Probation Service — Debate

Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 4:43 pm on 21 January 2010.

Alert me about debates like this

Photo of Lord Ramsbotham Lord Ramsbotham Crossbench 4:43, 21 January 2010

My Lords, I begin by thanking all the Members of the House who have taken such trouble and made such wide contributions to the debate. I admit that there was a second purpose of holding this debate, which was to send a message to the probation service that Members of this House understand the problems that they face and think that it is extremely important that they are brought to the notice not only of Ministers but of everyone, through the columns of Hansard.

I mentioned that in 2005 there was a so-called consultation on the probation service. Of the 756 people who responded, 99 per cent opposed what the Government were trying to do. If one reads the responses-I have not read them all, but I have read a number-one is left with the same impression as I am left with today, when 94 per cent of the House, if my maths is correct, have taken one line, while the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, who gave us the view from NOMS, took another. It is not my purpose to comment on that, except to say that it is important for those people who are responsible for an operational service to listen to the views of the people on the ground.

I thank the Minister for what he said in summing up-I commiserated with him at the start, because this is not his particular responsibility-but I was enormously disappointed to hear masses about commissioning, services and performance management, but not a single mention of the face-to-face contact between trained supervisors and offenders that is at the heart of what probation is required to do. I wish that end-to-end offender management, which is trotted out the whole time, was put into proportion, because it applies to only one-fifth of the probation service load. That is the one-fifth of people who also do a part of their sentence in prison. To dominate the four-fifths of what is done by the niceties of the one-fifth seems to me to be disproportionate and dangerous.

I hope very much that not just this Government but the Opposition-the noble Lord, Lord Henley, was kind enough to mention this-will look carefully through what has been said from the Floor. I hope that they will look at what has been represented by my noble friend Lord Dear on behalf of the police, what the noble and learned Lords, Lord Mayhew and Lord Woolf, and my noble friend Lord Tenby said about the courts, what my noble friend Lady Howe said about training, what my noble friend Lord Birt said about the vision that never came to anything, what, in particular, my noble friend Lady Stern said about the dangers, what the noble Baroness, Lady Gibson, said on the costs and on how the vision is being distorted, and what all the other speakers said. That is because in what was said is something that must not be disregarded by those who have a responsibility to the public, protecting them by producing a service that really tackles the problems posed by offenders.

I can remember very few debates in which so many wide aspects and so much agreement has been greeted, if I may say, by such a stonewall or stubborn defensive bat from the Government. I hope that that will not be their approach to what has been said today because, as I said at the beginning, it is hugely important to send a message to the probation service that what it is doing is appreciated-and appreciated for what it is doing, not for what people think that it is doing.

When the Minister said that all the people will be guaranteed employment, I hope that that message goes through, because last year cohort 10, as the next group of people joining the service after training is called, came to see me because those people were not being guaranteed employment. They were on their way to see Jack Straw, as a result of which money was added to the budget and they got employment. We must never put the people potentially coming into the probation service in that form of uncertainty again, because to give them uncertainty of employment is to send uncertainty through the service. People are not things; we should never forget that. I again thank everyone who has taken part in this debate and I beg leave to withdraw my Motion.

Motion withdrawn.