Women offenders: after the Corston Report - United Kingdom ...

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Ev 80Justice Committee: Evidence7. Service Provision for Different Groups7.1 As the only service going into all 13 female prisons and working in partnerships with other localvoluntary and statutory organisations we are best positioned to provide this evidence.Services that address different groups of women offenders generally are most effectively provided byindependent voluntary sector organisations. The prison estate is diverse yet the individuality of each prison,and what voluntary sector services are available, means consistency around service provision is lacking, and isarbitrarily based on location.7.2 The complex intersectional needs of women in prison are seldom accounted for in appropriate serviceprovision within prison; they are more often supported by a Voluntary provider with a specialism specific todifferent groups. In parallel the Through the Gate services from custody to community are essential forwomen’s complex support needs to be met.7.3 Cost effectiveness is measured in monetary terms rather than quality provision. Uncertainty incommissioning and the limited capacity to make large tender bids means small specialist voluntaryorganisations are undercut by large private generic services.We would like to refer the committee to the submission—Voices from within the women prison estate forfurther evidence.Laurel Townhead and Rachel Halford for Women in PrisonReferencesi Bromley Briefings June 2012ii Prisoner Advice Service, Information Sheet Categorisation of women prisonersSeptember 2012Written evidence from the acting HM Chief Inspectorate of ProbationIn October 2011 HM Inspectorate of Probation published a joint thematic inspection report on womenoffenders entitled Equal but Different? An Inspection of the use of Alternatives to Custody for Women Offenders.I am writing to you with a summary of the report which you may wish to consider as part of the Justice SelectCommittee’s inquiry into women offenders.HMI Probation is an independent inspectorate, funded by the Ministry of Justice and reporting directly tothe Secretary of State, on the effectiveness of work with individual adults, children and young people whohave offended, aimed at reducing reoffending and protecting the public.The Inspection1. This inspection focused on women who had either been sentenced to a community order or released fromprison on licence. Its purpose was: to consider the extent to which non custodial options are being put forwardand taken up in respect of women offenders. We therefore looked primarily at community orders and consideredtheir credibility, as demonstrated by the courts in imposing such orders and by the women offenders themselvesin complying with their requirements.2. The inspection was agreed by the Criminal Justice Chief Inspectors’ Group and formed part of the JointInspection Business Plan 2010–2012. It was led by HM Inspectorate of Probation, supported by HM CrownProsecution Service Inspectorate and HM Inspectorate of Prisons.3. As much of the more recent work with women was understood to have been developed on a regionalbasis, we decided to construct the inspection accordingly, visiting two Probation Trusts in each of the threeregions selected. These were: Lancashire and Merseyside (North West region). Staffordshire & West Midlandsand West Mercia (West of Midlands region), and Norfolk & Suffolk and Cambridgeshire & Peterborough(East of England region). These Trusts provided us with a cross-section of communities and both urban andrural areas.4. Fieldwork for the inspection took place between October 2010 and December 2010, during the course ofwhich we examined the case files of 107 women offenders, plus an additional 15 pre-sentence reports. We alsomet with members of the National Offender Management Service, Ministry of Justice and staff from the localprobation service at all levels; spoke with representatives of the Local Criminal Justice Boards; visited thewomen’s community centres and approved premises (hostels) in the areas we inspected to talk to both the staffand the women there; spent time in the Crown Court and magistrates’ courts and spoke to sentencers,prosecutors and other court staff and visited three prisons.
Justice Committee: Evidence Ev 81Overall Findings5. We found that the strong lead given by the Ministry of Justice and National Offender Management Servicehad been successful in promoting considerable activity at a regional and local level in relation to womenoffenders. Probation Trusts had worked well with the National Offender Management Service and the Ministryof Justice as well as partners and other agencies to develop a sound strategic framework for working withwomen offenders.6. Measures to assess the progress made on implementing the strategic framework were generallyunderdeveloped at all levels. The measures that we examined were too often over-reliant on scores from theoffender assessment system, OASys and consequently not applicable to women serving short prison sentencesof under 12 months who were not subject to OASys. Without these outcome measures, demonstrating theeffectiveness of their intervention in terms of reducing reoffending, it was difficult for statutory organisationssuch as Probation Trusts to assess the impact of the work undertaken at a strategic level or for the smaller,often voluntary, organisations to put themselves forward as a viable option for future funding.7. Although a great deal had been achieved, it was apparent that, with the changes in the NOMS structureand the subsequent removal of the regional framework, the sustainability of many of the measures now inplace and their subsequent development would depend on the capacity of the probation service to engage withlocal providers. A locally coordinated joint approach to the needs of women offenders was paramount.Considerable efforts were being made by Probation Trusts to develop relationships with those partners at alocal level who could support the women’s agenda. Nevertheless, provision varied considerably, particularly inrespect of mental health services where inconsistencies in the services offered could impact disproportionatelyon women offenders because of their multiple needs.8. All involved acknowledged, in the current financial climate, the importance of joint commissioningarrangements in delivering mainstream services. The involvement of the new Health and Wellbeing Boardsand the Police and Crime Commissioners, when operational, will be essential to the success of any sucharrangements as will that of the Local Criminal Justice Boards, with their capacity to act as brokers betweenthe various local agencies. The potential contribution of the voluntary sector to this agenda, particularly thosedelivering services to address local needs, also has to be recognised.9. We saw a lot to praise during the course of the inspection. Although there was a lack of women-specificprovision for both unpaid work and offending behaviour programmes, women-only groups, where run, weregenerally successful. Approved premises provided a credible and sustainable alternative to custody. BailAccommodation and Support Services were a useful means by which custodial remands could be reduced butawareness by courts and probation of these services tended to be low, so they were underused.10. The women’s community centres, where established, were a useful resource which enabled women,whether offenders or those at risk of offending, to access a range of services offering practical support andhelp in a conducive and non-threatening environment. The services on offer varied from one centre to anotherbut, typically, included advice and guidance on a range of issues of concern to women, including employment,finance, benefits, debt, housing, childcare, health and substance misuse. Although attendance at the centres wasnot in itself an alternative to custody unless specified as a formal requirement of an order, they could play animportant part in securing the engagement, and thereby compliance, of women offenders subject to supervisionby the probation service in work to address their offending. This aspect of their role was, in our opinion, toooften neglected or overlooked but both could and should be developed, particularly when working with thosewomen who probation found otherwise hard to engage.11. Relationships between women’s community centres and offender managers were often underdevelopedand it was apparent that work at the centres was often undervalued by probation staff who did not consider itintegral to the achievement of the sentence plan. The centres, despite being a valuable resource in themselves,consequentially suffered, in varying degrees, from being isolated from the work of probation. Referral rateswere frequently low. However, where centres were used effectively, they provided a safe place where workcould be undertaken to address both the current and any future offending by the women concerned and promotetheir compliance with their order.12. Sentencers were generally amenable to imposing non-custodial sentences on offenders where they posedonly a low risk of harm to others; they worked hard to establish the right balance between the needs of thewoman, the gravity of the offence and the risk of harm to the local community. Whilst the sentencing guidelinesdid not allow for women offenders to be treated differently from men, mitigating circumstances, often linkedto complex domestic situations, permitted sentencers to apply different approaches in many women’s cases.13. Although sentencers were generally content with the quality of pre-sentence reports prepared for them,we considered that reports did not always promote community sentences as a credible sentencing optionnor did they always provide a sound base on which to plan the work to be done with the woman duringher sentence.
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