Napo GS Ian Lawrence calls for politicians to show courage in making meaningful reforms to Prisons and Rehabilitation in a speech to the Public Policy Forum in London this week.
Colleagues, Chair, thank you.
Firstly, many thanks to Aaron and the team at the PPE for this opportunity; I am pleased to represent Napo members who work in the Probation and Family Court services in England and Wales.
So let me start with a positive, saying that in Napo’s view the creation of Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service, out of the ashes of NOMS, ought to be the driver for the long awaited and desperately needed integration of the offender management system. As you are aware the calling of a snap General Election means that the intended Prisons and Courts Bill goes back to the drafting board. But given the priority afforded to prison reform and the host of issues that we will be debating today, one can only hope that the future Government, whatever its longevity, will move forward urgently with reform, although in the currently (and more uncertain than is normal) political climate, we can but hope that prison and probation reform makes it to the priority list.
Well let’s drill down into just some of the pressing issues that our members in the probation service are facing in the context of managing the client base and some suggested solutions.
Firstly, on the policy to increase the number of probation staff in prison, which I can tell you has engendered some serious debate amongst our membership; it’s a fact that the probation service is often the only consistency in a prisoner’s journey through the criminal justice system. It’s suggested on the one hand that this proposal would seriously disrupt this concept. For example, there are offenders who will see a change in their supervising officer every time they move between prisons, thus bringing further uncertainty to an already fragmented system, which will only damage prisoner and probation relationships which we believe are the key to reducing reoffending.
The intention of the Transforming Rehabilitation reforms in 2014 (please don’t get me started on that) was to see community intervention provided by 21 Community Rehabilitation Companies but evidence clearly shows that this great social experiment has not delivered what it said it would on the tin, most notably the much vaunted Through the Gate rehabilitation service which is consistently shown to be a widespread failure by successive reports by the Probation Inspector Dame Glenys Stacey.
Napo also has major concerns about the still high levels of Domestic Violence and the depressing statistic that sees an average of two Women killed by their partners or former partners each week in the UK and believes that the capability of private providers to monitor the DV client base has been stretched too thin, and again that’s not always their fault as I believe they bought in to contracts that failed to take account of the changing world of rehabilitation.
In terms of making Prisons safer and more effective in the rehabilitation process, there is also a long list of practical issues to deal with as well; these range from:
The challenges of bringing two staffing cultures together into the HM Prison estate and the complex line management arrangements that will need to be put in place to create the seamless prison and rehabilitation structure that all of us want to see
The capacity of Prison Officer practitioners to play a meaningful part in the rehabilitative process, given that (as we have just heard) their priorities are very much about keeping themselves and the prison population safe as well as having to face the exponential rise in substance fueled violence and disruption and, as Norman Lamb said, radicalisation and ‘ghettoisation’.
The lack of physical capacity within the HMP Estate to co-locate hundreds more staff supported by ICT Systems that are, how shall I say this, are not so much state of the ART as state of the ARK !
So they are just a few key things. And let’s face it shall we, and it’s never popular to say this, outside of this type of engaged audience, but there are simply too many people in the prison system - and too many female prisoners. And I bet you won’t hear many politicians echoing this fact if (or when or maybe) another general election arrives in the coming months. It’s not exactly a winner on the doorstep if truth be told!
Prisons should be the last resort for those who have caused or are liable to cause danger to our communities, we have no issue with that (and the terrible events here in the UK and just this week in North London bear this out). Nevertheless, Napo believes that the Ministry of Justice should focus firstly on community interventions, and prison based rehabilitation, for which there is clearly a compelling need, should come a close second. We must have skilled practitioners out there in the community to complete the whole project and break the cycle of recidivism. And as the previous Chair of the Justice Select Committee Bob Neill and others have said, probation and prisons must get the investment and protection against further cuts, to allow for a greater focus on the priorities of reducing reoffending, defending our communities, and providing value for money to the taxpayer, who speaking frankly, and in the opinion of Napo’s members has been taken for a bit of a ride.
Whilst we await the outcomes of the probation system review that has been trying to unravel the post-transforming rehabilitation problems, we believe that the new Government should take a firmer line with those private probation providers who, as continual reports from HMI Probation are showing, and one more just last week covering the inadequate services provided by public and private providers in Suffolk, help us reach the compelling conclusion that private providers are clearly struggling to do all that they were contracted to, and that’s what I’ve told the Justice Select Committee when I gave oral evidence to their enquiries.
So while I am not so cynical as to blame owners of CRCs for all of their failures though we have serious issues with the operational models they are operating (especially in Wales and the South West where we are still in dispute with Aurelius and Working Links) many CRC owners were taken for a bit of a ride too.
Napo believes that where necessary, the MOJ should use its golden share option to wrest back control of failing CRCs; and/or adopt an alternative strategy such as considering oversight being vested with Police and Crime Commissioners and metropolitan Mayors and the Mayor of London, seeing failing CRCs revert to public control with opportunities being given to providers, public and private, to deliver high quality commissioned services. Napo will work with all providers especially those who are committed to develop a license to practice across prisons and probation for example.
And finally, the question of reform also means reducing the prison population by investing properly in probation, making it a real part of HMPPS and not just an add on; reviewing sentencing guidelines, restoring the confidence of the judiciary in the sentences they decide upon, and highlighting the vital role of probation in the intervention process to politicians and the public (and I would say this wouldn’t I - because I can), what’s also needed is a major pay review for probation staff.
We’ve heard much quite rightly, about prison pay reform, and the need for new recruitment. It is needed, it is desperately needed; but let me tell you, evidence produced by the Office for National Statistics proves that our Probation Officers are one of the lowest paid professions in and outside of the criminal justice sector with a 22% pay decrease in real terms over the last 7 Years against comparator professions and that is simply not good enough. So you can’t have one strategy for reform and improvement without the other, and that’s what I’ll be telling the new Secretary of State for Justice David Lidington in our scheduled telephone discussion tomorrow.
So in summary Chair, this may seem to be a bit of a long wish list, but I agree with Norman Lamb that with the right degree of commitment and political courage from Government, whatever its complexion, then what I am advocating in terms of the probation service and its part in prison reform will make a major contribution to the wider social changes that everyone here desperately wants to see.
Thank you so much for your time and attention.
Ian Lawrence, General Secretary, Napo
Making Prisons Places of Safety and Reform: Tackling Violence, Reducing Re-offending. 20th June 2017.