Weasel words
“This is how the Chair of the supposedly independent London Probation Trust, by far the largest in England and Wales, explains the actions of her board…” Jim Brown looks at the response from London Probation Trust to the Government’s outsourcing of probation.
Why it won’t work
“Any organisation thinking of bidding for probation work ought to be fully aware that despite all the rhetoric and spin, every Government policy from now till the next General Election will be designed to make the task of Transforming Rehabilitation as difficult as possible…” Jim Brown explains why the probation reforms won’t work.
Dear Mr Grayling
“I’m no politician or academic, I’m just a Probation Officer, but to me it seems as if Probation are the experts in managing ‘offenders’ but we are the only people excluded from bidding for our work.” As the outsourcing of probation marches on, the Probation Officer writes an open letter to Chris Grayling.
Omnishambles Update 19
“Meanwhile the Government’s plans to try and sweeten the [Transforming Rehabilitation] pill by encouraging the formation of cuddly-sounding ‘mutuals’ appears to have suffered a few setbacks…” Jim Brown provides a further update on the ongoing omnishambles of probation reform.
The silence is broken
“Probation is a vitally important public service with a proud history, exemplary performance and unparalleled integrity. Probation must have a voice and we are entitled to look to the leadership to provide it.” Jim Brown responds to a defence of probation’s leadership.
Omnishambles update 13
August has arrived and the Transforming Rehabilitation omnishambles rolls on with full cooperation from Probation Trust boards and management citing ‘contractual’ obligations that effectively prevent any other course of action. How they must be laughing down in London at the ease with which they’ve all fallen in to line and are following orders. As one […]
Attention all PO’s and PSO’s
I’ve been reading some exchanges over on the Napo forum website, and thank goodness there’s been some sign of life just recently. What particularly struck me was a response to a long and detailed post by ‘SaveProbation’ basically trying to rally the troops and get colleagues to wise up to the very real threat to our profession […]
Following orders
Chris Grayling duly turned up for his speech to the voluntary sector at the Centre for Social Justice and judging from tweets emanating from some of the excited throng, he’s managed to convince some of them that things will be different this time round. He assured them that this was definitely not going to be […]
Omnishambles update 10
As MP’s start packing their bags and jetting off to foreign climes no doubt, we learn that David Cameron has decided to postpone the widely-expected Cabinet reshuffle until they return. He didn’t want to ruin anyone’s holiday apparently, but I think all of us in probation rather hope that Chris Grayling has a really miserable […]
Musical chairs
It’s a good job Joe Kuipers, Chair of Avon and Somerset Probation Trust, tells us what’s going on, because no one else does. In his latest blog post he reveals that all CEO’s had to gather round their screens at 9 am sharp on Friday morning in order to take instructions from MoJ/Noms HQ in […]
Frontline Friday 28th June 2013: Our favourite frontline blogs this week
Here’s our list of ten frontline blogs we’ve particularly liked from the week of 24th June 2013. Let us know which posts we’ve missed and which other bloggers we should be following for next week’s list.
The probation thing
“In planning to break up this service and sell it, the Government is acting out of pure ideology. There is no evidence whatever that the private sector can do as well, let alone better.” Ben writing on Ben’s Prison Blog argues that the Government’s ideological drive to outsource probation will sideline the only people with expertise in this area - the Probation Service.
A post revisited
In December 2010, when this blog was still relatively new and I was in a particularly depressive state of mind, I published an ominous-sounding piece entitled ’10 Reasons Why Probation is Finished.’ Given our present predicament, I thought it might be instructive to revisit and reflect upon it, but be warned, it is not suitable for those of […]
Omnishambles update 5
More details are beginning to emerge concerning the timeline for the proposed probation omnishambles and I’m grateful to a reader for supplying a summary from their Trust and I quote selectively from it:- Phase 1 (to August 2013) The implications of the split between the public sector and competed services for staff and for workload will […]
Trigger happy
When Chris Grayling began plotting the demise of the Probation Service he realised there were one or two problems. Even he could see that the public would be just a tad nervous about the private or voluntary sector looking after some very dangerous people, so clearly they would have to stay with a small public […]
The Prisoners 2
I think most people would agree that these fly-on-the-wall documentaries about prisons make for particularly depressing viewing, and episode 2 of the BBC1 series The Prisoners didn’t disappoint in that regard. To the uninitiated, it should give a degree of insight into the scale and scope of some of the problems probation have to try […]
Frontline Friday round-up 19th April 2013: Understanding and empathy
Here’s our round-up of frontline blogs we’ve particularly liked from the week of 15th April 2013. This week: understanding and empathy - and where they seem to be lacking in political leaders.
Everyone for themselves!
“I guess it’s no great surprise to see that there’s absolutely no unity of purpose or direction forthcoming from (probation) Chiefs by way of a response to Chris Grayling’s privatisation plans and effectively it’s ‘everyone for themselves!” Jim Brown laments the lack of leadership from probation chiefs in responding to the Government’s probation reforms.
A very cruel game
A very cruel game begins in earnest on April Fool’s day this year. I should have written about it sooner, but my excuse is a preoccupation with government plans for privatising us. In the process though I’ve completely neglected the impending plight for many of our charges. If you didn’t know better you might think […]
Privatisation Round-up 2
It’s been gratifying to see widespread condemnation of Chris Grayling’s recent gagging instruction to all probation staff and if anything it’s served to re-energise the campaign to keep the Service public. When you are so obviously losing the argument for a policy, it’s outrageous and completely counter-productive in a democracy to attempt to silence critics and I’m […]