Probation Service

Debate between Nic Dakin and George Mudie

Wednesday 13th March 2013 Westminster Hall

[Mr Mudie]

I will touch on that later in my speech, but I am interested in the Minister’s comments.

It is interesting that the private sector will be commissioned, not locally by the individual probation trusts, but from Whitehall. The Government justify decimating this 105-year-old, well regarded service—which has received all the commendations I have read out—at considerable risk to public safety, on the specific grounds of reducing reoffending rates.

[Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this important debate.

Humberside probation trust has a gold award, too. The current level of trust and information exchange between prisons, probation staff, police and others involved in the management of risk has taken a long time to establish, and they fear that that might be compromised if medium-risk and low-risk offenders are managed outside the public sector. Does my hon. Friend agree that such fragmentation of risk management is a real difficulty for the future?

[Mr Mudie]

My hon. Friend has taken a page out of my speech, to the great relief of everyone present. Levels of trust and information exchange are key, and they have grown bit by bit as the relationships, and the benefits of those relationships, have grown. That is now to be swept aside, with private sector firms being forced on the trusts.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Mudie]

It is a very harmful thing. My hon. Friend makes a valuable point and allows me to take further chunks out of my speech. I will not go further into the relationships, but I worry about how the contracts will be procured and the effect on the existing small companies and voluntary organisations that work with the probation service. I warn them that small companies and voluntary organisations often cry out for privatisation or for procurement or break-up of public services, in the belief that they will get the work, but they are dreaming. The Minister has provided some arrangements and money to assist small companies to bid, but the reality is that the big international and national companies will get the contracts, while small companies will be pressed to the margin.

[Nic Dakin]

I underline that point. I have observed probation working locally in the Scunthorpe area, and it is doing so effectively with voluntary initiatives such as MPower—small activities, voluntary organisations and private companies that are locally based. That local anchorage is crucial in dealing with the work and in keeping our communities safe. I share my hon. Friend’s concern, which he is right to express.

[Mr Mudie]

My hon. Friend makes another page of my speech unnecessary, which is a blessing.

One of the main things that we want the Minister to consider is the question of commissioning from Whitehall. The urge to privatise and to bring in the big companies is distorting the remaining parts of the service and causing real questions to be asked, one of which is about procurement. Why are the contracts being specified from Whitehall? We would welcome an answer. Why are the existing public trusts not able to set up the contracts? Whitehall setting up contracts for probation trusts’ computers fills them with some worry, given its record on computers.

A real problem is the business of payment by results, which is allied to the intervention of my right hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Mr Blunkett). Payment by results has not been a feature of the culture or practice of the Ministry of Justice, and the general feeling was in favour of pilots if it were to be done; the Secretary of State, however, cancelled the pilots. The Minister would do everyone a favour if he indicated why that was so, apart from the mystical belief that the Secretary of State knows best. The introduction of payment by results in so sensitive an area is extremely worrying. The pilot schemes wisely set up by the previous Secretary of State to test that out have now been scrapped, and it would be good to know on what basis other than that mystical belief.

I am sorry, Mr Crausby, that I have overrun my time, although I have taken a few interventions. My last point, however, is on costs, which I make not so much to the Minister but to the Treasury. It has been confirmed that the Treasury is looking at costs. I understand that, and as a member of the Treasury Committee, I hope that that is a good look. When the Ministry of Justice budget is under severe threat, however, the Secretary of State is suggesting the pulling in of the 30,000 people who leave prison after small sentences; he is also suggesting doing that rapidly. That 25% increase in work load will involve a fair cost, especially as he is talking about individual mentors and so on. Can the Minister tell us whether that policy has been agreed with the Chancellor? Is the money available? It will be surprising if it is; it will also be surprising, because the Treasury has publicly voiced worries about whether the rest of the business has been tested and costed. Untested payment by results could cause not only operational but financial problems, yet the Secretary of State has committed himself.

I welcome the fact that people on 12-month sentences will be included and looked at for the first time. That will have a good effect on lowering the reoffending rate, but I find little to enthuse about in the rest of the proposals, other than recognising that they are another dash for privatisation and an attack on public services and public service finances.