Napo members show belief in their union

The end of another adrenalin fuelled week where I have traversed a good portion of England engaging with members, employers and probation stakeholders.

First off was a hearing of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) into the National Audit Office report into TR which somewhat unusually was held in Doncaster Prison. Whilst the PAC decided to only call NOMS and MoJ officials and no other stakeholders, we submitted written evidence as you would expect. We will get this out to members along with our take on what was said, courtesy of National-Vice Chair Katie Lomas who was there observing proceedings. This account will probably be included with other Napo submissions that we have made on the reviews of Probation Systems and the David Lammy MP project into BAME under-representation in the Criminal Justice System.

Next up was a meeting with Sodexo in Salford on Tuesday where I can report we had some really constructive exchanges on a range of issues that members had asked us to pursue.

The agenda included the thorny issue of office layouts in their CRC premises, and while we await a formal record of management’s conclusions on their post-implementation review that has followed our earlier representations, it sounded to me as if we are travelling in the right direction in terms of what is most effective to ensure quality interaction with clients and the security of data. Let’s hope we see some positive action on this soon.

Wednesday saw an important engagement with NNC Employers (NPS and CRCs) about future bargaining machinery. Again, we will get more news out once we see a full account of the meeting, but suffice to say the exchanges were constructive and I am hoping that we will have a package of reforms that we can put to members soon and certainly in time for a full debate at the September AGM where the decision on whether these are acceptable will be rightfully in the hands of members.

Thursday was kind of a very long day with a lightning visit to the Napo East Coast Branch AGM in York which also included members linking in from offices across the region and my thanks to everyone who made the effort to get involved.

Then off to Liverpool and John Moore's University for a really first class conference on TR 2 years on, organised by the Probation Journal (and let’s hear it for outgoing editor Lol Burke for his mammoth contribution over so many years) where I was able to provide Napo's take on where we are (full speech to be published) to packed house. Here I made a commitment that Napo stands for a reunified probation service as well as urging a greater emphasis on probations professional strengths as part of our campaign to see the introduction of a Licence to Practice in accord with Napo policy.

Finally, completing this posting on a high speed train back from another super AGM at Napo Mercia Branch is not ideal, but as I sign off (back on the 19th July) I wanted to say just how impressed I have been with Napo members who I have met on my travels these last few weeks.

Their take on life is a world away from the views of our detractors and I cannot express my appreciation enough to all those members who have come out to take part in an open and transparent discourse about where Napo is now in trying to cope with the multitude of problems that you are facing wherever you work, and where I want to help us get to.

I am proud of every one of you.