2. Supplementary information
submitted by the Rt Hon Baroness Scotland of Asthal QC, Minister
of State for Criminal Justice and Offender Management, Home Office
When I appeared before the Home Affairs Committee
on 29 November, I undertook to write to you with further information
about three issues which the Committee raised in connection with
the Government's proposals to restructure the probation service.
Those issues were:
1. The process by which these proposals were
developed and who was involved in their development.
2. The basis of the figures, contained in
the partial Regulatory Impact Assessment, which in Committee were
referred to as the £625 million savings to the public purse
and a 5% reduction in reoffending.
3. A clarification of the composition of
Probation Boards.
I would also like to take this opportunity to
clarify the answer I gave in response to Question 100. In answering
that question I may have given the impression that probation trusts
might also comprise non-public sector organisations. In fact,
the term "probation trust" describes the new public
sector bodies which we propose to establish to replace probation
boards. Private and/or voluntary and community sector organisations
may deliver probation services alongside trusts, but they will
not form part of a trust.
1. THE PROCESS
BY WHICH
THESE PROPOSALS
WERE DEVELOPED
AND WHO
WAS INVOLVED
IN THEIR
DEVELOPMENT
The proposals to restructure probation which
are currently the subject of public consultation originate in
the review of the correctional services undertaken by Lord Carter
and published in December 2003. That review concluded that a new
approach was needed with:
— prison and probation focused on the
management of offenders throughout the whole of their sentence;
and
— effectiveness and value for money
improved through greater competition from private and voluntary
providers and through establishing a purchaser/provider split.
The Government published its response to the
Carter report in January 2004 and conducted further consultation
that Summer on a very radical organisational change. That change
would have seen the 42 probation boards replaced by 10 regional
offender management boards and the creation of a separate Interventions
Agency. Ministers decided not to proceed at that stage with such
a radical change and announced in a Written Ministerial Statement
on 20 July 2004 that, as an interim step, NOMS would be developed
within the existing legislative framework—based upon the
local probation boards. The provisions contained in the Management
of Offenders & Sentencing Bill, which was introduced into
the House of Lords in January 2005, reflected this decision. Due
to lack of legislative time, the bill progressed no further.
Meanwhile, work by officials on the design of
the organisation in the longer-term continued and entered a detailed
analytical stage in February this year. It was led by a NOMS Director
and, at an early stage, involved a workshop and discussions with
a number of senior and experienced Probation Chief Officers and
Probation Board Chairs. The work was critically informed by the
fact that to make end-to-end management of offenders fully effective,
we need to be able to commission services across organisational
and geographical boundaries. The full benefits of commissioning
cannot be achieved while we lack the ability to challenge existing
suppliers of probation services. Separating the function of commissioning
from the provision of services has other benefits. It will enable
the National Offender Management Service (NOMS):
— to think and plan more strategically
and proactively;
— to think about offender needs and
the services they require, rather than what they have historically
had;
— to set policy in terms, not of detailed
process, but of desired outcomes; to free up providers to manage
their businesses, and to generate more innovative approaches and
solutions; and
— to be more disciplined in the development
of policy at the centre.
The proposals to restructure probation contained
in the consultation document are the outcome of Ministerial decisions
following this further work.
The basis of the figures, contained in the partial
Regulatory Impact Assessment, which in Committee were referred
to as the £625 million savings to the public purse and a
5% reduction in reoffending.
The principal aim of NOMS is to reduce reoffending
and it has a target of reducing reoffending by 5% by 2008, and
by 10% by 2010.
While all the reforms in the NOMS change programme
are designed to help achieve this target, in addition to the introduction
of offender management, it is the creation of a purchaser/provider
model and the introduction of greater competition in the provision
of correctional services which are most important.
The £625 million figure quoted in the partial
Regulatory Impact Assessment is not a calculated cost-saving but
an assessment of the wider social and economic benefits which
are estimated to accrue from reducing reoffending by 5% over the
period 2005-16—2008-09. The methodology underpinning this
assessment is set out in the Home Office Research Study 217 Economic
and Social Costs of Crime. I enclose a copy of the "technical
note" on the partial regulatory impact assessment which provides
further explanation of the basis for some of the illustrative
assumptions.
THE COMPOSITION
OF PROBATION
BOARDS
There are currently 574 Probation Board members
of whom 204 are women and 376 are men. 20% of all Board members
and 10% of Board Chairs are members of black and minority ethnic
communities. It is our intention, when establishing the new probation
trusts, to maintain the good progress made in recent years in
diversifying the membership of Boards. The following breakdown
of the membership of two Probation Boards is fairly representative
of the 42:
Board A
13 members including: a former race/diversity advisor
for the local Council; three JPs, one of whom is also a member
of a prison's Independent Monitoring Board; three with a current
or former background in NHS management; two businessmen with senior
managerial backgrounds in the retail sector; a former senior probation
manager; an former senior manager in a Police Authority; a senior
health service professional, who is also a member of a University
Governing Body; and a training professional.
Board B
12 members including: two senior academics one of
whom is a member of the Board of the National Learning and Skills
Council; and management consultant who specialises in the voluntary
sector; a local councillor; a senior health service professional;
an adult learning specialist; a former senior Trades Unionist;
and a local businessman and chair of an NHS Trust.
Baroness Scotland QC
6 January 2006
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