Given the right investment, management and support, community sentences deliver a cost-effective alternative to prison, said UNISON, the UK’s largest public service union today (1 September).
The prison population in England & Wales in August 2010 was 85,115, with many prisons suffering from severe over-crowding. We have the highest rates of imprisonment in Western Europe and the number of prisoners has more than doubled since 1991. The union is calling for better alternatives and launching an eight star plan to give community sentences a real pay-back to local communities and for the offenders taking part.
Community service can involve ground clearance, gardening, graffiti removal, working with adults with learning disabilities, painting, woodwork and individual placements in charity shops etc. But, the union is warning that current pressures on supervisors, threatens to undermine that work, leading to problems with group size, the threat of violence, no shows and disruption.
UNISON’s plan includes: a thorough review by the National Offender Management Service (NOMS) of the problems reported by our members; better resourcing of community service rather than the threatened cuts; an average of no more than 6 offenders to one supervisor on work group and a complete ban on mobile phones and action against violence.
Ben Priestley, UNISON National Officer for Probation Staff, said:
“Supervising offenders who don’t want to complete their community service is a tough job. But it is being made harder by the threat of cuts and the daily pressures that our members face.
“Group sizes have risen relentlessly over the past 5 years. It cannot be good practice or safe to have one supervisor watching over 14 offenders. Is it any wonder that violence is an increasing fear among our members?
“Allowing mobile phones on placements is just another potential cause of trouble. It is hard to stop them being used outside of break times and a complete ban is the only sensible solution.
“We know from evidence from Probation Trusts across England and Wales that the beneficiaries of community service – charities, community and voluntary organisations and local authorities- are pleased with the work that is delivered. But there are ways to improve the service to ensure that the public gets the best out of these sentences and offenders are to learn new skills and reform their offending behaviour.”
UNISON’s eight star plan includes:
1. A National Offender Management Service (NOMS) Review of the pressures and difficulties faced by our members in delivering Community Service with a view to improving the resourcing and management of the Service.
2. Better procedures to deal with offenders who turn up late or who are disruptive on work groups. Current pressures to keep completion rates high, means that disruptive individuals can negatively affect the work group and prevent effective working. Late arrivals have to be re-assigned to other groups and that poses extra administrative difficulties.
3. An average of no more than 6 offenders to one supervisor, the ratios are now sometimes as high as one supervisor to 14 offenders. This makes the job of the supervisor very difficult and in some circumstances dangerous. It also limits the quality of the supervision and the work that can be achieved by the work group.
4. A better mixing of difficult to manage offenders. The drive by Probation Trusts to get 50% of offenders onto individual placements, eg in charity shops, to save money on supervision, means that work groups are more likely to have a higher proportion of difficult- to -manage offenders, who are not suitable for individual placements. This again makes the job of the supervisor more stressful and confrontational and leads to conflict on work groups.
5. The right tools for the job. The cut backs mean that supervisors don’t have access to proper tools for work groups. Transport is also being run down in many areas, and pressure put on members to use their own vehicles. This will only get worse if the Government’s projected 25% cut to the Ministry of Justice budget becomes a reality.
6. A national policy banning the use of mobile phones by offenders on community service. Under the current arrangements, many Probation Trusts allow offenders to take mobiles onto work groups, but not use them, except in emergencies or in breaks. This is simply not enforceable and allows the use of phones for illicit or disruptive purposes.
7. Better management support. Violence is a real possibility at any time, but sometimes the paperwork given to supervisors telling them about the level of risk that a particular offender poses is late preventing a proper risk assessment for the work and the group.
8. An end to ill-guided proposals to privatise the provision of Community Service. The experience of the Probation Service is that whenever it has tried to privatise any of its services, the taxpayer gets a worse service at a higher cost.