- Conference
- 2024 Police, Probation and CAFCASS Conference
- Date
- 14 June 2024
- Decision
- Carried
Probation Service staff are reporting that it has become untenable to continue to complete Police and Safeguarding checks on on every case that is due to be sentenced at Magistrates and Crown Courts. This process is slowing down the Court system and creating a backlog of pre-sentence reports. This additional pressure, which is on top of the existing workload pressures that already exist in court is resulting in increased stress and staff sickness and potentially to errors being made due to the increased workload. Whilst accepting that safeguarding checks are necessary for thorough risk assessment it is evident that the police do not have the resources to deal with all Probation requests in the timescales required by our policies. Checks do not necessarily need to be expedited for all cases and it is the view of many staff that it would be more beneficial, efficient, and financially viable if there was a tiering system developed to ensure that only defendants that require the requisite checks are identified. It is noted that People on Probation will be required to attend an induction appointment within five working days of being sentenced to an order in the community. Further information will be gathered at this appointment and further checks can be made at this stage by Probation Practitioners.
Our members report widely varying safeguarding processes around the country however it is important that we have a consistent, uniform and achievable approach across all areas.
We call upon the SGE to work with the Probation Service at the appropriate level to encourage them to produce a tiering system to drive down the number of Police check and Safeguarding checks required for pre-sentence reports and to encourage them to ensure that children’s service databases are available to the whole Probation Service.
In relation to Police checks we request that the SGE encourage the Probation Service to agree to a Service Level Agreement with the Police to ensure that funding is available to ensure that Police are able to carry out checks when Probation staff require not when they are physically able to do so.