Crunch Time

Napo's NEC meets later today and before they decide to possibly let the General Secretary off the hook and rubber stamp the suggestion not to proceed with a legal challenge, they might like to ponder the following recent Facebook conversations:-

There are plenty of people offering Napo HQ free legal advice. There are entire legal firms willing to go to bat for us but it's a chunk of work and it takes bravery to engage in a legal fight. Napo has the tacit support of Labour's Shadow Justice Team. Much has been made of two resolutions passed at the TUC Conference to support us. What we need is to follow through with confidence and resolve and stop all the excuses and procrastinating. 

Napo members tell me that the time of thinking about action has passed and we need to act and if nothing happens quickly then we need to be asking why hasn't something been done and not be fobbed off. Share sale may well be happening in October and if the contracts are worded the way Grayling wants them to be then even another government will not be able to reverse privatisation easily. Better to have tried and failed than to have never tried at all. 

If all fails and the union is bankrupt do you really think the labour movement will turn their backs on Napo? Our campaign is a drop in the ocean resource wise as far as some of the bigger unions are concerned and the worst fate we might face is an amalgamation that may actually make us stronger. Frankly all resources should be targeted at the legal challenge right now and everything else should be considered an unwelcome distraction from the main task. 

Just a little way down the road lurk further budget cuts, increased workloads, redundancies, deprofessionalisation, lower wages and worse. The most experienced and ironically the most ambitious are at greatest risk of job loss. If you are cheap and will do anything you are asked to do without question you might be in luck. If like me you can't stomach the destruction of your profession, then things look grim and grimmer.

With regards to the emergency motion, if we mandated Chivalry Road last year to pursue JR then can't we hold them to account this year with an emergency motion, when it becomes clear at conference that this has not been progressed?

If it meets the criteria and is accepted, but look carefully at the wording of the original motion. They may well have pursued it and were told by lawyers that the particular matter was not strong enough to pursue further. The problem is probably that Labours legislation was so sloppily written that even if it was intended as a kind of failsafe (for the Secretary of State to take any action necessary) in the event of Trusts failing, it has allowed Grayling the authority to proceed. 

Unfortunately legislation reflected the overconfidence of the administration who probably thought it was a handy option for them to have, not ever considering it could be used in another way by a Justice Secretary intent on pursuing their own ideological agenda. A JR on the basis the Justice Secretary was acting illegally may not proceed, so it has probably now got to be on another basis. The MoJ is acting cautiously and being less than transparent in order to protect itself against legal challenge. It was expecting more challenges earlier, but that opportunity is now passed. 

Plenty of motions are passed at AGM including one popular one last year that I personally thought was a bit unrealistic, to overthrow the government. Not all motions that might have been more useful and realistic were heard as we ran out of time. I was literally waiting to go on when they called time.

I thought the new JR was being pursued on the basis that there is wording in the outsourcing legislation which mentions social impact which TR clearly ticks a huge box for. I agree sometimes some of the motions can be a little grandiose but that's democracy I suppose, each motion has as much right as any other to be heard.

Yes this is an extremely slim chance under the Social Value Act legislation that I and others brought to Napo HQs attention approximately 6 months ago after exploring it with our own legal and academic contacts after reading the following article 12 months ago.

Another contributor added this:- 

An Emergency Motion can be sent in by any 2 Napo members or a branch. It has to be submitted in writing to either Ian Lawrence or Chair of Steering Committee (staff at Chivalry Rd could confirm who that is) and has to meet following criteria: it must relate to urgent matters which (1) have arisen since closing date for motions (2) which cannot be dealt with in any other way (3) which are of such gravity as to justify rearrangement of business. Steering Committee then check if motion meets that criteria and if they think it does it goes on AGM agenda. If they don't think it meets the criteria the proposer of motion has 2 minutes to challenge the ruling and then members of AGM vote whether to accept Steering Committee ruling or not. In order to deal with point 1 (that its an issue that's arisen since closing date for ordinary motions) linking emergency motion to recent success of legal profession might work.

Finally, this from yesterday's blog:-

I think members might already feel stranded and bereft and not appreciate they could influence how Napo operates. It may well feel increasingly irrelevant in the face of surviving pressures at work. For those who still want to battle on, given the existing structure, members need to exert their muscle either via AGM (though the range of motions not inspiring this year) or via their NEC rep. 

If a local Branch submits a motion to NEC (I've forgotten the 3 categories but at least one leads to debate at NEC) and argues it well, more support from other areas could be garnered than might be imagined. Some pre-NEC liaison between areas helps build support too. Nothing ventured nothing gained, but need well chosen motion and good proposer/seconder. 

If we really are in conversations with Prospect etc this might be too late of course. I'm no constitution buff but I think more than 1 branch could debate the same motion to submit to NEC then you'd get a stronger indication of support from the off. Depending on news from this weeks NEC, posters here could join forces to compose a motion that they all took to their branches to get agreed to take to Nov NEC? Obviously this pre-supposes there would be a consensus as to motion!

Latest From Napo 40

I notice from an email to all members today that the latest edition of Napo News is now available online, but to be perfectly blunt, to say I'm dismayed would be an understatement. Given that I, and I believe some other readers, feel that the leadership at the top is completely dysfunctional, I don't know whether to laugh or cry at this from interim Chair Chris Pearson:-

With all this going on I haven’t had a great deal of time to review the workings of our union. My initial thoughts are that there are a lot of good people, officers and officials, doing a lot of good work on all our behalfs. That said, my initial observations are that some of that work needs to be a little more coordinated, a smidgen more directed and a pinch more efficient. I will pass on my thoughts and suggestions before handing over to Yvonne Pattison and Chris Winters at the AGM.

But then there's this from Tania Bassett:-

She also told delegates: ‘Napo members also work with those in the community that are being hardest hit by this coalition’s Dickensian approach to welfare. ‘The befriending funds that Probation has historically used to help clients in an emergency are now being used to help them pay for basics such as electricity. Probation offices up and down the country have a food box in the reception where staff can donate each week to help supplement the local food banks on which many of our clients rely’.

Whilst it's undoubtedly true that many probation offices have boxes for donations of food by staff, weren't 'Befriending Funds' dispensed with years ago, along with pool tables, cups of tea and 'advise, assist and befriend'?

MoJ Answers 3

More nonsense from the MoJ.

16. Timing of Under 12-Months supervision implementation  

The mantra has always been supervising offenders under 12 months when you have discussed TR. Why then are there no signs of this happening any time soon, and why couldn't the gold standard performing probation trusts do this job for you?

Is it true that the management of offenders with under 12 months custody has been postponed?

When does the plan to supervise all prisoners i.e. (under 12 months sentenced) kick in?

This change to the sentencing framework is a core element of our reforms. The extension of statutory licence conditions and rehabilitation supervision to offenders sentenced to less than 12 months imprisonment is subject to the commencement of the relevant provisions in the Offender Rehabilitation Act 2014. This will happen at the point of service mobilisation. As in every part of Government, we are faced with the challenge of trying to do better for less. We want to do this in a way that is sustainable for the future and we are committed to reinvesting savings to support supervision for short sentence offenders. We can only do that if we bring in the best of the public, voluntary and private sectors to work with offenders in order to reduce their reoffending rates.

17. Case allocation / complexity/bureaucracy

The allocation of cases has now become a highly contentious issue, having organically developed from what was a relatively simple process to a highly bureaucratic process for both organisations. This now requires significant management resource from both the NPS and CRC simply to manage the process. The transfer protocols within the Delius system add to this issue enormously and allocation of cases that once took 20-30 minutes now takes many hours of management resource on both sides of the business. To add to this CRC staff, administrators and receptionists have experienced difficulty accessing vital offender information because of NPS/CRC access limitations. How do NOMS/Ministers respond to this and what do they propose to better streamline processes and minimise growing staff frustration and greatly increased bureaucracy on both sides of the business?

Currently in our area there are an inadequate number of POs to undertake the required number of statutory reports. Therefore POs that were previously undertaking this work as part of their duties are now unable, as part of the CRC, to do these during working hours but can do them as 'sessional reports' earning extra payment- whilst NPS staff struggle on a daily basis for no extra pay. How will this be addressed?

We are already experiencing a lot of extra bureaucratic processes between NPS & CRC causing delays and concern about risk management and court processes! We have made a lot of these leaner and less costly as one organisation - how do you propose that TR will save money/improve provision?

How can you account for the amount of bureaucracy, doubling of work, additional work, and overall clear chaos which you have created as a result of splitting up the probation service and creating a workforce which has gone from being proud of the work they do to one where a large percentage are now looking to give up long terms careers?

You mentioned earlier that you wanted to reduce bureaucracy, I am a PO in a courts team and our administration work has doubled with the introduction of RSRs and case allocation system. What about all the work we have done on streamlining processes?

I know case allocation is a critical activity and it is important that some additional work takes place at the time of sentence to ensure that an offender is correctly allocated. In order to achieve this, the new operational processes were developed in close collaboration between the MoJ, NOMS and Probation Service staff. There is more work to do to minimise unnecessary bureaucracy at the front end of the process and we are continuing to test the new system to understand where we might make further improvements. The Transforming Rehabilitation Programme team organised two national workshops in July - one of these looking explicitly at case allocation processes. These events were well attended by operational staff and we are determined to continue to improve effectiveness and to reduce bureaucracy wherever possible during this transitional period.

Guidance was sent to Trusts prior to 1 June to explain how to set up access for authorised receptionists and administrative staff so they can view the NPS and CRC information they need to do their jobs.

18. Jobs

Dear Mr Grayling, I completed my training as a Probation Officer in 2009 to be told that there was no jobs at the end of the training. I was an Offender Supervisor 9 years previous to this and dropped £4,000 in my wage. However I wrote to all MP's and lobbied for this to change but this fell on the Conservative deaf ears. However Lord David Ramsbotham and Labour Home Secretary at that time agreed to meet with me and other trainees and NAPO members at Westminster and also the House of Commons. After lengthy discussions on the worries of reducing staff protecting the public they did listen and decided to make sure we did have our jobs at the end of the training. Here we are again the unsung heroes having to convince you that we do a damn good job and nobody can work with offenders and protect the public like we do why? Because we do it not for profit of money saving we do it as to protect the public from harm and job satisfaction changing offender lives for the better re-integrating them back in the community safely.

Jeremy, you state above you want to support and protect officers but their numbers have been reduced.

I want to reassure you that I see the skills and experience of probation professionals as immensely valuable in contributing to the rehabilitation of offenders. However, with more than half a million crimes committed each year by those who have broken the law before, we have to change our approach to rehabilitation. The status quo is not an option. What I want is to draw on the best services that can be offered by practitioners across the public, private and voluntary sectors, so that we can deliver better support to more offenders, and in turn reduce reoffending.

In relation to staffing levels, CRCs and NPS divisions are currently developing their workforce plans, building on the staff structures inherited from Probation Trusts. Once these are completed, they will be reviewed centrally and will inform the current round of recruitment for trainee probation officers. In the meantime, CRCs and NPS Deputy Directors are continuing to monitor and manage staffing in their areas and all vacancies are being managed as part of business as usual processes.

19. Cutting bureaucracy

Mr Grayling. In your New Year Address to Probation Staff you referred to cutting much of the bureaucracy and central control in relation to Probation work to allow Probation Officers to carry out the work we are trained to do rather than spending a considerable amount of our time completing administration tasks. When will you fulfil this pledge?

PBR - more bureaucracy surely?

How are you working to reduce bureaucracy?

Can you explain how you are working to reduce bureaucracy, when we have seen a significant increase in paperwork, of which all involve duplicating information several times and therefore take significant time to complete?

The new system, which was tested and developed in close consultation with Probation Trusts, has been designed to minimise unnecessary bureaucracy to ensure staff working in CRCs and in the NPS can spend more of their time managing and rehabilitating offenders. There will be an opportunity for us to learn more and refine processes during this period that CRCs are managed in the public sector before contract signature later this year.

20. Allocation of cases

Has the split been managed correctly? I expressed a preference for National Probation Service but was forced into the Community Rehabilitation Company as I scored 130 on the Greater Manchester list with staff 1 to 128 going to NPS and 129 and below going to CRC. I have now had to complete reallocation forms on practically all my cases, keeping only those who would be NPS if they weren't due to terminate before November and a few new allocations. Post 1st June 2014 I find I continue to hold NPS cases and have to complete NPS tasks including Report writing as there are insufficient staff in NPS and excess number of Probation Officers in CRC for the operational need. Why did I not get my preference of NPS? It seems wrong that I have to transfer my entire caseload and that I have to complete NPS tasks as a CRC employee.

Is there really a role for a qualified probation officer in the CRC? Since the changes, I am doing the role of a PSO, I can only see this ending one way. i.e. we will be paid less or "let go". Given there was no fair selection process, is this not a breach of employment law?

My officer current caseload numbers are in 50's, one officer has a caseload of 58. This is in addition to all the new work they have taken on since the NPS/CRC split. I average an allocation of 8 new cases each week; for a small team this is high. What in your view is a maximum number of high risk cases for a FTE Probation Officer to sagely manage?

If a case reverts to NPS because its risk level increases. It stays permanently with the NPS from that point. How will you deal with the implications for increasing NPS workload that this will result in?

The probation workforce has been allocated to the new organisations based upon their respective resource requirements. This was calculated on the basis of existing staffing needs for the different operational functions, taking account of the offender groups that each organisation would be responsible for. Whilst I recognise that some staff will be disappointed with the outcome, I believe that this provided an objective basis for undertaking the assignment. Where there are concerns about transferring a particular offender, staff have been able to postpone transfer until they are absolutely confident it is safe to do so. In these cases, the offender will remain with an appropriate probation officer, to ensure continuity and public protection. In addition, we will continue to monitor the balance of work across NPS and the CRCs, and adjust resources where that proves necessary. Staff from both NPS and CRCs will be able to apply for any new posts that are created.

21. CRC bidders

How many bidders remain for the 21 Community Rehabilitation Companies?

How many bidders do you now have?

So what a about Sue Trust & Chalk who I believe have also pulled out?

There remains a strong competition in all regions for the contracts to run the 21 Community Rehabilitation Companies with over 80 bids having been received and an average of four bidders for each area. Over half of the bidders include a voluntary, mutual or social enterprise organisation and mutuals continue to feature strongly, with eight potential staff mutuals competing for a share of the contracts.

In addition to this, charities experienced in tackling a range of issues affecting offenders, small and large businesses and experienced multinationals have partnered together to bid for the work that will help turn offenders’ lives around. All Tier 1 bidders have experience working in the Criminal Justice System. As well as the lead provider bids, almost 1000 organisations have registered to play a part in the wider supply chain, including more than 700 listed as VCSE (voluntary, community or social enterprise) organisations. The Transforming Rehabilitation programme remains on track to sign contracts with successful bidders by the end of 2014.

TR Week Sixteen

I'm one of the unhappy Manchester CRC POs. What is the union doing about the fact that some people can get paid for going PSRs but I have to or risk getting disciplined .

Supposedly from November CRC and NPS will have to operate as separate entities and it could not come soon enough. As I am fed up of having the piss taken out of.

******
Good Question, what are the unions doing, some doing them under threat, some doing them for extra cash - up to £150; are we not all currently working for the MoJ?

******
Cheshire and Greater Manchester CRC are sent regular threatening emails from the newly promoted Assistant Chief, about making sure the targets are hit. I quote "Failure to achieve performance targets in the private sector will place us all at risk as poor performance will not be tolerated. I expect a significant increase in our performance from this moment forward please and any further failures will be investigated by line managers and appropriate action taken where necessary". 

It is an awful place to work at the moment. Morale is at an all time low. Threatening somebody does not really make them want to work any harder! Just makes them hate you even more and they will never go the extra mile for you.

******
It is a dumb approach. Poor management, frankly. Indicative of a fundamentally bankrupt ideology. You can shout at it as much as you like, it still takes four minutes to boil an egg. JDI is not management, it is cowardice. JFDI is not cowardice, it is bullying and harassment. Scared little men and women with no answers, no leadership skills and no backbone.

*******
Since I have been shafted into the CRC, I have never worked so hard due to having a 90% caseload of DV cases. It is impossible to do all the work with each case that I am supposed to do due to the shear volume of cases. Prior to the split we probably had about 10 DV cases each. Also, should child protection cases not be managed by NPS? When I trained 30 years ago our first and most priority was child protection. Running around like a headless chicken is going to cause a lot of mistakes and last minute fire fighting and maybe cost to human life. THE RISK TO THE PUBLIC IS MORE APPARENT NOW THEN IT HAS EVER BEEN.

******
First I would like to say in my area we have also seen a decline in the quality of reports prepared for court. This is because court PSO's are writing majority of them. These have been staff who have been in court for years who have never even held case loads let alone written reports. I'm sorry but their inexperience shines through and the amount of poor assessments and inappropriate proposals is embarrassing quite frankly. The problem with the split is you don't necessarily have the right person for the job.

******
100% right. The split does not have the right people for the right job. I have noticed in Manchester in our office 3 newly qualified officers are in NPS, they should be on protected caseloads. They are refusing to take lifers, sex offenders, holding a small case load, had only written about 10 PSR's and perhaps 1 Parole report during their training, then you have highly experienced officers that have 25 years plus service that have been shafted into CRC. ITS ALL WRONG and giving the NPS a right headache which higher managers are refusing to see. And no one from CRC are rushing to apply for the NPS posts and rightly so for the way we have been treated, they have had to re-advertise. THE TRAIN CRASH HAS ALREADY HAPPENED IN MANCHESTER, WE ARE JUST PICKING UP THE SCRAPS.

******
Some really sound comments highlighting major flaws in the split. With risk escalation particularly with DV actually serves to increase risks further. Take my office for example. One case of DV where we received info to indicate risk had increased to high. As it would have been obvious that the info came from his partner the decision was made not to transfer the case to NPS as he only had a couple of months left on his order. If we had started risk escalation process this would have alerted him and put his partner at even greater risk. This was at the time of being just in process of transfer of cases between NPS and CRC so could be facilitated. 

Major concerns if this happened now as no option to keep case within CRC. Second example was similar but resulted in staff member being seriously threatened and procedures put in place to protect them because of risk escalation and transfer to NPS. Now we have all had situations where risk has increased and had to disclose this to the service user but there seems to be something more symbolic to the service user by having to be transferred to the office which is now becoming to be known as the 'NONCE AND NUTTER' office by the service users. So much for managing risk more effectively!!

******
Let us be clear. All above is symptomatic of the dumbing down of Probation. As an SPO and 24 year practitioner, I am confronted on a daily basis with decisions that are being taken based on Performance Targets, resourcing or TR 'requirements'. Decades of 'best practice', 'good practice' and 'safe practice' are being eroded by the hour and and the only thing 'defensible' about many of these decisions is 'I was acting under orders' - a long established non-defence. 

Grayling and his Prison Service amateurs at the MoJ are taking a common sense/Daily Mail readers approach to concepts of practice that are putting staff, offenders and victims at risk. Senior Managers are, I believe, making representations to the MoJ regarding these indefensible changes not because they believe that the MoJ will listen, but because they have recognised the need for an audit trail, a means by which CRCs and the NPS can point to a series of documents that evidence that the MoJ were warned. 

When the bidders take over and create a crisis in community sentence that mirrors that that exists in the prisons, they will NOT be able to say the fault belongs with the providers. The model is flawed; we all know it and we can all see it every day in the faces of our colleagues. This is worst practice, bad practice and indefensible practice introduced at the insistence of a Justice Secretary with no comprehension of the nuances of rehabilitation and who surrounds himself with Yes men and women with even less idea. Ursula Brennan is as culpable as Grayling and the failure to turn this TR debacle off will remain their biggest mistakes.

******
The last probation inspectorate report I can find on domestic violence is over ten years old. It identified many areas for improvement, not least responding to changes in risk factors – for example in three-quarters of cases risk was not reviewed following significant events: 'Typically if a DV perpetrator moved back to live with his victim, or if further assaults occurred, steps were not taken by the case manager to review the risk factors and level of RoH'. 

A report on police performance last March was not encouraging:'The issue of risk assessment needed urgent attention: perpetrator targeting was underdeveloped in most forces. The Chief Inspector Tom Winsor said 'It is essential that the police make substantial reforms to their handling of domestic abuse, including in their understanding of the coercive and psychological nature of the crime' Quite amazing that all these years on the 'coercive and psychological nature' of DV needs highlighting to the police. Have they learnt anything?

It is disappointing that after so many years of partnerships working and the rhetoric of risk as background music, there is still a long, long way to go. Womens' refuges across the country are also closing whilst others struggle to remain open with reduced funding. In probation the assessment of domestic violence perpetrators has been steadily degraded: a decade ago it was de riguer for a PO to write a comprehensive report based on a minimum of two interviews. Now, they can be produced on the day via an FDR prepared by unqualified staff who may have been minimally trained for a few days. When you consider the gradual dumbing down of assessments, you can see how principles of good practice predicated on sound evidence have simply been expediently tossed aside. 

Probation was not doing a great job ten years ago and the police are no better now. It seems reasonable to conclude that things will get worse, but we should not be too starry-eyed about probation performance in this area of work. 

******
I agree. Practice is being changed to suit the TR agenda and the court reports are the beginning of this. I have tried the risk escalation process, it is a bloody nightmare to use and took me half a day and two calls to IT, then the NPS officer had a nightmare too. Previously I would have just talked to my manager, updated the risk and continued to manage the case myself reacting to the change in risk. It really makes me so sad to lose a case I've worked with for ages and where I was the one to recognise the changes, only for someone in NPS to take it over not knowing anything about it. Plus, don't get me started about the DV reports coming out from courts, really they are just not good enough.

*******
I have now begun complaining each time I get a sub-standard report from court and I believe that these complaints are being carried forward. With regards to being split into the CRC, I am a PSO and am struggling with mental health cases that would previously have gone to a PO - I feel as though I'm in over my head and can't do the job anymore - good luck to those PSOs who feel able to take DV/CP/MH cases on but I'm not and have no wish to do so - in effect I'm being put out of a job. Finally, I've had no training on any of the above either and it's a case of ask a colleague if an when you come upon a query.

*******
Spoke to a trainee yesterday. She had just finished her HALF DAY training on DA. I had 3 days and that only scratched the surface.

*******
I barely have the time to do the ISP's for all the cases that are landing on my desk. It's a joke. Daily I am torn between recording risk to cover my own back or addressing it to protect the public.

*******
Post TR there have been some terrible reports from NPS on medium risk dv cases - rushed without all the relevant information. Then in CRC medium risk DV cases are pretty much all POs are getting to work with. 

Imagine a caseload of 40-50 medium risk DV offenders to manage, day after day, managing risk, filling out forms, meeting targets. Now imagine 40-50 victims. 40-50 victims. 80-100 if you include the children, which you should. 

TR has created this. It has also added into the mix a ridiculous amount of bureaucracy meaning that when risk has increased and the victims are most vulnerable, probation will fail them. Fail them by changing the officer who knows the case and can best manage the risk, who knows what plans are in place and how to execute them. This is happening with all cases but it's right to highlight medium risk DV cases as it is happening with them the most.

*******
Doing the work v. recording the work. A mantra of our management has always been "if it isn't recorded, it hasn't happened". So for a CRC PO with 60 cases, maybe 40 are DV, of which maybe 20 are still weekly & 20 fortnightly; maybe 15 have a relevant specified activity & 5 have an accredited programme. So lets assume that, for this example, the PO sees 30 DV perpetrators each week. Would an hour per case be acceptable, allowing for face-to-face contact, meaningful intervention AND recording the contact?

If so, that's 30 hours' work weekly. 

That leaves (contractually) 7 hours weekly to see the remaining 20 cases, attend child safeguarding meetings, liaison with women safety workers, attend (or prepare reports for) local DV forums, undertake pre- and post-programme work, complete any OASys assessments, undertake liaison with local police (if such a protocol exists for the CRC), complete any CRC-imposed paperwork, travel between meetings (in some rural areas thus can mean an hour each way)... then there are additional mundane tasks such as duty officer, case inductions, supervision (what's that? I hear you cry), team meetings (uh?), training (???), mandatory corporate events...

Its not safe. Its barely possible. Its plain dangerous and wrong.

Whilst we are closer to getting this work right, we only see and impact upon a fraction of the abusive power & control shit that thrives in the UK. The behaviour of government officials, MPs and others in power only serves to feed the problem. The bullying and intimidation, the psychological terrorism, the threats, the control, the gagging... its got DV perpetrator written right across it. And its not a male dominated trait.

*******
I'd use different figures but they only strengthen your point. Up on High unless we are really in the deep doo doo (couldn't happen?) the movers and shakers don't assume 37 hours a week - they assume, after leave, sickness, training about 25 hours a week for planning purposes. This is an average per practitioner week in week out over years rather than weeks and defines the capacity of the system to undertake work. That's less than half hour per case per week. It works out at about 30 minutes per client on a case load of 50. It includes picking up the call from reception, walking down the stairs, locating a room to interview and then after the interview, walking back the way you came and then writing it up (and how long does it take to access the nDelius to do this?)

******
Caseload levels have remained since the TR sifting, with both NPS and CRC staff working well over capacity, leading to increasing sickness levels. I see SPO's pulling their hair out over what to do with the huge volume of cases and reports they struggle to allocate, and the impact on staff is immense. 

Temperatures run high amongst staff increasingly and the divisions are rising between NPS and CRC staff. There is much anxiety over the tasks that cannot be completed without sitting at the desk from morning to night without a break. NPS staff forced to write reports which in many cases involves a prison visit as impossible to book video links. Disgruntled CRC staff regularly argue with their managers over new silly procedures. Temp staff move on quickly to wherever the lower caseload is, while half of temp PSR writers write awful reports. A lot of programmes and PSR's are being completed on a sessional basis, which many of us don't want but with the PSR's at least we get paid for the work we in the NPS are made to do anyway when everyone else has gone home.

******
Legal reps would do better by insisting that reports for court were completed by the supervising officer of their clients - most reports are now done by people who do not know the individual and often don't even speak to the supervising officer.....just court team staff given a couple of hours in total so how much information are they going to get in that time???

******
Well that's the new model and when share sale comes and goes this will be more frequent. If legal reps have a problem with it they should complain to his Rt Honourable fuckwit Chris Grayling.

******
Napo??? What have they done about workload measurement? Sweet FA by the looks of it. We have been put out to pasture, three months down the line and no further forward of measuring the work I have in the NPS than on June the 1st. It is not as if they did not know this was happening. I have no argument when targets do not get met with my manager and won't have until this is sorted out either. West Yorks stress and sickness level is at an all time high and getting worse by the week as those left behind get shafted with extra cases to cover. No sessional work being offered in Bradford that's for sure. At this rate there will be no-one left when they do come in.

******
Plus we have had to put up with the stupid and pointless post sentence debacle. Please God help you all if this is adopted nationwide. The RSR tool is also hopeless. Most of the NPS cases we are getting are all below the age of 21 as it is unbalanced when the case is young and has any violent offences. One lad aged 19 came out as 14 per cent and all he had done was kick a few windows in because he had nicked a couple of phones from his school peers when he was 13, robberies. Then we get serial DV perps off to the CRC cos they are getting on a bit and there have been nice long gaps between them knocking a succession of poor unfortunate women around. It's a joke but woe betide questioning this with managers who blindly go along with it for fear of upsetting their senior.

******
I have heard that colleagues in the NPS in Gloucester have been told they don't have to do OASys because the team is in such meltdown and management aren't coping. That means no risk assessments for the high risk offenders.

******
There is now a certain casual disregard creeping into many areas of work that appears to be a form of resistance. Lots of work that was undertaken with a degree of enthusiasm is now not being done and a kind of 'that'll do it' attitude is becoming the norm. There are those who would still be staring at their screens even if there was a 3 minute warning of a nuclear strike in some vain effort to meet a target but many practitioners just think 'F**k em' and are doing the bare minimum to keep management off their backs. 

Colleagues in my office are certainly doing the minimum to scrape by and our line manager (only a few years from retirement) has taken to muttering things like 'more corporate cr*p from above' at our briefings and when they return from meetings 'another round of hot air and bol***ks' echoing both our thoughts and confirming the whole she-bang is a pile of guano. We used to have an office saying of 'onwards and upwards' whenever new targets or something was announced now it might as well be 'slippery slope downwards'

No one has any loyalty to 'the Company' or maybe more accurate to call it 'The Firm'. Most are looking for new jobs and if they could get out they would. This is after all ultimately Grayling's folly and every effort we make to try to make a silk purse helps him to ruin us. Of course sickness rates are higher than when probation was united in a Trust and perhaps some expression of surprise at the low level of this figure might be more in order in the circumstances. Sickness policies are now designed in favour of employers to bash staff with so many come back before they are well and spread germs in overcrowded open plan offices that invariably smell of the last microwaved takeaway being eaten at someones desk.

Spare a thought for the CP people who in London who were part of the first failed probation privatisation attempt. They will soon be returning to the CRC in time to be sold off again to to one of their present employers rivals. No doubt a very stressful time and frying pans and fire come to mind.

This is undoubtedly the lull that is supposed to convince everyone that everything is OK and nothing to worry about before the election before the reality of the share sale and planned budget cuts bite and everyone will have to cope with the screw being tightened further, public sector redundancies, less money for services we rely on and chaos.

Don't swallow the propaganda and don't believe the 'business as usual' patter spewed forth by the MoJ and their imps and minions who are desperate to hold on to their jobs too.

Recently it was said that the entire criminal justice system runs on goodwill, unpaid overtime and more luck than judgement. Lets hope that Grayling's luck is finally running out and that his extremely greasy goose is well and truly cooked by December because if not then it'll be a slow and painful death of a thousand cuts as far as the probation service is concerned. Last one out turn off the lights.

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Another company profiting from TR. I have to attend training in Monday delivered by Penna PLC commissioned by the MOJ to deliver transition training to help me to transition from public to private sector practices, they are making me become corporate. 

We have also been instructed, with exceptions being signed off by SPO, to see all our offenders in Criminal Justice Hubs, for this read church halls and community centres. No rationale, just to manage numbers, but no confidentiality, pass to volunteers. God knows how we are supposed to build any relationships let alone reduce offending, yet we are told to follow desistance practices.

FDRs on DV cases, one and a half hours to produce report, totally downgrading DV. Durham Tees Valley yet again. The lack of transparency, failure to consult with unions and the knee jerk reactions are alienating managers and staff alike on top of the IT chaos, but from Monday I will be totally corporate and privatised. Does anyone know the cost of the training?

******
This is so true and absolutely applicable to what has been, and is now worsening, in the world of Probation and prisons. Processes and process mapping, designed by those who clearly have no knowledge or interest, abound and must be followed. Assessment / guidance tools, 'treatment' programmes are presented as absolutes. People are following an ill-informed /disinterested lead from a position of ignorance. Knowledge, experience, practice based evidence is rejected and actively 'shut down'. Ineffective and potentially harmful practice results.

If anyone wishes to buy the Emperors new clothes, they may wish to wait. Very soon they will be able to purchase not just a new suit, but a whole wardrobe, and will probably get offered a very good price.

*******
Wales also told that NPS can't function without CRC help so CRC PO's being offered contracts to write pre sentence reports.
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One of my colleagues in the CRC has seen 35 clients this week. How are we meant to do any meaningful work when seeing so many clients? Same colleague will then be told by the SPO that if their delius and OASys are late, "there will be consequences"
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Just sat and gone through the new NPS/ CRC case allocation process with some MoJ/NOMS folk. They’re concerned re the duplication of work.

What's in Prospect?

I'm told that Chivalry Road is a hive of activity at the moment and news that the London Solicitors have won their case against Chris Grayling over legal aid might well give some Napo members hope that the activity might involve intense effort on a similar legal challenge. 

Far from it I'm told because, as I've repeatedly stated on this blog, there has never been any serious plan, let alone desire, of pursuing a Judicial Review on any aspect of TR. Now there will always be those that choose not to believe this, preferring instead to swallow the line that it's all being done in secret so as not to prejudice the case. Indeed this theme has already surfaced on this blog:-

The solicitors have taken over a year to get to this point, highlights that it is not an overnight process.

They also tweeted a few weeks ago apologising for the little info that they had disclosed during the process, stating that they could not publicise much without prejudicing the case.

My contempt for those in positions of authority within the union for allowing this myth to perpetuate knows no bounds. I'm going to say this just one more time - there will be no JR of TR - there never was any intention of mounting a legal challenge because the General Secretary has always been against it, for reasons that are not entirely clear, and the only hope of mounting a challenge to this view was lost when Tom Rendon was hounded from office.

I've heard it said many times before that one of the reasons for not mounting a legal challenge - which incidentally the MoJ privately find astonishing - is the desire to hang on to the money in case of a winding up of the union. It could just be incompetence of course, but it's all academic now because any legal challenge is almost certainly out of time. 

So, if there's not a lot of activity going on fighting TR or preparing a legal challenge, what is keeping everyone so busy, preventing meaningful communication with the membership and the General Secretary from writing his blog? I'm told he's busy courting a merger with another union, having been earlier rebuffed by his old union the PCS. I'm led to believe the union in question is Prospect:-

Prospect has over 3,600 members working in a broad range of organisations that are essential to maintaining law and order throughout the UK.

Their input is key across all parts of the judicial system, from departmental policy and criminal investigation through to court proceedings and the penal and probationary systems.

Their expertise spans a variety of specialist roles from forensic scientists to justices' clerks, serious fraud investigators to prison service chaplains and psychological assistants.

The union has members throughout the Ministry of Justice – one of the country's biggest departments – as well as in smaller private companies such as LGC, formerly the Laboratory of the Government Chemist before privatisation and now a provider of investigative, diagnostic and measurement services.

Another key membership area for Prospect within the justice sector is the Metropolitan Police Service where the union represents around 1,000 specialist police staff including fingerprint officers, blood spatter scientists, ballistics specialists, explosive experts, e-forensics specialists (including data retrieval from computers and mobile phones), crime scene examiners and collision investigators, photographers, technicians, health & safety officers, estates managers and surveyors, and custody nurse practitioners.

Now don't get me wrong, trying to arrange a merger with another union might be a very sensible thing to be doing if it looks like the imposition of TR and consequent loss of membership begins to question the viability of the union. But this raises a number of questions in my mind, the first being if this is all being undertaken with the authority and approval of the union's governing Executive? 

The second question is a bit more serious and concerns how this will eventually be 'sold' to the membership? Will it be a case of 'it's the best we can do in the circumstances' which begins to sound rather ominously like the explanation that was offered to the membership over those 'agreed' TR terms. Was that recent rather pointless letter sent out by the General Secretary saying how well things are going designed to prepare the ground, a bit like trying to stop a run on a bank in parlous trouble?

I'm sure that at least some members will be asking themselves if the situation we now find ourselves in is not so much as a result of TR, but rather more as a result of some breathtakingly inept decision-making at the very heart of the union? There's just time to register this weekend for the AGM in Scarborough at the early bird rate of £45.

No doubt there will be others who will say this is all an anti-union plot by a blog with a hidden agenda. All I can do is repeat that I'm only interested in fighting TR and speaking as I find and as I hear. As always it's up to readers to look at the evidence and make up their own mind. 

MoJ Answers 2

Part two of that bullshit from the MoJ.

7. Quality Assurance

Re Probation privatisation. Why would a private company ever prioritise public safety over profit? It is their sole reason for being.

How is it right that companies should profit from rehabilitating offenders?

Private companies do not have a social purpose, their legal priority isn't to put people first it is to make a profit for shareholders. How can the Government guarantee that the level of service currently given to service users doesn't fall, as there will be concerns that corners that will be cut to ensure profit is made and there will be an underinvestment in the provision of services offered.

As a hypothetical question, what happens if a CRC does not meet the targets? Under which criteria will the money not be paid? Will there be an equivalent of OFSTED?

Payment by results is about incentivising reductions in reoffending – that’s something that is in everyone’s interests.

We have a diverse market of bidders seeking to own and run CRCs, including mutuals run by probation staff and voluntary sector organisations, as well as private sector companies. To be successful in the competition, they will have to demonstrate that they have both robust procedures in place to identify, evaluate and manage the risks posed to the public by offenders and also sufficiently skilled and trained staff to undertake this role.

CRC contracts will set out detailed requirements in relation to offender management, including management of the risks posed by an offender, which CRCs must adhere to. Contracts have been designed to ensure that the MoJ contract managers can take robust action to deal with any risks to public safety, including the ability to step in, require action from CRCs and ultimately terminate contracts.

Furthermore there will continue to be an independent Inspectorate of Probation with the same statutory remit as now. The Inspectorate will be expected to inspect the system as a whole, covering both the public sector probation service and the contracted providers.

8. Quality Assurance

If re-offending is going to be payment by results in the CRC what do you envisage being more important to the company that wins the bid? Someone finishing their order well and to the best of their abilities? Or someone finishing their order, regardless of rehabilitation, to secure the payment?

In terms of interventions for offenders will the bidders be commissioned to focus on 'what works' and rehabilitation contributing towards changing people’s cognitive behaviours rather than reducing re-offending in the short term using more punishment led justice e.g. electronic monitoring which is often short lived in terms of reducing re-offending?

My top priority is to reduce reoffending. Our contracts are therefore designed so that to be paid in full CRCs have to focus on ensuring both that offenders complete the requirements of their orders and that they are successfully rehabilitated. CRCs will be contractually required to ensure that the full sentence of the court is delivered. We will measure CRC performance in this respect and can deduct from their overall payment if performance falls below our expectations. Separately, a proportion of the overall payment to CRCs is at risk under Payment by Results, and they will not receive full payment unless they improve reoffending rates for offenders in their cohort.

9. Domestic Violence

Can Ministers explain why Sex Offender Treatment Programmes (NSOG, iSOPT etc) are part of the NPS and Building Better Relationships (BBR) part of the CRC when BBR has much higher risk men on them? By arguing that the NPS will still supervise high risk cases, are we not saying that the NPS is more suited to managing high risk and putting NSOG in NPS following this logic? Thus, having BBR in the CRC means there is an implicit argument that BBR is less important in terms of Risk?

Any offenders who pose a high risk of serious harm to the public will be managed by the NPS.

CRCs will, in general, deliver accredited programmes in the new system, and the Government will continue to set standards for the delivery of accredited programmes. Offenders who have a requirement to attend BBR will be assessed as posing either a medium or a high risk of seriously harmful reoffending and therefore offenders supervised by both the CRC and the NPS will attend the programme. As you know, the programme is designed to be effective with offenders who pose varying levels of risk of serious harm. The exception we have made is Sex Offender Treatment Programmes (SOTPs). As all offenders eligible for SOTPs will be supervised by the NPS, it makes sense that the provision of these programmes stays within the NPS.

10. Reasoning

Do ministers consider their ideological untested 'reforms' to be so important that rushing them through at great risk to the public, risk which probation staff are seeing on a daily basis, is justified?

Our reforms are based on the need to reduce reoffending and not on ideology. As in every part of Government, we are faced with the challenge of trying to do better for less. We could either have imposed further cuts on the structures we had inherited, risking increases in reoffending and leaving short sentence offenders without support after release or, as we are doing, reform the system so that it provides more effective rehabilitation and better value for the taxpayer. We are doing this in a way that is sustainable for the future and are committed to re-investing savings to support supervision for short sentence offenders. We are on track to award and mobilise contracts for offender rehabilitation services across England and Wales by 2015.

11.Timescales

Comments have recently been made by Prison's Minister to indicate that the 'top up supervision' for prisoners sentenced to under 24 months is unlikely to go ahead any time soon. Please could you clarify whether this will go ahead as planned when the Offender Rehabilitation Bill becomes an Act and if not, please could you explain the rationale for this u-turn?

We plan to bring into force the provisions in the Offender Rehabilitation Act 2014 that extends post-release supervision to short-sentenced prisoners when the contracts take effect. At the same time we also plan to bring into force the new rehabilitation activity requirement and other changes the Act makes to community orders and suspended sentence orders.

12. Reasoning/costs

It seems the main argument for the privatisation of over half of the existing probation services is to supervise offenders who are sentenced to under 12 months custody, this is a separate bill. The probation service as was could have incorporated this practice if the government had allowed, therefore there should be no attachment of this particular issue to the privatisation of our staff.

Is it true that the Minister is planning to require public prisons to reduce their costs to the level of the private providers? If so, how does he expect all this 'pre-release rehabilitation' work to be achieved? When costs are sheared to the minimum, prisons will only have the resources to carry out their basic security tasks. If the 'big idea' was to assist prisoners who are currently leaving prison 'with £46 in their pockets', how does this conceivably sit with the plan to cut public prison expenditure by a third?

Why couldn't the probation service have been given the resources to supervise the under 12 months first before rolling out TR? The old saying if it isn't broke don’t fix it springs to mind? If Probation was given the amount of money spent on TR then we could have provided the government with the service it thinks it will get from private companies only with public protection as the key focus, not profit making.

Regarding the under 12 months group how do you see this group being supervised? Will any extra resources be given to engage this difficult group?

Was consideration given to introducing private service providers to the under 12 months service users, rather than trying to integrate it into the new CRC? Especially where no new financial resources are being made available to support this group of service users.

There was quality and excellence already!! Top performing Trusts ripped apart. It wasn't broken so why try and fix it! Probation Trusts were willing to work with the under 12 month offenders, but this was refused. This was the whole basis of TR in the first instance and now this isn't even being rolled out until the end of the year (if that is to be believed!)

There is much good work in the probation service. But re-offending rates remain too high, and our reforms are about bringing the best of the public, private and voluntary sectors to bear to address that problem, and to extend supervision to short sentence prisoners after release – of whom 57.8% reoffend within 12 months. The last government looked at whether we could provide supervision for the under 12 month group using the current system, but decided it could not be done within existing budgets. Every part of the Criminal Justice System is under pressure to deliver better services, at less cost. We could either have imposed further cuts on the structures we had inherited, risking increases in reoffending and leaving short sentence offenders without support after release or, as we are doing, reform the system so that it provides more effective rehabilitation and better value for the taxpayer. We can only do that if we bring in the best of the public, voluntary and private sectors to work with offenders in order to reduce their reoffending rates.

13. Reasoning 

Your plans and decisions are based upon flawed, and quite frankly irrelevant, statistics about 'reoffending'. Firstly, the Probation Service is proven and effective in the work that we do, so why obliterate it purely to make money, and secondly, do you actually understand the roles, responsibilities and work of a Probation Officer?

The purpose of the TR reforms is to extend rehabilitative support to more offenders and drive down reoffending. For adult offenders sentenced to prison for periods of less than 12 months (most of whom are not currently subject to statutory supervision from probation on release), 57.8% reoffend within 12 months. These reforms are certainly not an exercise in making money, rather they are about enabling us to deliver more support to more offenders within the budget we have, at a time of considerable pressure on public finances. I recognise the excellent work that probation staff do, and want to build on that and create even better opportunities for it in the new system. I have spoken to many probation staff over the past couple of years and heard a wide range of views on the reforms. I recognise how important it is that the new system is designed by those who understand the work of practitioners, which is why we have experienced probation staff seconded to work on the Transforming Rehabilitation programme, and we have ensured that the new operating processes were tested extensively with Probation Trusts.

14. Reasoning

If Probation are rated as excellent or as in the case of Northumbria "Outstanding" then why are we not being allowed to undertake the supervision of those with sentences of less than 12 months. Why give it to a French catering company who have no track record of working within criminal justice and their record to date, having seen the issues at HMP Northumberland, are poor to say the least.

How does the cost of TR compare to the cost of leaving rehabilitation in the hands of Probation and making small changes to improve results? The cost of setting this up with separate stationery, computers, payroll etc must be extreme.

We, like every other part of the system, are faced with the challenge of trying to do better for less. We could either have imposed further cuts on the structures we had inherited, risking increases in reoffending and leaving short sentence offenders without support after release or, as we are doing, reform the system so that it provides more effective rehabilitation at a better value to the taxpayer. We can only do that if we bring in the best of the public, voluntary and private sectors to work with offenders in order to reduce their reoffending rates. We currently have a healthy competition in all contract areas and all the bidders have experience in working with offenders or across the Criminal Justice System.

15. Piloting

Why hasn't there been a successful pilot of the privatisation of Probation before it is rolled out nationally?

We are currently piloting a number of different approaches to Payment by Results across Government and have gained valuable learning from these pilots. This gives us confidence that we can design and commission robust contracts that drive the right behaviours and generate value for money.

However, there are key elements of these reforms, such as extending the licence and supervision to offenders released from short custodial sentences and the introduction of resettlement prisons, for which it is not possible to gain evidence from pilots on a local basis. It would not be desirable to introduce a change to the sentencing framework of such a magnitude in one part of the country but not another. Similarly, changes to the prison structure to re-designate some as resettlement prisons need to be carried out at a national level or they could not be carried out at all.

I want us to take this opportunity to implement these important reforms across the system, so that we can extend supervision to short sentence prisoners and start to reduce reoffending rates without delay 

MoJ Answers 1

Earlier this year there was a chance for probation staff to put difficult questions direct to ministers via a 'web chat'. Many questions went unanswered and as a result, over the summer, a small army of MoJ mandarins have been toiling over some suitably banal and obtuse answers. This typical MoJ bullshit is available on EPIC, the private probation intranet, but I thought it would be of interest to a wider audience and I intend publishing it in full via a number of blog posts.   

Ministerial Web Chat with Probation Staff on Monday 23 June: Responses to Questions not Answered on the day

1. Case Transfer 

Is the Secretary of State aware of any fundamental risks of continuity in the transfer process concerning offenders who have had a change of officer from CRC to NPS or vice versa? Does he believe that what he has created in spite of his vision of transforming rehabilitation is in actual fact an additional layer of bureaucracy? Should he not be concerned that this artificial barrier between two organisations prevent the fluid management of the risk of serious harm presented by such offenders?

What was the logic of splitting Offender Management? This appears to have created increased levels of bureaucracy and cost.

Why if you are reducing bureaucracy have you added three processes to the PSR writing and several new referral forms between CRC and NPS? It seems to me that bureaucracy is on the increase.

The CRC contracts, and the new operational processes, have been designed to ensure staff in the new organisations do indeed work very closely together to manage offenders safely in the community. I assume that in the first question you are referring to the risk escalation process. We sought to avoid unnecessary bureaucracy in the design of the escalation process, which underwent testing with Probation Trusts. There are many excellent examples of staff working closely across organisational boundaries to manage the risk posed by offenders, including through MAPPA. 

2. Evidence

Your methods are untested, unsupported and unsafe. What are you intent on rushing the changes through? 

What and where is the evidence to suggest that this 'system' will work?

Can I go back to PBR - What evidence is there to suggest PBR works and where can I find this?

Come on! Mr Grayling - this is a mess and its hurting dedicated staff and impeding their ability to work with a highly difficult group of society which needs continuity of provision and support - TR is not going to achieve this! Imposing additional supervision on S/T custodial instead of just giving a CO to begin with merely increases punitive sentencing, custody population and undermines community links! Save cost by less S/T prison and invest in more better resourced community sentences - still 10th of the cost of prison!

Reoffending rates are too high, particularly amongst short sentenced offenders who are not formally managed by probation. In the current financial climate, there is no way we could have extended supervision on licence to those offenders without substantial changes to the way in which probation services are delivered. Given the high cost to victims, and to the wider economy, of this reoffending, it is important that we act quickly. However, I will not take risks with public safety. We are taking a staged approach to implementation which will enable us to ensure the system works. This is why we have first restructured the probation service, allowing the new operating processes to bed down in the public sector. At the end of the competition, new providers will take on CRCs which are already fully functioning, and in which staff will be carrying out the same functions on the day before contract signature and the day after. We have and will continue to learn valuable lessons from piloting and local testing. In particular, the pilot programme at HMP Peterborough continues to provide useful learning. Our pilot at HMP Doncaster has also explored how Payment by Results incentives can drive better reoffending outcomes for offenders leaving custody. 

3. PbR

Is payment by results still one of the driving factors in the new CRC? If yes what would the payment model be?

How will private companies make money out of CRCs for their shareholders?

[In relation to PbR] How can the CRC/NPS be held responsible for an offence 24 months after someone's Licence/Community order ended?

Do you recognise that there has been a history of payment by results leading to companies working to hit the results in a superficial manner, including fraud? For instance, if required for those unemployed to find a job that lasts for nine weeks, thousands were found a job for nine weeks and a day only - thus triggering payment. 

Can it be said that Payment by Results in Probation will prioritise long-term successes with service users for their benefit and not financial benefit to the controlling owner? Instead of working in a similar way to Payment by Results in prison-based education which can incentivise multiple short-term qualifications for financial gain, and not longer term successes which are more beneficial to the service user?

Payment by Results is very much part of our plans. The payment mechanism that we are introducing will reward providers who are ultimately successful in helping offenders turn away from crime. However, we also recognise that many offenders require significant and sustained rehabilitation support. Our payment mechanism therefore also incentivises providers to work with repeat offenders to try to reduce the frequency of their offending, recognising that this is a step on the path towards complete desistance. 

  
Why is it considered good business to remunerate one sector (CRC) yet not the other (NPS), dependent on results. Surely the aim of both is to reduce reoffending.

Both the NPS and CRCs will be remunerated for the work that they do with offenders, but a proportion of the payment made to CRCs will be at risk and dependent on their performance in reducing reoffending. We want to get the best out of the public, voluntary and private sectors, at the local as well as national level. But our approach recognises that public, private and voluntary sector organisations are not only funded differently but have different drivers for performance. The NPS would not itself be able to take on financial risk, because it is an integral part of NOMS and the MoJ and it is not possible to transfer financial risk within the public sector.

5. Risks

What's your biggest fear about the probation changes?

Will you be taking responsibility for the damage you have done to probation and the prisons once you have moved on from the department?

Do you really think this is going to work? Why did you not ask staff that do this job everyday and know what they are doing? I have been in my job for over 6 years and thoroughly enjoyed it now I don’t know where I stand.

Why change something that was working fine and didn’t need to be changed? Now it’s all falling apart.

My biggest concern is the need to deal with more than half a million crimes that are committed each year by those who have broken the law before. The very highest reoffending rates are among adult prisoners sentenced to custodial sentences of under 12 months. A staggering 57.8% of this group went on to reoffend once released. Many of these prolific offenders, with a host of complex problems, are released on to the streets with £46 in their pockets and little else. Living with the status quo just means accepting more crime and more victims, which we simply are not prepared to do.

We recognise that this has been a time of great change, however former Trusts, as the employers of probation staff until 1 June, worked hard to ensure their workforce was effectively engaged and provided with as much information as necessary. We continue to maintain a robust communication and support strategy for staff across the service. I am pleased that the service is continuing to operate effectively during the transition, and am grateful for the hard work of staff.

6. Deskilling CRCs

How do you feel about the fact that many qualified Probation Officers assigned to CRCs are actively seeking to leave/retrain in other careers due to the blatant de skilling involved in TR Agenda changes? What impact do you think this may have on public safety?

To what extent would you agree that PO grades allocated to CRC have essentially been demoted as no longer hold high risk work, write PSR, parole reports, etc & now do role of a PSO?

I recognise that this has been a challenging time for staff and that it is vitally important that we retain the expertise of probation professionals. I want to see their skills and expertise in play across the public, private and voluntary sectors. There will be a contractual requirement for CRCs to have and maintain a workforce with appropriate levels of training and competence, and those managing offenders will have to meet the Core Skills in Probation Practice, including the ability to understand and respond to the risk of harm posed by offenders. Those bidding to run CRCs will need to demonstrate in their bids how they will deliver this, both in the short and long term.

Why are the Government advertising for trainee PO's where lots of fully trained & experienced POs are now in CRC unable to use their skills.

What is your opinion on the loss of skills, knowledge and expertise from the support functions? NOMS/CRC's could be about to lose the future leaders and innovators who could have made Probation Trusts more efficient if the "old guard" had been removed earlier.

I have had three lifers taken off me and my PSR/Parole report writing responsibilities removed by being transferred to CRC - you have effectively halved the staff doing these roles and de-professionalised me as a Probation Officer (DipSW) and 15 years time served... this is a total debacle!

Is there really a role for a qualified probation officer in the CRC? Since the changes, I am doing the role of a PSO, I can only see this ending one way. i.e. we will be paid less or "let go". Given there was no fair selection process, is this not a breach of employment law?

In my office staff are highly stressed and have been for over a year because of the TR agenda. People are leaving constantly and are not being replaced, as the staff just aren't out there. How can the new structure work without qualified, experienced staff to undertake the work?

Does the freedom and discretion granted to CRC by the TOM extend to not employing probation officer grades?

When does the Minister envisage both organisations being fully staffed on a permanent basis?

CRCs and NPS divisions are currently developing their workforce plans, building on the staff structures inherited from Probation Trusts. Once these are completed, they will be reviewed centrally and will inform the current round of recruitment for trainee probation officers. In the meantime, CRCs and NPS Deputy Directors are continuing to monitor and manage staffing in their areas and all vacancies are being managed as part of business as usual processes.