36. Memorandum submitted by
Rethinking Crime and Punishment
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The four year RCP initiative on prison and alternatives
found that in order to replace short prison sentences with community
based alternatives, sentencers need to be more involved in their
implementation , stronger links should be made between organisations
running alternatives to prison and the communities they serve
and localised funding arrangements should be considered so that
sentencers are more aware of the costs of their decisions and
local agencies are given incentives to develop effective alternatives
to prison. Practical projects in the Thames Valley are pointing
the way to how communities can help decide on the nature of unpaid
work to be done by offenders and how sentencers can visit community
based alternatives to prison, meeting the offenders and the operational
staff and discussing their reactions.
INTRODUCTION
1. Rethinking Crime and Punishment (RCP)
is an initiative set up by the Esmee Fairbairn Foundation in 2001
to explore the use of prisons and alternatives in the UK. In 2004
RCP produced its report which made a number of recommendations
relevant to this important inquiry. So too did the inquiry into
alternatives to prison conducted by Lord Coulsfield called "Crime,
Courts and Confidence". Links to both reports are below (with
hard copies available on request):
http://www.rethinking.org.uk/informed/pdf/RCP%20The%20Report.pdf
http://www.rethinking.org.uk/coulsfield/Final%20Report.pdf
2. The main recommendations from RCP relevant
to sentencing are that sentencers should be more involved in the
implementation of community-based sentences; that stronger links
should be made between organisations running alternatives to prison
and the communities they serve, by extending the role of youth
offender panels and creating mechanisms through which communities
decide on the nature of community work to be done by offenders;
and that localised funding arrangements should be considered so
that sentencers are more aware of the costs of their decisions
and local agencies are given incentives to develop effective alternatives
to prison. The report also concluded that although pubic attitudes
are not necessarily as punitive as is often thought by the media
and politicians a major public education campaign about community
penalties is needed, drawing on lessons from RCP. RCP found for
example that given hypothetical choices about how to spend money,
three times as many people prefer prevention to imprisonment.
When asked about how best to respond to prison overcrowding, twice
as many of the public preferred tougher community punishments
or residential drug treatment than early release or greater use
of prisons. Moreover there is considerable appetite on the part
of the public for getting involved. A Mori poll at the end of
2004 found that two thirds of the public said they would be interested
in having a say in the types of unpaid community work that offenders
are sentenced to do in their area.
ENGAGING THE
COMMUNITY IN
ALTERNATIVES TO
PRISON
3. As part of a follow up to RCP, ICPS together
with the Probation Service and the Thames Valley Partnership has
set up a project to test ways of engaging local community groups
in decisions about unpaid work. The Making Good initiative,
involving town, parish councils, tenant and resident groups, and
neighbourhood action groups is pointing the way to how the organisation
of unpaid work and selection of placements might encourage greater
community confidence. Early results from pilot projects in Slough,
Bicester, High Wycombe and Milton Keynes are encouraging with
a final report on the project due in 2008.
ENGAGING SENTENCERS
IN ALTERNATIVE
TO PRISON
4. The project has also established a structured
programme to enable sentencers to visit community based alternatives
to prison, meeting the offenders and the operational staff and
discussing their reactions. The potential for boosting judicial
confidence in alternatives to prison is suggested by the report
of the judges" programme which took place in 2005-06 in the
Thames Valley region. The report is available on request and at
www.prisonstudies.org. The programme involved Crown Court judges
visiting a range of community based programmes including a domestic
violence programme, drug treatment centre and unpaid work projects.
The report found that while the knowledge base of many Judges
can be limited or dated but that in all but one cases participating
judges said that the programme helped them to have more confidence
in community sentences.
5. We very much hope that the learning from
this initiative will be taken forward by the Judicial Studies
Board and National Offender Management Service.
March 2007
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