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

Women offenders: after the Corston Report 53133. Ian Porée envisaged that new funding arrangements could encompass women’scentres: “It is entirely conceivable—the Minister used this example earlier—that a newrehabilitation services provider starting work in custody would join up provision throughto something like the women’s community centres, because it would be a very logicalsupport model to work with someone on the inside as well as post-release.” 268134. Probation trusts are currently the driver for ensuring that needs of women offendersare addressed in local partnerships, including with Police and Crime Commissioners, andothers responsible for dealing effectively with offenders including local authorities, healthservices, social care and the voluntary sector. 269 Our witnesses were concerned about theimplications of the reforms for existing local strategic partnership and commissioningarrangements, and the potential complexities this would bring to the loci of accountabilityat national and local levels. We also heard that it was important to be mindful of thepotential impact of changes in commissioning arrangements on the capacity of projectsthemselves. For example, we heard that the Asha Centre has 16 funding streams, each withdifferent monitoring requirements: “This is for an organisation whose strength is verymuch in the delivery of front-room work, not in the back-room practices of data collectionand so on. If we are going to be commissioning services from those bodies, we have to bemindful of the demands that we place on them and resource them accordingly, otherwisewe are going to crush them.” 270135. The ISIS Women’s Centre in Gloucestershire had recently had to reduce the numberof non-criminal justice referrals to the project to meet its contractual targets to NOMS andthe probation trust. The Nelson Trust observed: “[...] it seems very inefficient to developour unique suite of services and then withhold them from a cohort that could benefitgreatly from them. We therefore submit that core funding for specialist women’s centresshould come with a more flexible remit to undertake outreach and engagement work withwomen at the margins of social exclusion and with multiple needs, and not solely targetingthe reduction of countywide re-offending rates.” 271 The broader role for women’s centresenvisaged by Baroness Corston seems to be in jeopardy with the combination of areduction in funding in this financial year and confusion about the funding mechanismson which they will depend in future. In bringing funding for women’s centres under theNOMS umbrella, and making funding dependent on reductions in reoffending, thenature of the services provided, and the context in which they are provided, may berequired to change considerably. Whilst reducing reoffending is one important goal,upstream diversion from offending and reduced frequency and seriousness of re-offendingare also socially desirable outcomes which need to be valued by the criminal justicesystem. In shifting the funding of women’s community services in this way there is a riskof dismantling a system which the emerging evidence suggests is working very well.Women’s centres should not become wholly identified with the criminal justice system,but should continue to provide a local support network so that women can continue toreceive help as they move away from the criminal justice system.268 Q 298269 Qq 216–218270 Q 216271 Ev w32