Public at greater risk from ex-offenders as study reveals more than a third of officers ‘cut corners’

The extent of Chris Grayling’s botched privatisation of the probation service is exposed by research which brands it an “unmitigated disaster” that left the public at greater risk from ex-offenders released from jail.

Probation officers say bigger caseloads and unrealistic targets, ushered in when Grayling was the justice secretary, have meant that they are unable to keep to the same standards as before. More than a third – 36% – of those interviewed as part of the research admit that they regularly cut corners and compromise professional standards to meet targets.

“The privatisation of probation is unprecedented in terms of its scale and scope and it has proven to be something of an unmitigated disaster for professionals,” write Professor Gill Kirton, of Queen Mary University of London, and Dr Cécile Guillaume, of Roehampton University, in the journal Work, Employment and Society, published by the British Sociological Association.

The pair looked at the effects of the government’s privatisation of about half of the probation service in 2015, in which lower-risk offenders were monitored by 21 private companies and the rest left to public sector organisations.

We are not in a position to protect the public, but we will be the scapegoats when tragedies happen Probation officer

They surveyed almost 1,000 probation officers, and carried out face-to-face research with 100. More than a third said they did not have enough time for their clients. More than half said their targets were unrealistic.

In a typical comment, one probation officer told researchers: “I truly believe that offenders will receive a poorer service and staff will struggle to provide the high level of service they have always given. Consequently, the public will be at risk.”

Another said: “I do not consider that we are in a position to protect the public, but we will be the scapegoats when tragedies happen.”

In their report Kirton and Guillaume said the privatisation had been carried out in the face of “massive opposition from criminal justice experts, senior probation leaders, the unions representing probation workers, and the workers themselves” and with “no meaningful consultation”.

It had created “conveyor belt” conditions in the privatised part of the service that meant officers were having to “compromise what they regarded as professional standards”.

Since the research was carried out, the government has announced plans to bring the probation service fully back into public ownership. The Ministry of Justice said: “We have already announced plans to reform our probation system to better support officers and ensure stringent, enforceable community sentences.

“Our changes will recognise the specialism and value of probation work, while supporting staff to develop the right skills and expertise.

“Our previous reforms extended probation supervision to around 40,000 extra offenders each year – a positive change for public safety – who would have otherwise been unsupervised.”