Reforming the Failing National Probation Service

Article by Nisha Rikhi

In a recent Panorama documentary, I saw first–hand the failings of the probation service. I was left appalled and horrified. This article examines the purpose of the probation service and how it can be reformed.

The National Probation Service is a state institution that exists to rehabilitate offenders and protect the public. The probation service is responsible for managing some of the most high-risk offenders in the country. It is supposed to do this by imposing conditions and implementing measures to effectively manage, control and monitor those people deemed at high-risk of reoffending. High-risk offenders include violent criminals and sex offenders. It is the probation service’s job to ensure that the risk these offenders pose is managed effectively so that their victims and the wider general public are safe. By failing to effectively monitor and control the most dangerous offenders in the country, the National Probation Service is failing victims and the wider general public.

The National Probation Service needs to significantly tighten up the implementation of controls at its Approved Premises. Approved Premises are places where some of the most dangerous offenders are required to live while on probation so that they can be monitored, with the aim of keeping the public safe. One would expect the probation service to be implementing measures to ensure the effective monitoring of these residents, and I was appalled to find that such measures were not consistently applied. Curfews should be stringently enforced. Offenders should face mandatory weekly drug tests and alcohol tests. Rooms should be searched on a daily basis. It is a government service that works to protect the public; therefore, it should be doing everything it can to protect the public. Failing to take the basic steps to supervise these offenders and reduce the likelihood of reoffending is dereliction of duty. The probation service simply cannot protect people from dangerous criminals if they are not implementing the controls that allow them to do so.

Urgent recalls to prison should also be dealt with energetically. This is because a recall to prison is issued to protect the public, sometimes to safeguard particular members of the public. It is absolutely vital that probation staff monitor the urgent recall system and take action to ensure that urgent recalls are acted upon. Failing to act promptly on that recall and get that person back in prison is a breach of the probation service’s founding principles. This is one of the reasons why the probation service is failing and the public is losing confidence in the National Probation Service. This is because a failure to act on urgent recalls has given the public an impression that the probation service are not acting in the public interest, to protect them from dangerous criminals. It is clear that the probation service needs to urgently improve the way it deals with the urgent recall system to improve public confidence. The probation service cannot protect the public if it is not prepared to act vigorously on things as simple as recalling an offender to prison because he poses a risk to a member of the public.

Therefore, it is clear that there needs to be serious and urgent reforms to the National Probation Service so that it better protects the public while supporting and helping released offenders turn their lives around.