It's all the fault of probation officers, of course

Today's Guardian reports that the Prison Governors Association are blaming the unsustainably large number of prisoners on two things: the inexorable rise of the indeterminate sentence for public protection, and prisoners being recalled to custody for breaching their licences. You don't have to be as paranoid and hassled as I am to spot the implication: it's those bloody wishy-washy liberals in the probation offices, who've suddenly decided to get steel toecaps for their sandals and get tough.

The point about licences being breached is old hat, really, and pretty vague with it. Yes, prisoners are recalled to prison for breaching terms of their licences - and isn't that what's supposed to happen? I'm told that Inside Time, the magazine written by and for prisoners, regularly carries stories of prisoners having been recalled for being a few minutes late for their appointments. I very much doubt if this is much more than an urban myth - recalls happen when appointments have been missed completely and earlier warnings have not been heeded, or when further offences have been committed, or when there are good grounds to believe that the risk of harm to others is increasing, not just because someone arrives half an hour after their allotted time. But of course we're now being criticised for over-enthusiastically enforcing orders and licences!

I think the point about IPP sentences is a valid one, though I do object to the article's assertion that these are being passed without "proper risk assessment" - they almost always are based on risk assessments which are called pre-sentence reports... But again the blame is being placed on the wrong people. A judge is required to pass a sentence of imprisonment for public protection if the offence is on a list of "serious specified offences" and he or she considers the offender to pose a serious risk of harm to the public. If that offender has a previous conviction for a specified offence (a wider definition but also including the serious specified offences), then the judge must presume that they do pose a risk, unless it would be unreasonable to presume otherwise. I've written reports in cases where it's been very clear that the judge has carefully considered all factors before making a decision, but in reality they are extremely constrained in terms of what sentences they can or cannot pass.

What do we do?

As widely predicted (even by me), prison numbers hit new heights on Friday. Some will no doubt say, so what? Well, higher prison numbers means more time has to be spent on containing those who are there, rather than making efforts to rehabilitate them, provide education or training, facilitate family visits and so on. It also means a greater likelihood of prisoners harming themselves as, according to a BBC report, apparently happened in London last week.

So, what to do? Lord Falconer, keeper of the brand, shiny new office of Secretary of State for Justice (an excellent title) has been out and about talking about possible solutions, from an early release scheme for non-violent offenders (I can sense tabloid editors already writing their stories for when the first such prisoner re-offends after release). Hidden amongst all of that is a promise to make community penalties tougher - because of course the presumption is that "tougher" means "more acceptable" to those voters who can swing elections. Nowhere is there any mention of any serious attempts to make community sentences more understandable to the general public - to explain what goes on, what being "on Probation" really means, and what probation officers really do, except drink our camomile tea and scratch our toes through our sandals. And I blame the Probation Service for this, just as much as I blame other parts of the Home Office - there hasn't been a concerted effort to provide leadership in this area on a national basis, although a search through local newspaper headlines shows that there is some very good work going on at a local level.

So why is this? Probation work has a very solid values base, backed up by decades of criminological research, backed up by extremely committed front line staff. But why do we never hear anything other than the story that "Mr X walked free from court" rather than "Mr X received a community sentence"?

Yesterday's Guardian had this interesting piece tracing back the roots of increasing use of custody, and an ever-more punitive sentencing climate to the early 1990s and the killing of James Bulger. The article quotes David Blunkett as describing the individualism of the 1980s that caused a social breakdown, and the massive influx of crack cocaine in the 1990s as further key factors in this shift - what a shame he didn't seem to show that sort of insight as Home Secretary. It's a little beyond me on a Sunday night to push all of this into a coherent framework - there's probably a postgraduate thesis in there somewhere - but what seems to me is that there will not be an end to prison overcrowding until there's a greater acceptance that non-custodial measures can be - and are - effective in cutting crime. Tougher community sentences will only lead to more breaches, and yet more prisoners.

Division

Confirmation came yesterday that, as widely trailed over the last few months, the Home Office will shortly shed some of its responsibilities to the Department of Constitutional Affairs, which will become a Ministry of Justice. Probation, prisons and courts will be the principal elements to shift, though responsibility for policing, counter-terrorism and immigration will remain. However, there will still be a National Criminal Justice Board which will be jointly chaired by the Home Secretary, Lord Chancellor and Attorney General, which in effect means that the Home Office will still be keeping its fingers in the criminal justice pie. The Home Office's statement notes that some of these changes, including the creation of the Ministry of Justice, will take place in May this year.

The announcement attracted quite a bit of criticism, particularly as it was felt this was rushed out before the Easter recess, thus preventing a proper chance for debate. The main attacks have focused on the expense and effort involved in yet another change within the Home Office (the cost of establishing NOMS, which still as yet is not entirely functional and may still be contingent on the safe passage of the Offender Management Bill, is said to have been as much as the budget for the whole of the National Probation Service), and further fragmentation in a ministry that has been heavily criticised for poor internal communication. The former Home Sec Charles Clarke was particularly scathing, and I would think he could be forgiven for being a bit miffed about this, given that it seems that John Reid has surfed over just as many crises as Clarke did, but managed to dodge the flak.

Today's Guardian leader is very critical, speculating that the announcement is more about the political impact of being seen to be doing something (probably ahead of the local elections in May). The Times asks questions about how sections within the two departments will now be able to work with each other (particularly the police, who will remain under the Home Office), and Peter Riddell comments that Reid had to play the "terrorism card" in order to get his way.

In other news this week: a few days ago we saw the publication of the government's Security, Crime and Justice Review: I'll admit to not having read it in great detail, as I've been far too busy, but the impression I got was that it was high on headline-grabbing 'ideas' such as fingerprint-activated MP3 players to cut crime (a side effect of which would probably be an expansion of the fingerprint databases...) and low on anything really new (it mentioned continuing the Permanent Revolution in privatising criminal justice services - I may be paraphrasing). And later on today we'll hear what the new record number of prison places is.

Politicking

Thanks to angrymammal for drawing my attention to this article in the Sunday Times - in the run-up to the Third Reading of the Offender Management Bill, the prisons minister Gerry Sutcliffe MP asked his officials to identify Chief Probation Officers who were for or against the legislation. Ostensibly this was to use those who were more in favour to act as 'champions' in persuading recalcitrant Labour backbenchers - clearly politicising civil servants - but there's also an obvious, threatening implication for the job security of those who have been more critical.

The Home Office reportedly insisted that "It is normal that the opinions of stakeholders are canvassed and assessed before a Bill is published as often they are on the front line delivering the policies" - unfortunately, whilst they did indeed consult when the White Paper was published, they chose not to listen to the 700+ respondents who criticised the proposals, compared to the 4 who were in favour. More meaningless guff from the Home Office. Still, it does at least show how frightened they were about the potential rebellion.

What do probation officers do? (1)

This occasional series (exactly how occasional remains to be seen) was inspired by a comment posted here several months ago from someone who was considering applying to become a Trainee Probation Officer, and wanted to know what the job entailed in practice. I'll try to write a bit about all of the different aspects of the job as I see it, though please bear in mind that this is only a view from the desk of one particular probation officer. If any of my PO colleagues would like to comment and add their experiences and opinion to what I've got to offer, I'd be very pleased to hear from you.

1: Court work and Pre-Sentence Reports (PSRs)

It's probably best to begin at the beginning. A defendant appears in court and pleads guilty or is found guilty of an offence, and the court requests a PSR to assist it in passing sentence; when you read newspaper reports of trials that say the case was put off for 'reports', this is usually what is meant. The court is not obliged to ask for reports (I think - please correct me if I'm wrong here), particularly in cases where the offence is "so serious" that only a custodial sentence is justified, but they frequently do, and especially when the offence falls on the cusp between a community penalty and a custodial sentence. Somewhere near 250,000 PSRs are written each year.

The defendant is interviewed by a probation officer, who then writes a report for the next hearing. The report contains an offence analysis, which looks at the motivation behind the offending (might be money, drugs, alcohol, anger control problems and so on), the effect of the offence on the victim(s), and any pattern of offending behaviour. This last element is usually based on previous convictions, which are (or should be...) supplied to the report author by the CPS at the court, but can also be based on police intelligence. This is quite a sensitive issue, because obviously the defendant will only be sentenced on the basis of the offence for which they have been convicted. However, and particularly in cases involving domestic violence, where there might be a long list of police 'callouts' to an address that have not resulted in arrest or charge of the offender, this can be relevant in terms of an assessment of where the offence fits into an overall picture of that person's activity.

The analysis should also contain an account of the defendant's attitude towards his or her offence, including towards the victim(s), and any expressions of remorse that they may have made during the PSR interview. This is another tricky area; unbelievably, it's not unknown for someone to fake remorse in order to try to con the PO into giving them a 'better' report... Actually, we're pretty good at spotting where this is the case, and the court itself should have an overall picture of the offence anyway, so this is not really as big a problem as it might seem.

After the offence analysis comes the 'offender analysis'. Back in the good old days, PSRs were known as Social Enquiry Reports, and contained an examination of the defendant's personal circumstances that might be relevant for the court in passing sentence. A wide range of potential information can fall into this section: family history, education, drug or alcohol abuse, mental health problems, employment... each case is different though this section should give a broad range of coverage. This is potentially tricky, because - particularly in cases where the defendant has not been involved with the Probation Service in the past - they are usually the primary source of this information. Again, we can check with the police, Social Services and other statutory agencies, as well as family members if relevant, but PSRs are done to quite strict deadlines so any information in the offender analysis must be seen as coming with a 'health warning' in terms of its sources.

Following the offender analysis is a section on risk assessment and risk management. I'll be writing a separate post on this, because it's such a major component of working in the Probation Service, but suffice it to say that this looks at the likelihood of that person harming others or themselves, and the chances of them committing further offences. This section first became a requirement in 1995.

Finally, there's a section where a recommendation to the court is made. This tries to encompass any statements made by the court about the level of seriousness of the case (which they are obliged by the Criminal Justice Act 2003 to give to the Probation Service, though in practice this does appear to be rather patchy), and the view of the author on what the key issues are in reducing the risks of harm and re-offending. A suggestion is then made of what an appropriate sentence might be, which could include a community order, a suspended sentence order, or a custodial sentence (it might also even be a recommendation for a fine or a conditional discharge).

If a community penalty is recommended, the author should recommend requirements chosen from the 'menu' of 12 possible requirements contained in the CJA 2003, the overall number of which should reflect the seriousness of the case (usually no more than three on any one order). This might include supervision by a probation officer, up to 300 hours of unpaid work, an offending behaviour programme or a curfew. The author might also recommend that the case be adjourned for further information, such as a psychiatric report or an assessment of the suitability for a Drug Rehabilitation Requirement, which would be done by a specialist drugs worker.

If a custodial sentence appears to be the only appropriate disposal, the PSR may not contain recommendations for particular work to be done in custody, but they are increasingly used by prisons as a basis for sentence planning, and courts are now able to recommend particular licence conditions for when a prisoner is released from custody.

Basically, that's what all PSRs should contain. However, there are some differences between reports written for particular courts. Crown Court PSRs, because the offences are more serious, often contain an assessment on 'dangerousness' (more on this when I talk about risk assessment), and there are fewer recommendations for community penalties. Magistrates Courts are usually offered a choice between 'standard' reports, done during an adjournment of usually three or four weeks, or 'fast delivery' reports, done in a much shorter period and sometimes even on the same day. Fast Delivery reports should really only be done in the least complex cases and where there are no suggestions that the defendant poses a risk of harm, though these guidelines are, unfortunately, not always strictly adhered to.

Prison experiences

Today's Guardian carries a mammoth set of articles about life in British prisons - from the guy on his first day of a 12 month sentence at HMP Wandsworth in south London, to Phil Weatley the director general and Anne Owers, the prisons inspector. Quite a read.

Sorry...

Apologies to anyone reading this via RSS feeds (hope I've got that right - I'm not sure how it works) for what probably looks like a whole lot of spam from me - I've been updating the labels for my archived posts and trying to get a little bit of consistency into this blog. Hopefully that's all now completed and I can just get on with writing rubbish about the criminal justice system.

Courting trouble

The BBC quotes figures from the Magistrates Association, which record that in 2006, 8.2% of defendants did not turn up for their hearings, up to 150,000 out of the two million or more seen in court in a year.

The Magistrates Association are running a campaign called 'Cutting Costs, Jeopardising Justice' to highlight the impact that the widespread lack of resources will have on the ability of magistrates court to deliver fair and just outcomes. This is a timely reminder for me that there is a chronic lack of funding throughout the criminal justice system, and not just limited to one particular area. Problems in one part have a knock-on effect in other areas, and it's important to recognise that this will have an impact across the board in terms of our ability, as people working in this field, to do the work effectively.

Yet more on the Offender Management Bill

Some comments from a few blogs on the Offender Management Bill:

John McDonnell, rebel Labour MP and aspiring leader of the Labour Party, has a highly critical post and mentions that Gordon Brown intervened personally by calling individual MPs into meet with him about the Bill.

Graham Broadbelt of Demos argues that the bill represents action without insight - it will create an even more complex system without any real idea about what has an impact on reducing re-offending.

Not specifically on the Bill but here Trevor Philpott, who has considerable experience of voluntary sector engagement with offenders, puts the case for greater funding for charitable organisations seeking to get involved.

Bizarrely, the Home Secretary's blog, Reid My Lips, contains no references to his triumph whatsoever. Which makes me wonder about his priorities...