Re-offending - are much harsher non-custodial sentences instead of prison the answer?

The following is a speech I gave at the full East Riding of Yorkshire Council meeting today:

Those members of the Council's Safer and Stronger Communities Overview and Scrutiny committee and others know how frustrating the issue of re-offending is and how locally it is costing the East Riding in excess of £23 million per year…. Clearly short term prison sentencing is not working with some 60% of those serving less then 12 months going on to re-offend.

Since the last meeting meeting of the committee I decided to tackle recommendation (b) on page 95 head on (that representation be made to the Government on the need for stronger leadership and direction on ways to handle short term offenders who have alcohol or drug related problems so that they could be fully absorbed into the rehabilitation process) and took the opportunity to raise this directly with the Justice Minister, the Rt. Hon. Ken Clarke MP in a written question prior to his speech last week in which I asked:

"Prison sentences fall into two distinct categories - less than 12 months and over.

The evidence shows that short-term prisoners go on to commit the majority of re-offending. Why?

A prisoner serving over 12 months will benefit from rehabilitation programmes in prison, once released will be on licence and under supervision by the probation service.

With short sentences of less than 12 months, the prison service has neither the time nor the opportunity to rehabilitate the prisoner, they are mollycoddled during their stay, and released without supervision or support.... an offender can leave the prison gates with £40 in their pocket and nothing else… no one to meet them, no job, no accommodation and still maintaining drink and drug habits – is it any wonder they go on to re-offend?

Do we need to look seriously at short-term sentencing and whether this is the most effective way of tackling re-offending?"

It was great that Ken Clarke covered the subject of re-offending in much detail as part of the speech - obviously this was nothing to do with my question - but it’s re-assuring to see that he's looking to tackle head on the problem of re-offending which costs the East Riding of Yorkshire so much money.

To quote the Minister he said "Prison needs to do more than keep criminals off the streets. It must try to prevent them from committing more crime against more victims when they come out.

The biggest failure of the present system is re-offending. Nearly half the people in prison come straight back out and commit another crime in less than twelve months. Absurd. Under New Labour, we had an underclass of people in our broken society who walked out of jail and straight back into crime, again and again.

Fifty three thousand criminals were jailed for six months or less in 2008. Nearly two thirds of them committed another crime within the next year and were sent straight back to prison again. And that was only the ones who were caught and convicted again. Thousands of further crimes against new victims. Quite absurd."

Three key points of the new Government policy are

• The introduction of a 'rehabilitation revolution' that will pay independent providers to reduce re-offending paid for by the savings this new approach will generate within the criminal justice system.
• The conducting of a full review of sentencing policy to ensure that it is effective in deterring crime, protecting the public, punishing offenders and cutting re-offending.
• Ensuring that sentencing for drug use helps offenders come off drugs.

I get the feeling someone is at last listening… In the near future I look forward to seeing much harsher non-custodial sentences that really work, less people sent to prison, and I look forward to seeing significant improvements in re-offending rates when the scrutiny committee next looks at the issue.

Remember ladies and gentlemen Prison works - but not for all!

Rehabilitation of offenders and reducing re-offending

The estimated number of crimes in the East Riding attributed to re-offenders is 6,500 with an estimated cost implication of £22.8 million.


This is a serious issue; costing the East Riding a phenomenal amount of money and for this reason must be given the highest priority, and should be given the strongest leadership.

Clearly prison works for some people and not for others, community payback and fines work for some and not others.

Sentencing is a serious issue - we will all have different thoughts on sentencing guidelines, but ultimately it is about primary legalisation, which is the will of the Government, who do seem to want to control every aspect of our lives.

Prison sentences given to offenders fall into two distinct categories - those sentenced to less than 12 months and those over 12 months.

The evidence indicates that those sentenced to less then 12 months committhe majority of re-offending. Why is this?

A prisoner serving over 12 months will benefit from programmes that are available in prison, once released will be on licence and under statutory supervision by the probation service, and most importantly will have a single case manager throughout the prison sentence and upon release.

But for those serving less than 12 months, the prison service has neither the time nor the opportunity to effectively work with the prisoner, they are released without being under licence and the Probation Service has no statutory right or obligation to work with them.

On completion of the sentence an offender can leave the prison gates with £40 in their pocket and nothing else… not even someone to meet them and take them to the benefits office – is it any wonder they go on to re-offend?

All prisons offer a detoxification service for prisoners withdrawing from drugs or alcohol – but it’s up to the prisoner to take this up – although all prisons carry out random drug testing on 10% of the prison population every month. This is achieving only modest success and must be improved.

The Regional Reducing Re-offending Action Plan sets out nine key areas of work with offenders with community or custodial sentences, these are termed ‘pathways’ and include:

• Accommodation



• Education, Training and Employment



• Mental and Physical Health



• Drugs and Alcohol



• Finance, Benefit and Debt



• Children and Families of Offenders



• Attitudes, thinking and Behaviour



• Prolific and Priority Offenders



• Voluntary Sector and Community Sector Engagement

As with most things, tackling re-offending is very much target driven, unfortunately we have the large organisations with National Targets and large budgets that don’t necessarily dovetail well with local targets – and can’t commit fully to partnership working.

Specifically, prisons operate regionally taking in prisoners from the region rather than the locality… Here it would seem logical to see regional funding and regional targets. But for this to happen major legislative changes are required.

Locally we have many different agencies, organisations and partners working on the different pathways, either together or separately.

To compound this there are 5 of the Government's National Performance Indicators:

• NI 18 - Adult re-offending rates for those under Probation supervision:



• NI 30 - Re-offending rate of prolific and priority offenders



• NI 143 – Offenders under Probation supervision living in settled and suitable accommodation at the end of their order or licence



• NI 144 - Offenders under Probation supervision in employment at the end of their order or licence



• NI – 40 Problem drug users in effective treatment

But perhaps it's just as significant that there is no indicator relating to ex-offenders who are not under Probation supervision or managed under the PPO scheme.

From April 2010 agencies will have a shared statutory responsibility to formulate and implement a strategy for the reduction of re-offending in the area (as well as the existing duty to formulate and implement a strategy for the reduction of crime and disorder)

The Reducing Re-offending Group (an action group of the East Riding LSP’s Safer and Stronger Communities Action Group (SSCAG)) is chaired by the Probation Service, which would seem to be the most suitable organisation, and one that takes a regional view.

Other Group members include the Police, NHS East Riding, Job Centre Plus, victim support, Learning and Skills Council, HM Courts Service, HM Prison Service, and ERYC (Safe Communities Housing and Organisational Development), the latter giving a local perspective.

This group focuses on Accommodation, and Education, Training and Employment, while maintaining an overview of the other pathways…. and SSCAG has acknowledged that more leadership needs to be exercised, and I support the Probation Service in doing this, but they must be held to account if they don’t.

Probation has tended to be reluctant to involve itself in work that does not directly involve the offenders for whom it has statutory responsibility. I would urge them to work closer with all partners.

In conclusion - Many organisations have responsibility for reducing re-offending, the East Riding of Yorkshire Council's Safer and Stronger Comunities Overview and Scrutiny Committee (on which I sit) identified a need for greater coordination and a current lack of leadership.

Is it really acceptable not to provide the strongest possible leadership of a service provision that has a cost implication for the East Riding of £22.8 million ..."?