commissioning process mean that people under probation supervision risk missing out on services delivered by small but vital organisations with strong local links at the heart of communities and with specialist knowledge of people’s needs to support them to move away from crime.

Education, training and employment; and Accommodation contracts

When plans for the new probation model were first drawn up these contracts were going to be smaller, covering Police and Crime Commissioner areas. However, due to the impact of Covid-19 on HMPPS commissioning capacity it was decided to reduce the number of contracts and increase their geographical footprint to cover whole probation regions.

Voluntary sector delivery is least represented in the Education, Training and Employment contracts with only one lead provider from the sector – The Growth Company. In England and Wales a significant number of small and specialist criminal justice voluntary sector organisations support people with their education, training and employment needs. But because these probation contracts must be delivered across entire probation regions, many of these organisations with a local footprint were unable to bid. It is a real shame not to see some of these organisations represented in supply chains. Of all the contracts these have the least extensive supply chains.

It’s a similar story with the accommodation contracts. 9 out of these 14 contracts have gone to voluntary sector organisations but the supply chains are quite limited.

During the bidding process we received significant feedback from voluntary organisations that the values of the contracts were too low for them to deliver services in partnership. Some were also concerned about the technical requirements for the contracts shutting out some organisations.

Personal wellbeing contracts

The personal wellbeing contracts include the provision of emotional welbeing, family and significant others, lifestyle and association, and social inclusion services. In Wales HMPPS commissioned a separate and specific personal wellbeing service for young adults. These contracts were let at Police and Crime Commissioner level and after feedback following the commissioning of the Education, training and employment and Accommodation contracts the threshold for some of the technical contract requirements was lowered.

34 of the 45 Personal wellbeing contracts have gone to the voluntary sector but there are only 6 voluntary sector lead providers. The extent of supply chains across these lead providers varies. In some areas there are several supply chain partners representing a range of organisations that deliver specialist services or work with particular groups, for example organisations that work to support family relationships and organisations led by and focused on racially minoritised people. In others they are significantly more limited than we would have liked – in three contract areas there are no subcontractors at all, and in 11 areas there are only a couple of organisations in the supply chains.

Overall, the extent that the supply chains involve small and specialist organisations is limited and in many areas lead providers have the same organisations in supply chains across different contract areas indicating limited involvement of organisations with local links and knowledge. We are significantly concerned that the diversity of support that exists within the voluntary sector is not being sufficiently drawn upon.

During the commissioning process we heard from organisations of the challenges they were facing in building diverse supply chains. Organisations told us that the timeframe for bidding was not conducive to building these relationships and that the contract values were too low to enable significant involvement of partners.

Women’s services contracts

The women’s contracts were let at Police and crime commissioner level and are to provide a service to women under probation supervision incorporating Education, training and employment; Accommodation; and Personal wellbeing services.

Initially HMPPS had planned to only commission a specialist women’s service for personal wellbeing and we are extremely pleased that following our feedback this fuller specialist service was commissioned recognising the need for women to receive a more holistic women-centred service to meet a wider range of needs.

Voluntary organisations will be delivering all of these contracts, the vast majority of whom are specialist women’s centres. Overall, there is a broader and more varied spread of lead providers, and also sub-contractors where supply chains are present. This is testament to the already strong relationships that exist among specialist women’s organisations making it easier to quickly build partnerships during this process. However, specialist women’s organisations remain concerned that the service specification does not encompass all services that women in contact with the criminal justice system need – in particular there is no focus on domestic abuse and sexual violence. The sector also found the commissioning process extremely challenging and so complex that some organisations chose not to or were unable to get involved.

Looking to the future

The contracts announced today are just the beginning. Beyond these ‘day one’ contracts, Regional Probation Directors will have budgets of over £100k a year to commission further services across the following categories:

• Finance, benefits and debt
• Dependency and recovery
• Young adults (18-25 years old)
• Black, Asian, and minority ethnic
• Restorative justice
• Cognitive and behavioural change
• Service user involvement.

Regional Probation Directors will also be responsible for re-commissioning the contracts announced today – which go live on 26th June – when they come to an end (31st March 2025 for all categories except Women’s services which will end on 31st March 2026).

In addition, Regional Probation Directors will have access to a Regional Outcomes and Innovation Fund from which they could commission services which support the reduction of reoffending but which are not part of enforceable sentence delivery requirements.

These services will all be commissioned through the Dynamic Framework and other commissioners could commission or co-commission services from the Dynamic Framework in any of the 14 service categories. The Dynamic Framework therefore remains a really important route for voluntary sector organisations to be involved in delivering services to people under probation supervision. Find out more about how to qualify here.

It is vital that Regional Probation Directors ensure the voluntary sector is represented in future probation contracts, but also go further to ensure the vibrancy and diversity of this sector (which has on the whole been excluded so far) is fully utilised – in particular the skills and expertise of small, specialist and local organisations.

To make sure this happens voluntary organisations need good communication: accurate, transparent, and timely information, with as much notice possible of bidding opportunities. This is vital for providers to build partnerships, bid for grants and contracts and mobilise services.

To ensure small and specialist organisations can engage in future commissioning opportunities HMPPS should recognise that complex contracts disadvantage small organisations and there needs to be greater use of grants to commission services at a local level. Grants should be the default mechanism for commissioning services, with contracts used as an exception when grants are not appropriate.

To ensure the knowledge and existing expertise that exists in local areas is taken advantage of there needs to be significant emphasis on partnership work, co-design with the voluntary sector and co-commissioning services with partners, other commissioners and charitable funders.

Clinks is currently building relationships with Regional Probation Directors and their teams to support them to engage with the voluntary sector and draw upon its vibrant and broad knowledge and expertise.

MoJ Announces Winners

"A few quid being handed out, and a few regular customers in the mix, but here's the full list of contract winners to work with probation by region."

£200 million investment in rehab services to cut crime

Charities and companies which help rehabilitate offenders have been awarded around £200 million of Government funding to help cut crime in the new probation system.

• Services to provide specialist housing, employment and training support to reduce reoffending
• Multi-million-pound contracts awarded to more than 25 organisations
• Providers to work with Probation Service to rehabilitate offenders and cut crime

The investment of an initial £195 million has been awarded to 26 organisations across England and Wales to provide vital support services that help reduce reoffending, such as employment and housing advice. This includes over £45 million awarded to services tailored to female offenders to address their specific needs and the underlying causes of their crimes as part of the Government’s pledge to see fewer women go to prison. The total funding awarded could rise to £270 million if contracts with these organisations are extended to their full terms.

By tackling the drivers of crime and getting offenders’ lives back on track, these services will help to prevent thousands of people becoming victims each year and save some of the £18 billion annual cost of repeat offending.

The move is one of the improvements being made to the Probation Service next month as responsibility for supervising low- and medium-risk offenders comes back under public sector control. The delivery of unpaid work in community sentences and behavioural change programmes are also being brought back in-house.

Prisons and Probation Minister Alex Chalk said:

"Tackling things like homelessness, unemployment and illiteracy is vital to our drive to cut crime but these issues cannot be solved by our brilliant probation staff alone. The expertise and support of charities and companies like those we are funding today plays a crucial role in helping offenders to rehabilitate and lead a crime-free life."

Almost £46 million has been awarded to charities which provide wraparound support to women in the criminal justice system, acknowledging the complex array of issues female offenders particularly face. Organisations including The Nelson Trust, Women in Prison, and a partnership between the St Giles Trust and the Wise Group will work with vulnerable women to help them get their lives back on track. This significant investment provides long-term support to women’s centres and other dedicated services for women serving community sentences or leaving prison.

Prison leavers are around 50 per cent more likely to reoffend if released with nowhere to stay so over £33 million will be shared by charities helping the homeless, including St Mungo’s, Shelter and NACRO. Their work will help get offenders off the streets into stable accommodation and work alongside the Probation Service’s new temporary accommodation service.

A further £33 million has been awarded to companies such as Seetec, Maximus and Ingeus which provide offenders with skills training and employment support. With their expertise in helping people find work they will partner with probation staff and the New Futures Network in the Prison Service to support offenders into jobs.

Up to £118 million has been awarded to organisations which work with offenders to address personal issues, including Catch 22, The Forward Trust and The Growth Company. This ranges from support accessing mental health services to help with managing complex family relationships.

The funding has been awarded through a new process designed to make it easier for charities and other third-sector organisations to access funding from Government and around two-thirds of the funding has been awarded to registered charities. In addition, many lead organisations are using the specialist skills of smaller organisations to help deliver services, with another 50 organisations, mostly in the voluntary sector, in their supply chains.

Notes to Editors

Women’s and personal support services have been procured at Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) level, while each provider for Education, Training and Employment services will work across one of the twelve probation regions in England and Wales. Accommodation services will also be provided at a regional level except in Wales where they have been procured at PCC level.

For the first time, the Probation Service is jointly commissioning the full range of rehabilitative services in Greater Manchester with the region’s Combined Authority from July 2021. In London, women’s services will be commissioned jointly with the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC) by providing funding to MOPAC’s existing providers for an extension and expansion of the current service. A new commissioning process will be undertaken for services from 2022.

Full list of contracts awarded according to region

Please note, the figures given are for the standard term of the contracts which are 2 years and 9 months, unless specified (see each contract below). Note Women’s services contracts are for 3 years and 9 months. For Accommodation and Education, Training and Employment services these are predicted values.

East Midlands

Women’s Services
Lincolnshire Action Trust - £544,992 (Lincolnshire)
Changing Lives - £1,240,656 (Leicestershire)
Nottingham Women’s Centre - £1,831,193 (Nottinghamshire)
Women’s Work Derbyshire - £1,509,887 (Derbyshire)
Support services for issues including mental health, family and relationships
The Forward Trust - £998,975 (Lincolnshire)
Ingeus - £6,021,064 (Derbyshire, Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire)
Accommodation
Nacro - £2,963,412
Education, Training and Employment
Ingeus - £2,913,656

East of England

Women’s Services
Advance - £2,128,122 (Bedfordshire, Essex, Hertfordshire)
St Giles Wise (SGW) - £2,177,655 (Cambridgeshire, Norfolk, Suffolk) (Northamptonshire – until June 2023)
Support services for issues including mental health, family and relationships
Nacro - £3,054,280 (Suffolk, Northamptonshire, Hertfordshire)
The Forward Trust - £4,374,002 (Cambridgeshire, Bedfordshire, Norfolk, Essex)
Accommodation
Seetec - £2,883,298
Education, Training and Employment
Seetec - £2,729,155

Kent, Surrey and Sussex

Women’s Services
Advance - £1,317,735 (Kent)
Brighton Women’s Centre - £1,167,285 (Sussex)
Women in Prison - £588,630 (Surrey)
Support services for issues including mental health, family and relationships
The Forward Trust - £2,557,318 (Sussex, Surrey)
Seetec - £2,135,134 (Kent)
Accommodation
Seetec - £1,977,871
Education, Training and Employment
Seetec - £1,903,774

London

Women’s Services
In London, women’s services will be commissioned jointly with the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC) from mid-2022 with the Probation Service providing funding to MOPAC’s existing providers until then.
Support services for issues including mental health, family and relationships
Catch 22 - £12,501,519
Accommodation
St Mungo - £4,882,708
Education, Training and Employment
Maximus - £4,999,117

North East

Women’s Services
Changing Lives - £4,253,089 (Cleveland, Northumbria)
St Giles Wise (SGW) - £866,581 (Durham)
Support services for issues including mental health, family and relationships
Ingeus - £3,032,996 (Northumbria)
St Giles Wise (SGW) - £3,177,664 (Durham, Cleveland)
Accommodation
Thirteen Housing Group - £2,740,568
Education, Training and Employment
Ingeus - £2,903,359

North West

Women’s Services
Lancashire Women - £1,791,947 (Lancashire)
PSS UK - £3,050,765 (Cheshire, Merseyside)
Women’s Community Matters - £319,435 (Cumbria – until June 2023) (Subject to contract)
Support services for issues including mental health, family and relationships
The Growth Company - £5,732,481 (Lancashire, Merseyside) (Cumbria – until June 2023)
Seetec - £2,108,173 (Cheshire)
Accommodation
Seetec - £2,988,646
Education, Training and Employment
Maximus - £3,151,152

South Central

Women’s Services
Advance - £2,111,499 (Hampshire) (Thames Valley – until June 2023)
Support services for issues including mental health, family and relationships
Catch 22 - £4,091,542 (Hampshire, Thames Valley)
Accommodation
Ingeus - £1,828,763
Education, Training and Employment
Ingeus - £1,889,412

South West

Women’s Services
Nelson Trust - £2,897,254 (Avon & Somerset, Gloucestershire, Wiltshire)
The Women’s Centre Cornwall - £1,765,668 (Devon & Cornwall, Dorset)
Support services for issues including mental health, family and relationships
Catch 22 - £5,706,872 (Avon & Somerset, Dorset) (Wiltshire, Devon & Cornwall, Gloucestershire – all until June 2023)
Accommodation
Seetec - £2,852,365
Education, Training and Employment
Seetec - £2,624,658

Wales

Women’s Services
The Nelson Trust - £1,992,162 (Dyfed-Powys, Gwent, South Wales – all until June 2023)
PSS UK - £432,225 (North Wales – until June 2023)
Support services for issues including mental health, family and relationships (Young Adults and 26+)
St Giles Wise (SGW) - £6,011,313 (Dyfed-Powys, Gwent – all until June 2023) (South Wales, North Wales)
Accommodation
Forward Trust - £2,006,168 (Dyfed-Powys, Gwent, South Wales)
Nacro - £633,425 (North Wales)
Education, Training and Employment
Maximus - £2,440,833

West Midlands

Women’s Services
Changing Lives - £6,095,524 (West Midlands, Warwickshire)(Staffordshire – until June 2023)
Willowdene - £1,014,080 (West Mercia)
Support services for issues including mental health, family and relationships
Catch 22 - £1,639,494 (West Mercia)
Ingeus - £8,324,204 (Staffordshire, West Midlands) (Warwickshire – until June 2023)
Accommodation
Nacro - £3,823,196
Education, Training and Employment
Maximus - £4,147,256

Yorkshire & The Humber

Women’s Services
Changing Lives - £1,835,581 (South Yorkshire)
St Giles Wise (SGW) - £1,072,461 (North Yorkshire)
Together Women - £4,604,673 (Humberside, West Yorkshire)
Support services for issues including mental health, family and relationships
Foundation - £1,246,789 (North Yorkshire)
Ingeus - £6,671,666 (Humberside, West Yorkshire)
The Growth Company - £2,593, 567 (South Yorkshire)
Accommodation
Shelter - £4,068,990
Education, Training and Employment
The Growth Company - £4,134,343

Greater Manchester

Greater Manchester Combined Authority – For the first time, the Probation Service is jointly commissioning the full range of rehabilitative services in Greater Manchester with the region’s Combined Authority from July 2021.