The Lost Cause

They say a little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing and a personal mission to try and understand what the hell Trump is up to has landed me at the American Civil War and some institutionalised revisionist history. My ignorance of US history and politics is so complete that I had not appreciated the extent to which the alternative title of The Lost Cause held sway to this day. This from Wikipedia:-

The Lost Cause of the Confederacy, or simply the Lost Cause, is an American pseudo-historical, negationist ideology that advocates the belief that the cause of the Confederate States during the American Civil War was a just and heroic one. This ideology has furthered the belief that slavery was just and moral, because it brought economic prosperity. The notion was used to perpetuate racism and racist power structures during the Jim Crow era in the American South. It emphasizes the supposed chivalric virtues of the antebellum South. It thus views the war as a struggle primarily waged to save the Southern way of life and to protect "states' rights", especially the right to secede from the Union. It casts that attempt as faced with "overwhelming Northern aggression". At the same time, it minimizes or completely denies the central role of slavery and white supremacy in the build-up to, and outbreak of, the war.

In a 2015 San Francisco Chronicle article about films depicting the Confederacy I was alarmed to read:-

They say that history is written by the victors, but the Civil War has been the rare exception. Perhaps the need for the country to stay together made it necessary for the North to sit silently and accept the South’s conception of the conflict. In any case, for most of the past 150 years, the South’s version of the war and Reconstruction has held sway in our schools, our literature and, since the dawn of feature films, our movies.

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Over the past couple of decades, scholars such as Eric Foner and Bruce Levine have overturned most of the myths surrounding the Civil War and Reconstruction, but it took the British director Steve McQueen to put the truth about the horrific plantation era onto the screen and before the public, in “12 Years a Slave.” Quentin Tarantino’s “Django Unchained,” the year before, was a big step in the right direction.

Recently, the mass killing in South Carolina and the subsequent outcry over the Confederate flag flying over statehouses brought the Civil War back into the national conversation, and for once public figures found the courage to say what that flag really means, and to repudiate it and its history.

It may be that in these past few weeks, we have finally turned a page, and the Confederacy will not rise again. If this is so, the truth will benefit the entire country, but especially the South. This is a region with a disproportionate number of our greatest writers, and most of our best soldiers. It has delicious cuisine, gracious women and a tradition of hospitality that is real and sincere. The musical traditions of the South, both white and black, are among the nation’s cultural glories. And America’s best raconteurs are from the South.

The South no longer needs — and never did need — the Confederacy as the organizing principle of its pride. It has many things to be proud of, and despite what the movies have tried to tell you, the Confederacy was never one of them.

So, if I've understood correctly, Trump's astonishing rise to power and subsequent fall from grace not only has its roots in unresolved matters from the 19th century, but has set the scene for a new 'lost cause' and even a virtual confederacy. This from Project Syndicate:-

The Lost Cause of the Trumpocracy

Donald Trump's insistent denial of reality following his loss in the 2020 US presidential election threatens to do still more damage to American democracy, even though it comes as no surprise. Like the southerners who never could get over their loss in the American Civil War, Trump has nothing left but his own mythomania.

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The astonishing outburst of jubilation that broke out across the US – and in countries around the world – following Trump’s defeat was a testament to how frightened people have been by his presidency. The relief may be premature. Axios reported recently that Trump has already discussed with aides the possibility of running for president again in 2024.

This might well be a Trumpian ruse. As of now, Trump seems more focused on creating another “lost cause” myth – like the self-glorifying one concocted by unreconstructed Southerners after the US Civil War. Such incendiary mythology could prove useful to Trump in countless ways in the years ahead, including keeping him relevant and on TV. It may be a long time before the US and the world have seen the last of Donald Trump.

Which brings us to this from the Guardian on Friday:-

This is no conventional coup. Trump is paving the way for a 'virtual Confederacy'

Race is the message behind his supporters’ legal shenanigans, and a keystone for a Trumpian government in exile

Not for the first time, Donald Trump’s unhinged behaviour prompts an uncomfortable question: should we be laughing in derision or trembling with fear? Is he playing out his last days as nothing more than a sore loser pathetically kidding himself that he might yet score the winning run, even after the crowd’s gone home and the stadium is empty – or is his insistence that last week’s election was stolen an attempt to cling on to power, to stage a coup against his democratically elected successor?

The case for laughter is strong, as Trump’s allegations crumble to dust. On Thursday, a wing of the department of homeland security – part of the government that Trump still heads – declared that last week’s election “was the most secure in American history”, and that there was “no evidence” of any malpractice, still less of the mass-scale fraud that Trump has groundlessly alleged.

The result is that Trump’s lawyers have been all but laughed out of court, forced by impatient judges to admit that they don’t have any evidence, let alone proof. His courtiers continue to pretend that the emperor is fully clothed, of course, but even they are winking at the crowd. Surely Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was joking when he promised with a smile: “There will be a smooth transition to a second Trump administration.”

The inner circle are happy to let Trump, who has appeared only once in public since election day, remain hunkered down in his White House bunker, “feverishly tweeting, watching television and telephoning allies”, as the Los Angeles Times reports. They carry on telling him what he wants to hear, but they know his cause is doomed. Tellingly, even Trump’s own son-in-law, Jared Kushner, made his excuses for Saturday’s supposed council of war, sending “aides” in his place.

All that should prompt derision rather than fear. We can take the lead set by the president-elect himself, relax and let the process play out until Joe Biden is sworn in on 20 January. That’s certainly appealing, and most of the time I manage it. But every now and then, fear intrudes.

Why, for example, has Trump fired the civilian leadership of the defence department, including the defence secretary, Mark Esper, filling their posts and others in intelligence with ultra-loyalists? Esper stood up to Trump over the summer, when the president wanted to deploy the military to crush peaceful protests. Does Trump have something similar in mind, a move that would require a yes man to nod it through? Is it possible that Pompeo was not, after all, joking?

For now, I can accept that a full, tanks-in-the-streets coup is not on the cards. One Capitol Hill Republican tells me he suspects Trump sacked Esper mainly to “make him feel better”, and “to get even with the people who thwarted him”, rather than because he wants a Pentagon boss who will agree to send in the troops. Equally possible, says my source, is that Trump plans to go out with a bang, and wants pliant people in post. What kind of bang? Some talk of a total withdrawal from Afghanistan. Conversely, there’s chatter about a possible attack on Iran.

That would be huge – and Trump likes huge – but it’s not a coup. On this reading, Trump is rejecting the election result less in order to keep power than to instil in his base the sense of grievance that will bind them to him for his next act – whether that be a new media company, Trump TV, to challenge Fox News or another run for the White House in 2024.

But if that’s true, it’s hardly grounds for relief. That Trump’s attempt to defy a democratic election is comically inept or cynically motivated doesn’t alter the fact that he’s making it. No less alarming, all but a handful of Republicans have backed him. Fearing both his wrath and the hold he continues to exercise over the Republican electorate – highly relevant, given that two Senate seats are up for grabs in Georgia in January – the party’s most senior figures have acquiesced in Trump’s evidence-free claim that the Democrats rigged the election.

That matters. Most directly, it will impair the incoming president as he tries to get to grips with a pandemic that on Thursday saw a record number of new cases in the US – 159,000 in a single day – about which Trump is doing and saying precisely nothing. How can Biden lead if half the country has been primed to believe he is not the rightful president? The Republican rebuttal – that Democrats hardly welcomed Trump in 2016 – trips on one simple fact: Hillary Clinton conceded defeat right away. That is the only way a democratic system can work, with the consent of the loser.

The fear is that Trump and his followers will never give way, that he will remain the head of a “Trumpian government in exile”, as the historian Sean Wilentz puts it, antagonistic to the legitimate, elected government, armed with allies in Congress, sustained via social media and nourished by grievance and the romance of a lost cause: a new, virtual Confederacy.

The word is not wholly hyperbolic because, inevitably in America, so much of this turns on race. When Trump’s cheerleaders locate the supposed voter fraud in Philadelphia or Detroit, their listeners get the message: it’s that black cities are corrupt and, at root, that black people shouldn’t be allowed to decide who gets to be president of the United States. As Barack Obama writes in his upcoming memoir, these are “dark spirits” that have “long been lurking on the edge of the Republican party – xenophobia … paranoid conspiracy theories, an antipathy toward black and brown folks”.

So no, this won’t be a coup like we’ve seen in the movies. But nor can we just laugh it off. Trump is often ridiculous, but he’s no joke.

Jonathan Freedland is a Guardian columnist

Rejoice!

One thing we can be fairly sure of is that we haven't heard the last from the Whitehall genius. Non Disclosure Agreements never seem to feature much at this rarefied level, so I suspect it won't be long before we can all revel in some scores being settled, especially as the Brexit reality hits home. It won't be long either before Mr Johnson exits No 10, but until then it looks like Carrie's in charge.        

This from the Guardian:-

PM accused Dominic Cummings of briefing against him, sources claim

Aide’s exit from No 10 reported to have followed a tense 45-minute showdown with Boris Johnson

Boris Johnson accused Dominic Cummings of briefing against him and Carrie Symonds, his fiancee, during a tense 45-minute showdown before the adviser’s departure, according to sources. The prime minister’s senior adviser left Downing Street with his belongings in a cardboard box on Friday evening. Lee Cain, Downing Street’s director of communications, was also told to leave.

Johnson held a meeting with Cummings and Cain to discuss their “general behaviour” where he is understood to have accused his aides of briefing against him and his partner. The prime minister also accused the pair of destabilising the government in the midst of Brexit negotiations ahead of a crucial phase in talks in Brussels next week, the Financial Times reported.

Government sources have denied the fractious talks took place. Cummings told the Telegraph that claims the prime minister had accused him of briefing against him as “an invention” and said: “We had a laugh together.” However, the tenor of Cummings’ dramatic ousting by Johnson will raise fears that the adviser may not display the discretion expected of a former aide.

A government insider told the FT: “I won’t be surprised if there’s an explosive stunt between now and Christmas.” A colleague of Cummings said: “It’s not Dom’s style just to quietly drift away.” Conservative officials said Cummings and Cain would continue to be employed by No 10 until mid-December but were expected to work from home. Cummings’ “work from home” project is expected to focus on Covid-19 mass testing for the next six weeks.

Cummings’ theatrical exit on Friday through the No 10 black door, having formally resigned on Thursday, came despite his office being at 70 Whitehall. Downing Street said that Cummings’ departure would not impact Brexit talks. The prime minister’s official spokesman, James Slack, insisted suggestions the government could compromise on key principles in the wake of Cummings’s decision to leave were “simply false”.

Cummings was widely perceived as the mastermind behind the victorious Vote Leave campaign in the 2016 referendum.

Sources told the Daily Telegraph that Cummings told allies that the prime minister was “indecisive” and that he and Cain had to rely on Michael Gove, the Cabinet Office minister, for leadership. Johnson’s allies accused Cummings of “trying to blame everyone but himself”.

Guardian Editorial:-

The Guardian view on Dominic Cummings: voting to leave

A departure from Downing Street caps a week of Tory infighting that has dominated the news at a time of national emergency

Boris Johnson should have asked his chief adviser, Dominic Cummings, to resign months ago when he broke the first coronavirus lockdown and showed no regret afterwards. Perhaps Mr Johnson thought he could not do without the architect of his election victory and his ally in pursuing a hardline Brexit. But the damage was done. Public confidence in the government’s handling of coronavirus fell and has not stopping falling since.

Mr Cummings walked out of Downing Street, in an act of theatrical defiance, on Friday. It is a mark of the tragicomic nature of Mr Johnson’s government that a week of infighting within No 10 dominates the news at a time of national emergency when hundreds are dying every day from a dangerous disease. Mr Cummings gets to walk away while Britain is stuck with the damage he has wrought.

He won the Brexit referendum by spreading lies, unconcerned about damaging public trust. He has snubbed parliament, weaponised populist sentiment against state institutions and played fast and loose with the constitution. He may say that unconventional times needed unconventional ideas. But he seemed to enjoy his war too much. He picked, and lost, too many fights for his own good. A swirling cast of characters was drawn in. Even Carrie Symonds, Mr Johnson’s fiancee, got involved.

Mr Cummings was edged out of power before he could flounce out. This tawdry episode demonstrates two things. One is Mr Johnson’s palpable lack of leadership in a crisis. He encouraged his chief adviser to embrace his inner Leninism — where the end justifies the means. Second is the government’s well-deserved reputation for incompetence. The prime minister over-centralised Downing Street and let Mr Cummings ride roughshod over a weak cabinet that he had hand-picked but which lacked the confidence or foresight to predict problems.

Mr Cummings’ plans have gone awry thanks to the unpredictability of politics. After the US election his ideas for a hard Brexit were going nowhere. A Biden White House would have little time for the UK if it turned its back on Europe. Mr Cummings’ departure is a clear indication that the prime minister is ready to make the compromises needed to strike a deal with the EU.

Coronavirus required bigger government. Fiscal conservatives like the chancellor, Rishi Sunak, and many other Tory MPs worried that once voters understood that big spending would not bankrupt the economy they might get a taste for decent public services. Mr Sunak wanted to balance the books, Mr Cummings wanted to blow them up. He agitated for the un-Tory idea that state power could turbocharge the economy, making powerful enemies in No 11.

Resentments have built like sediment on the river bed of Conservatism and threatened to choke the flow of government. Backbench MPs see Mr Cummings’ contempt for them as symptomatic of a high-handed Downing Street and have rebelled in such numbers that it threatens the stability of a government that, paradoxically, won a landslide largely thanks to Mr Cummings.

Mr Johnson might think that, without his adviser, his ungovernable party becomes governable. But he might find that elections become unwinnable. Some of this is more about style than substance. Mr Johnson still has to make good on his promise to “level up” Britain, especially since north-south divisions have been dramatically exposed by coronavirus. The prime minister needs to up his game. Once gained, a reputation for incompetence is hard to shift. Too often with Mr Johnson the buck stops somewhere else and blame is dumped on someone else. With Mr Cummings out, there is no hiding place for Mr Johnson.

Remembering a Period of Enlightenment

There are many in the probation field who can still reflect on rather more enlightened times when the sponsoring department was the Home Office and benefitted from wise counsel such as provided by David Faulkner who died recently. This from the Guardian:-

  
Dominic Cummings, take note: even Thatcher had liberal civil servants

Committed to the common good, David Faulkner, who has died, embodied all that was right about the Civil Service

In a delicately weighted coda at the end of Middlemarch, George Eliot quietly celebrates the unheroic but life-enhancing example of the novel’s central character. Dorothea Brooke’s spirit may have “spent itself in channels which have no great name on the earth,” Eliot writes. “But the effect of her being on those around her was incalculably diffusive, for the growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts.”

The effect of the Home Office civil servant David Faulkner, who died last week aged 86, was incalculably diffusive too. I didn’t know him terribly well, but I am definitely one of many journalists, researchers, academics and practitioners whom he influenced. In manner, Faulkner was always modest, fair, serious and unflashy. When I have mentioned him to others in the last few days, the first thing that people say is always – and rightly – how nice he was.

But Faulkner was also a tough thinker. He honed his policymaking talents in the 1980s, a turbulent time for British government. As a result, he always looked round political corners before charging on. He liked to say his job was to speak truth to power, but in a voice to which power would listen. In this way, unlike Dorothea Brooke, he managed to notch up some notably historic acts too. These included the setting up of the still invaluable independent prisons inspectorate. He also oversaw a long period in the 1980s in which government policy towards criminal justice, penal issues, policing and drugs took serious account of research and facts rather than following and chasing headlines. This may seem surprising, since these were the Margaret Thatcher years, but on these issues the Home Office was able to keep its distance from No 10.

Faulkner was a liberal in the best sense. In one of the books he wrote in retirement he defined this in an exemplary way – and with a neat thrust of the dagger at the end:

“The term ‘liberal’ has come to be used as one of abuse, often without much thought for what it means. I have always understood it to mean a commitment to the values of freedom, democracy, social justice, respect for the individual and protection from oppression by corporate interests or the state. Critics now associate it with weakness, complacency and social irresponsibility and by doing so diminish the fundamental values for which it stands. Politicians and others praise the liberal values for which the country fought two world wars, but rarely apply them to contemporary situations.”

He also embodied a form of civil service integrity that now seems increasingly remote. In Faulkner’s civil service generation, career paths took very different directions from today. He spent almost his whole career in one department, the Home Office, moving up through it and developing a commitment to the institution itself. Today that institutional mentality would be a cause for censure, not approval, and the lack of diversity that went with it would trigger justified alarm. But it gave room for senior civil servants to be involved in policy development in ways that are also rarer today, when so much of a department’s work is routinely outsourced (which was not yet the case in the Home Office in the 1980s) to consultancies and cronies as well as to more partisan pressure groups.

The upshot was that Faulkner’s thoughtfulness, preparedness and openness were mostly treated as a departmental asset, not a threat. It is hard to think of any career civil servant who was so genuinely interested for so long in solving hard public policy problems calmly, in listening to what others knew and thought before making a decision, or who was so willing to share his own thinking with colleagues and with others as he did so. He was the antithesis of the Yes Minister stereotype.

Probably Faulkner’s finest hour was when he was the head of what was then the Home Office prison department, before taking charge of criminal justice policy more generally until 1992. Faulkner didn’t achieve everything he wanted in either of these roles, not by a long chalk, and his heart wasn’t always in everything that he had to do. But he had an ethos and a strategy, and he was a pivotal figure in something that mattered a lot, helping to create a more liberal, rational and purposeful criminal justice world than had existed before that period of reform. It was the golden age of the much missed Home Office research unit.

But that was then, and this is now. References to the growing good of the world, as George Eliot put it, ring hollow in these post-liberal times. The fairness, transparency, fact-based policymaking and the openness to ameliorative ideas that marked Faulkner’s approach are despised in the Dominic Cummings era. Public confidence, expressed through mainstream media, and later social media, has been the great governmental god of the past quarter century, from New Labour to Boris Johnson.

Towards the end of his autobiographical 2014 Servant of the Crown, Faulkner reflected on whether his liberal principles were now an anachronism. “I have asked myself many times whether they belong to an era which has now passed,” he wrote. “But I cannot persuade myself that they are no longer relevant. To argue for them is not to try to return to the past, but to find a sense of direction for the future.”

Is this merely denial? Or is it possible that a new liberal approach to collective ethos and rational policymaking can in fact be forged again from the fractured pieces of the liberal past? Looking at Donald Trump’s defiance of America’s voters, at the insouciance with which Boris Johnson dismisses a possible EU trade deal, or the shamelessness of the current UK government’s partisan chumocracy, it is hard to be confident. Yet Faulkner’s instinct was right. The plain fact is that, for all the difficulties, there is no alternative.

Martin Kettle is a Guardian columnist

Recall and Scapegoating

Yesterday saw publication of the second part of the Probation Inspectorate's report into the handling of the Joseph McCann case. There remains widespread anger and concern amongst practitioners that they continue to be 'scapegoated' for the consequences of what are essentially organisational policies and procedures.     

Foreword 

The power to recall a person to prison is a significant one. It is one of the most important decisions probation officers make and over 27,000 of these decisions were made in 2019/2020. The immediate consequences for the recalled prisoner are self-evident, but the decision also has consequences for victims, potential victims and the public at large. In part one of this independent review, published in June 2020, we reviewed the case of Joseph McCann and expressed serious concerns about decision-making in relation to recall during the period 2017 to early 2019. We have not found a repeat of those concerns in part two, our review that looks at current recall culture and practice in the period since then. Probation staff are clear that public protection is the primary concern in recall decisions, and this was reflected in the cases we reviewed. 

Recall decisions are often complex and frequently rely on the analysis of detailed information and behaviour. It is important, therefore, that they are supported by a methodical, consistent and fair process. The National Probation Service (NPS) and Community Rehabilitation Companies (CRCs) currently have different processes for recalling individuals, and these are applied inconsistently. It is important that recall decision-making is prioritised and operational staff are given the necessary time and management support to make effective decisions. Probation staff have concerns about the professional and personal consequences if they fail to instigate a recall and a high-profile incident subsequently occurs. A professional culture needs to be at the heart of recall decisions. This requires a consistent process and operational staff having the confidence that they will be supported if they make considered, defensible decisions. 

We have found that the current system for licence warnings, which are designed to prevent the need for a recall, varies both between and within organisations and its effectiveness has not been evaluated. Nearly all of the cases we reviewed where a warning had been issued still resulted in recall, raising questions about the impact of this approach. Furthermore, license warnings are not subject to additional scrutiny outside of the normal management oversight of cases. This requires urgent attention. It potentially results in inconsistent licence enforcement and is also unfair from the perspective of procedural justice. Alternatives to recall are often used alongside licence warnings, but the effectiveness of this strategy has not been reviewed since it was implemented in 2017. We are satisfied that when alternatives to recall are considered they are balanced against the requirements of public protection, but there is inconsistency in both their accessibility and use. 

Decisions on recall and licence warnings often rely on the judgement of individual practitioners, but these decisions and practice judgements are not routinely monitored for bias and unconscious bias. Disproportional outcomes, particularly for black, Asian and minority ethnic service users, have been identified in other parts of the criminal justice system, but they are not routinely monitored in relation to recall decisions. This needs to be addressed to ensure that recall decisions are routinely scrutinised and any learning can inform improvements in probation practice. 

Decisions on recall and licence warnings are complex. Across the nine organisations we inspected, there were examples of responsible officers taking recall decisions to protect victims, potential victims and the public. There were also examples of probation staff coordinating comprehensive support packages for individuals in an attempt to break entrenched patterns of criminal behaviour. This professionalism should be built on with the aim of developing a confident, professional organisational culture. To this end, our recommendations are designed to strengthen the process and support probation staff in their decision-making.

Justin Russell

HM Chief Inspector of Probation

Executive summary 

Context of the review 

On 05 March 2020, the Secretary of State for the Ministry of Justice announced that an independent review of the case of Joseph McCann would be undertaken by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Probation. The review would be in two parts. Part one was to focus on the supervision of Joseph McCann by the National Probation Service (NPS) and part two would review the current probation culture and practice in respect of recall. Part one was published on 30 June 2020. This report constitutes part two of the review. 

Part two was completed against the background of COVID-19. Nine probation providers were involved in the review and 39 meetings with managers and operational staff took place remotely via video or telephone conference during July and August 2020. We inspected a sample of 50 release licence cases that had been recalled or had warnings issued between October 2019 and February 2020. Where available, we also interviewed the allocated responsible officer. The case sample predated the probation exceptional delivery model (EDM) introduced at the end of March as a result of the COVID-19 crisis. The EDM ensures that public protection continues to be the priority for probation providers. The learning and recommendations from this inspection apply to probation practice both before and after the introduction of the EDM. 

Recall decision-making and threshold 

We found that public protection and the protection of victims are central to probation service decision-making on recall. Operational staff are clear that this is the primary focus of recall practice. Alternatives to recall are routinely considered where appropriate, but this does not compromise the focus of decision-making on public protection. 

In 2019/2020, 34 per cent of recalls included a failure of the service user to keep in touch with their supervising officer as the reason. Responsible officers make impressive efforts to engage non-compliant service users and often put comprehensive support packages in place. These cases are resource-intensive and frequently result in a recurring cycle of release and recall. 

Licence enforcement and recall requires a consistent process that must allow for individualised decision-making. It is rarely a simple decision and probation practice must allow for the key information to be assessed and reviewed. Responsible officers require the necessary time and management support to obtain and analyse information and make good decisions. Office practice and procedures should enable such a process to ensure that recall and warning decisions are defensible and not overly cautious. We found that this varied between offices and organisations. 

Probation organisations have communicated the Recall, Review and Re-Release of Recalled Prisoners Policy Framework (RPF)2 to their staff, but staff and managers’ knowledge of the specific processes and criteria is inconsistent. Operational staff were, however, clear that decisions on recall must focus on increases in the risk of serious harm linked to previous patterns of behaviour. Communication of the revised framework has been stronger in the NPS than in the CRCs, but communication within individual divisions has not been part of a coordinated national strategy. This lack of coordination has reduced the impact of a key national policy. 

Licence warning and alternatives to custody 

A breach of licence conditions does not automatically result in the instigation of recall. Where probation providers assess that individuals can still be managed safely in the community, they can issue a licence warning. Licence warnings can be accompanied by amended licence conditions. These may include increased levels of contact; cooperating with activities such as drug testing; or additional restrictions in relation to residence or curfew. 

Current licence warning practice is inconsistent both between and within organisations. There are inconsistencies in the threshold, recording and delivery of warnings. This makes it difficult to identify cases where the service user has been warned and not recalled and to operate effective quality assurance processes. In most cases where warnings have been issued, recall to prison is still the eventual outcome. This underlines the need to review practice and issue a revised licence warning process. 

Practitioners now take a balanced approach when deciding between recall and alternatives to recall, and this approach is considered good practice across organisations. However, access to and use of alternatives to recall, such as approved premises (APs) and electronic monitoring, are inconsistent. Probation organisations have not analysed the effectiveness of the overall strategy on alternatives, or whether it averts or simply delays an eventual recall. The role of APs as an alternative to recall requires clarification. NPS responsible officers, in contrast to AP managers and staff, regard APs as an important alternative to recall.

Quality assurance 

Rates of recall vary both between and within organisations. This variation cannot be accounted for solely by the circumstances of the individual case. In the NPS, divisions receive information on performance on a quarterly basis. This includes the number of recalls and the reasons for them, along with the number of licence variations. There are no performance targets in relation to recall numbers, but the reports highlight local delivery units where recall rates significantly deviate from the national average. NPS divisions use this information to monitor variations. The CRCs generate information on recalls as part of their enforcement monitoring. Again, there is no performance target for the number of recalls, and organisations do not monitor any actions taken as an alternative to recall. CRCs do, however, monitor the rates of recall. For example, one CRC identified a low rate of recalls and amended its practice as a result. 

The routine quality assurance of recall decisions is reliant on each senior manager’s endorsement of the practitioner’s decision as part of the decision-making process. Licence warning decisions are not the subject of any targeted monitoring or review. Some probation providers use the national Alternative to Recalls and Recall Report Part A quality assurance tool, 3 but this focuses on recall cases only rather than looking also at cases where recall was decided against. NPS London and NPS North East have undertaken their own quality assurance and dip-sampling initiatives to monitor recall cases for disproportionality. However, probation providers do not routinely review recall decisions to check for bias and unconscious bias. 

Organisational culture 

Recall culture and practice are directly influenced by national policy and high-profile serious case reviews. In recent years there was a widespread belief among operational staff that recalls should be minimised. More recently there have been fears that responsible officers will be unfairly held responsible for any adverse consequences resulting from a failure to instigate recall. Both perceptions undermine professional decision-making, which must be at the core of the process. The current correct balance between alternatives to custody and public protection is understood by operational staff. To ensure operational staff do not become too cautious in their approach, there needs to be a consistent decision-making process both for recalls and decisions not to recall. The development of a professional culture depends on operational staff feeling confident that defensible, professional decisions will be supported if a serious incident does occur involving a person under supervision. 

There are significant differences in recall practice and culture between the CRCs and NPS divisions. These include differences in the level of management endorsement; staff expectations; the understanding of the RPF; and differences in types of recall. These differences were recognised by Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) Wales in the training activities its staff undertook in the three months after reunification in December 2019. The NPS divisions and CRCs in England should learn from this example. Given the importance of recall decision-making, the NPS and CRCs should prioritise communicating the RPF to staff and embedding a consistent recall process when they are re-joined. 

Public Protection Casework Section (PPCS) and the post-recall process 

The relationship between the central HMPPS PPCS and probation providers operates efficiently. Emergency and out-of-hours recalls are processed promptly, and the PPCS’s advice on the recall threshold is viewed positively by both senior and operational managers. 

Following a standard recall, both responsible officers and the PPCS can review cases and decide to re-release a recalled prisoner under the executive release scheme. The operation of executive release is inconsistent. Responsible officers are uncertain about the operation of the process and the number of releases varies between providers. Consideration for release should not depend on which organisation a person is supervised by. The administration and use of the process should be reviewed. 

The PPCS must refer all standard recall cases to the Parole Board within 28 days of a prisoner’s return to prison. This includes consideration of the Part B risk management report that responsible officers submit to the PPCS within 10 days of a prisoner’s return to custody. This timescale allows time for prisoners to make representations to the Parole Board on the contents of the document. Part B risk management reports include a recommendation as to whether the prisoner should be re-released. The current process for completion is not working efficiently. To complete the report within the timescale, responsible officers must have quick access to prisoners immediately after their return to prison. Access, however, is inconsistent and responsible officers are frequently left without the necessary information to make an informed recommendation on re-release.

--oo00oo--

Comments from yesterday:-

Probation staff felt “pressure” from the government to send fewer criminals back to prison for committing new crimes or breaking their licence conditions, a watchdog has found. HM Inspectorate of Probation said a sharp drop in the rate of recall to prison across England and Wales from 2016 onwards was linked to policy changes, and that a reversal was only sparked by a high-profile murder case. Senior National Probation Service (NPS) leaders said that when an “alternatives to recall” strategy was implemented four years ago, there was "pressure from the Ministry of Justice to reduce the number of recalls in their divisions". Someone should take the hit for this.

******
"I agree. I really don't think it's fair for Probation Officers and Probation Service Officers to be SFO'd, investigated, suspended then sacked for not recalling Offenders when encouraged and pressured not to recall. I now upload all email communications to Delius that involve recall or not to recall decisions, this would have been unthinkable for me a decade ago."

Triumph of Nastiness?

Not much seems to be happening on the probation front and even if it was, I can't draw myself away from what's happening over in the US. The initial relief that good, decent people had triumphed over the obscenity represented by Trump has already evaporated for me. 

As Trump continues to try and steal the election, I had intended to expand on the theme of democracy being under threat or the danger of civil unrest or war even, but after much soul-searching and hours glued to CNN, I've come to a much simpler but equally worrying conclusion. The Republican Party is just full of a lot of nasty people. This seems to embrace my thoughts:-

ARE REPUBLICANS NASTY PEOPLE?

Characterizing entire groups of people is the basis of prejudice. Sweeping generalizations are the foundation of racism, sexism, antisemitism, and every form of discriminatory ideology. Offensive stereotypes appear often in crudely written op-eds, where selected evidence about individuals is applied to whole categories of people. I have worked hard to avoid the easy tendency to overgeneralize. But this question persists in my mind: are today’s Republicans nasty?    

Certainly there are nasty Republicans, as there are nasty people of every political persuasion. Perhaps it is too easy to make a long list of nasty Republicans. I think it’s enough to refer to the collective televised behavior of Republican Senators and Representatives during the impeachment hearings, where argument and nastiness were blended into a toxic brew designed to distract attention from what Trump had actually done.

What provokes my bigger question is the possibility that nastiness has become the essence of Republicanism. This process did not begin with Trump.

----//-----

I think it’s also reasonable to argue that common Republican political maneuvers are nasty. Voter suppression, gerrymandering, and taking away powers from newly elected Democratic governors are dirty political tools that have become the hallmark of 21st-century Republicanism. The official policies of the Republicans in Washington are beastly: caging immigrant children and the treatment of Puerto Ricans after Hurricane Maria.

What about your neighbor who votes Republican, but seems like a nice guy? Is he responsible for the nastiness of other Republicans? I believe that supporting a politician, approving publicly of a politician, means accepting responsibility for that politician’s actions.

The approval of 90% of Republican voters for Trump is the basis for his complete lack of restraint of his nastiest impulses. In the month of May, he topped himself. He retweeted a video in which a Republican New Mexico county commissioner said that “the only good Democrat is a dead Democrat”. He repeatedly accused the MSNBC host Joe Scarborough of murdering a staffer, provoking that woman’s widowed husband to plead with Twitter’s CEO to take down Trump’s tweets.

That’s about as nasty as it gets. It may be too great a leap of generalization to say that Republicans are nasty people. But in their full-throated support for Trump, no matter how nasty he gets, America’s Republicans promote nastiness.

Isn’t that nasty?

Steve Hochstadt is a writer and an emeritus professor of history at Illinois College.

Sweet Georgia

We really can't go any longer without saying something about the momentous events playing out across the Atlantic. As I write this, Joe Biden has taken the lead in what was thought to be the staunchly republican State of Georgia. By sweet irony and on its own it now looks to ensure that the world can be saved from enduring for much longer the obscenity that is President Trump. 

Regular readers will be aware that I decided to rashly 'call' this election in Biden's favour at 11.47 GMT on November 4th having been glued to the absolutely brilliant and forensic reporting on CNN and having become completely disillusioned with BBC news coverage. If you want a fair but straight-talking version of what the hell is going on across the pond, I'd suggest you go there. You have no idea how my mood has lifted by the wonderful news unfolding amidst this terrible global pandemic. God Bless Georgia!   

Addendum

It's becoming increasingly clear that Mr Trump has been 'hoist by his own petard' and when the inevitable oscar-winning film is made, it will be a wonderful moral tale where good triumphs over evil. Rather than do the right thing and encourage everyone to cast their vote safely by mail-in, he chose to politicise this hugely popular option, branding it as unsafe and open to fraud. By so doing he almost certainly significantly lowered the Republican turn-out, whilst at the same time increasing the Democratic vote. 

By his twisted and completely cynical, warped logic, he then imagined he could steal the election by subsequently disenfranchising millions of postal votes! The man is not only utterly deluded, nasty and amoral, he's almost certainly been responsible for many thousands of deaths by politicising the wearing of face masks. 

History is quite rightly not going to treat this man kindly. It seems a certain German bank want speedy repayment of $340million and there are several criminal cases to answer just as soon as his Presidential immunity ceases. I don't have children, but blimey there's one heck of a moral lesson to teach future generations here.   

Transition News

As the probation service prepares for yet another major upheaval, morale is undoubtedly low with the prospect of another 'shafting' and omnishambles as everything is thrown in the air with no one at all sure how or where they will land. Of course the order of the day is to put a brave face on things and assure staff everything will be fine. This from London gives a flavour of things:-  

Welcome

A few words from Kilvinder Vigurs and Kirsty Blair

Welcome to this first edition of Transition News, bringing you all the latest updates on the transition to the new unified model for probation, in one handy monthly publication. 

We’re delighted to come together as the respective directors of London National Probation Service (NPS) and MTC, to bring you this joint update, and are committed to continuing to work together to ensure a smooth transition to the new service. With less than 12 months until the new unified model commences, we’re committed to telling you what we know about the transition plans as they develop – and we learn more. And to give you an opportunity to ask questions or raise any concerns you may have along the way. 

Stronger together 

The transition to the new unified model will signal the start of a new era for the probation service. And with that comes an opportunity to deliver even better quality probation services by building on the strengths of colleagues from the NPS and those from MTC and London Community Rehabilitation Company (CRC) who will transfer to the new unified service – whether that be to the NPS or Dynamic Framework provider. We both continue to work closely with the HMPPS Transition Programme Team to help shape and influence their plans, with a firm focus on ensuring our services, employees and service users can safely transition to the new arrangements. 

We aim, through each edition of this newsletter, to:

• Share significant transition milestones with you, and provide updates against them.
• Give you a better understanding of what the transition will mean for you and your role, once this detail is known.
• Answer some of your frequently asked questions. 

The reality is, the transition plans are very top-level at this stage, the details are still being developed, and we don’t have all the answers as yet. But we’ve taken the opportunity in this edition to outline and provide what we hope you will find to be a useful reminder of what we know so far.

A continued focus on quality 

With Exceptional Delivery Model (EDM) recovery planning underway across probation nationally, between now and June next year the focus for colleagues in London CRC, MTC and London NPS must be firmly on continuing to deliver quality probation services. This will ensure we have solid foundations to build on when we come together as colleagues in the new unified NPS. We know we can rely on your support as we start to safely increase our service delivery in line with local recovery plans. In the meantime, we hope you find the contents of this newsletter interesting and helpful, and would love to hear from you if you have any questions. Simply email your organisation’s inbox – TransitionNews@mtcgroup.org.uk or londonnps.bsc@justice.gov.uk – and we’ll do all we can to answer them in the next edition. A big thank you for all your hard work and commitment during these unprecedented times.

Kilvinder Vigurs Regional Probation Director, NPS

Kirsty Blair Interim Managing Director, MTC 

What we know so far 

Coinciding with all Community Rehabilitation Company (CRC) contracts coming to an end, probation service delivery in England will transition to the new unified model from 25 June next year. The new model will see colleagues from CRCs and the National Probation Service (NPS) coming together to deliver probation services across 11 unified regions across England. This will mirror the approach taken in Wales where probation service delivery has already been unified. 

End-to-end service delivery 

As announced in June this year, delivery of Unpaid Work, Accredited Programmes and structured interventions will now be managed by the new unified NPS alongside case management. While this means the Probation Delivery Partner (PDP) framework is no longer a component of the unified model, the Dynamic Framework (DF) is, and the competition to select providers is under way – starting with ETE and moving on to Accommodation, Personal Wellbeing, and Women’s Services. Under this framework, practitioners in the unified NPS will be able to access a range of rehabilitative services which meet regional requirements, and are provided by pre-qualified voluntary and private sector organisations. With experience of developing and delivering structured interventions, MTC which runs London CRC, is tendering for this piece of work. 

On 25 June, depending on the work they do, individuals who currently work for London CRC or in MTC corporate roles which support case management and are identified as in scope to do so, will transfer to the NPS or the regional DF provider. A standard, nationwide process, which looks at the tasks performed by individual roles, will determine which roles are in scope to transfer to the unified service. All private sector probation providers have been asked to contribute to this process by providing information to the Transition Programme Team by the end of September. 

Coming together to deliver quality services 

Recognising the complexity of bringing two organisations together, and with a firm focus on ensuring services can continue to be delivered safely, a phased approach will be taken to integrating operational delivery under the unified model. This means, wherever appropriate, CRC, MTC and NPS colleagues will continue to do their existing jobs and be based at their existing locations initially when the unified model for probation launches on 25 June. Everyone who transfers from London CRC and MTC will have an induction on any new systems (including OASys and nDelius) and processes before this date. 

A key principle for the new model for probation is to create a new, unified service which combines the skills, experience and best practice approaches of both NPS and CRC colleagues to deliver consistent, quality end-to-end probation services to reduce reoffending and protect the public. Once the new model has launched, the focus for Kilvinder and her senior leadership team will therefore be to build on this and work with you to shape London probation’s new service and organisational culture. 

Enabling you to be your best 

HMPPS have recently published their Probation Workforce Strategy which outlines their three year vision to make probation a rewarding place to work. Developed by the Probation Workforce Programme – working closely with NPS Regional Directors, CRC CEOs, probation employees, trade unions, and other key stakeholders – the strategy covers five objectives of the HMPPS People Plan: 

• Investing in and promoting wellbeing for all employees. 
• Attracting and retaining talented people. Ã Supporting and developing employees. 
• Creating a more diverse workforce where everyone feels included. 
• Fostering confident leaders who inspire and empower others. 

The strategy also confirms an increase in recruitment of probation employees this year, with a target of a minimum of 1,000 new Probation Officers in training by January 2021. You can read the Probation Workforce Strategy here.

Something's Got To Change

Absolutely nobody wanted CRISSA from the outset, except the 2 people that created it. They pushed and push and pushed, until it was made mandatory. That’s how probation works nowadays, no evidence base, no collaboration, Just Effing Do It because the HMIP might give us a gold star.

******

Agree CRISSA is for automatons! Probation over assesses and over records but massively under delivers meaningful work with offenders. I genuinely believe that Probation has no identity now and bends to the will of others like a tree in the wind. The offenders know this and don't trust Probation any more than they trust any other professionals. Sigh. It was not always like this. Sigh

******

A quick google bought up this shite. I feel sorry for the offenders having to go through this scripted conveyor belt every week and for the POs that buy in to this drivel then type it all up.

“During the session, we will also talk about the offence and explore deeper into why it happened and how we can help them to not be in a situation again. The session framework that I, and most other officers use is the CRISSA model. In English this means, Check in, Review, Implement/ intervention, Summarise, Set tasks, appointments.

This basically means, I check in with them, see if any circumstances have changed since the last session, and go through their general engagement with the order. I review the previous session and any learning, and tasks set from the last time. We sit down and implement and come up with interventions that focus on a criminogenic need, linked to the sentence plan, for example thinking skills and attitudes. We then summarise the session we have had, set tasks if necessary that will be reviewed in the next session and finally set an appointment for the next session, whether is either weekly, fortnightly or monthly.”

******
Absolutely agree. HMIP have indicated for years now that our work with offenders in supervision sessions is piss poor, but they stop short at exploring why. The organisation has focussed so much on case recording and completing OASYS under impossibly exacting QA standards, that it has forgotten who we are working for. Think back to the last time you had training on skills associated with meaningful engagement and delivery of supervision sessions, versus training in risk and OASYS completion.

The organisation has lost its way and reinforces matters by bringing in recording initiatives like CRISSA, officer diary, risk registers, constant pressure to update OASYS, constant pressure to complete this against standards which talk about meticulous completion of evidence boxes, assessor comments....and then the senior leaders scratch their heads and say "we just can't understand why employees say we don't listen, we offer a TEAMS meeting once a month, we don't get it??"

******
"come up with interventions that focus on a criminogenic need, linked to the sentence plan, for example thinking skills and attitudes." Linked to a sentence plan from an OASys system built on the premise that the client needs to be "fixed", it demeans both the professional and the client. Both of us insulted in a stroke.

******

I do love how corporate bullshit tells us how we need to more reflect the community we serve. Well if that really were the case, the service would employ 95% men!! Which is clearly ridiculous and not required!! What is required is to start thinking about why we are unsuccessful at working with about 50% of our users, and I'm suggested tailoring services around what men actually need is one of many ways to achieve this...or we simply be more honest as a service that we are here to punish and enforce and that is our end goal.

******
Probation is unsuccessful because it doesn’t reflect the community we serve. This doesn’t just mean more male POs, but more difference across all probation jobs;

More men
More Black, Asian and ethnic people, especially men..
More working class people who didn’t go to university.
More people with criminal records.
More people that have overcome addictions.
More people that have migrated from other countries.
More people that have lived life.

Too Much Clickety Clicking

Yesterday's post and spirited discussion serves to highlight just how much feeling and unease there is around the issue of the extraordinary and growing gender imbalance within probation. We have discussed this many times before, the reasons are varied and complex but include selection, training, salary, professional judgement, discretion and job satisfaction. Surely this exasperated contributor put their finger on much of the problem? 

"I agree with comments about "command and control" - OASYS has GOT to go to be replaced with an assessment system which makes sense, CRISSA has got to go, Risk registers (or at least updating them every five minutes) has got to go - and can someone please make that bloody box in Delius larger so I can actually see what's in it - actually fuck it, Delius has got to go, I spend too much time clickety clicking and not enough time WORKING. We need to chose ONE of these issues and band together and say "enough is enough - we are NOT doing this anymore"....the person is more important than the CRISSA notes I write about them."

And these:-

"Just love that risk management economy created by The Centre so their on-message chums in academia could sell sackloads of shit, politicians could scare the public witless & NOMS/HMPPS could control the probation narrative."

******
"The current Probation service that sucks up to the police, creates little security units to please Tory ministers and buddies up with prison governors by unnecessarily vetting it’s own staff."

At Odds With The Evidence

Two emails a day apart and for me they rather neatly highlight the fundamental problem. To many of us, possibly an ever-diminishing band of contrarians, 'probation' is quite obviously being strangled by the ever-tightening grip of HMPPS and their typical civil service command and control mind set. 

How long can we wait for the penny to drop? How long before somebody is prepared to put their neck on the line and confirm the bloody obvious? This forced marriage with a uniformed service, embracing as it does an entirely different culture and modus operandi has been a disaster for our professional ethos, distinctive identity and ability to practice effectively. Probation simply cannot be practiced as a civil servant under HMPPS diktat! 

I find it so unfair and dispiriting, especially for prospective new recruits, that the MoJ/HMPPS management and publicity machine continue to disseminate the warm and upbeat image of a career full of promise, but one that is so at odds with the evidence.  

Criss Cross

Hi Jim

Probably not coherent. I am so cross/fed up, but if you want to use this feel free.

NPS acknowledge that low morale in the workforce is an issue. Also that there aren’t enough of us. And that workplace bullying is a problem. Nonetheless, they persist in piling ludicrous tasks on overworked staff, micromanaging us to an inch of our sanity, and threatening us with sanctions if we... go sick, manage a case with SFO, don't meet a deadline, whatever.

Management is a job for managers, weirdly it seems to have become the sole activity of the “Service”, whose only function appears to be the meeting of management targets which should be a diagnostic, not a mission in itself.

One feature of this neurotic over-management is the requirement to record all contacts with clients on the case recording database using the CRISS model: Check in, Review, Intervention, Summary, Set Tasks. This is inevitably monitored by equally freaked-out team managers.

If you’re doing the job right, you are sustaining very marginal people, often remotely, in the middle of a global pandemic. This requires compassion, risk sensitive antennae, therapeutic skills, pragmatism. The job is to sustain people, keep them going, stop them hurting anyone else. I have done work since March of which I am very proud, and which has rehabilitated, and protected the public. Tragically, it felt subversive, and necessitated a) squeezing it in between the day job ticking boxes b) was almost impossible to record under the CRISS template.

Presumably the hope is:-

Check in: Having a bit of trouble with my decision making

Review: He does some dodgy things

Intervention: Stern talk which I will record as “Motivational Work” about not being an idiot. Reminder that Sanctions will follow non-compliance. Powerpoint print off re thinking skills

Summary: That is him sorted then

Set tasks: Record, cut and paste repeatedly

--oo00oo--

Removed at author's request.