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

Women offenders: after the Corston Report 19provision for the small minority of women offenders who represent a higher risk to thepublic. 8039. Women in Prison felt that where good practice in commissioning is found, it is led bypersonalities championing the need for gender specific services, rather than any particularimpetus from the equality duty. 81 Liz Rijnenberg, Chief Executive of Wiltshire ProbationTrust, representing the Probation Chiefs’ Association (PCA), saw the existence of thestatutory duty as significant as it meant provision must be made for women despite themrepresenting a small proportion of offenders. 82 The Acting HM Chief Inspector ofProbation proposed that central champions can help agencies, including probation trustsand their partners, to navigate the range of statutory duties which they are required to met,but which can be conflicting. 83 For example, when undertaking joint local strategicassessments, Trusts are able to raise women’s equality as an issue, along with the otherprotected characteristics of individuals. 84 Wales Probation Trust holds a quarterly ‘womenin criminal justice’ meeting and HMP Eastwood Park had found that the duty providedleverage in healthcare and substance misuse commissioning. 85 On the other hand, in theexperience of the Together Women Programme and West Mercia Probation Trustmainstream service commissioners had shown little compliance with the duty in relation tothe provision of services that tackle the underlying causes of female offending. 8640. It is regrettable that the Coalition Government appears not to have learnt from theexperience of its predecessor that strong ministerial leadership across departmentalboundaries is essential to continue to make progress, with the result that in its first twoyears there was a hiatus in efforts to make headway on implementing the importantrecommendations made by Baroness Corston in 2007. It is clear that the matter of femaleoffending too easily fails to get priority in the face of other competing issues. The lack ofcentral drive has resulted in outsiders having difficulty determining Ministry of Justicepolicy and direction, and insiders detecting a dampening in mood and enthusiasm,leaving an impression that for this Government it was not a sufficiently high priority. Wewere particularly struck by Baroness Corston’s evidence that under the previousGovernment it was not until a group of women Ministers worked together to take issuesforward that significant progress was made in this area. We welcome the fact that, afterwe announced our inquiry, the Secretary of State for Justice assigned particularMinisterial responsibility for women offenders. Clear leadership and a high level ofsupport from other Ministers will be essential in restoring lost momentum.41. There is little evidence that the equality duty—in so far as it relates to gender—hasbeen used robustly to hold providers to account. In particular, the duty does not appear tohave had the desired impact on systematically encouraging local mainstreamcommissioners to provide gender specific services tackling the underlying causes of80 Q 167 [Ms Ashfield]81 Ev 7482 Q 20883 Q 20584 Q 208 [Ms Rijnenberg]85 Ev w94, Ev w4186 Ev w51, Ev w99