Offender Management Bill

I am grateful to the noble Baroness and the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, for asking for clarification. I will try to deal with that matter during my response. I thank my noble friend Lord Judd for tabling the amendments and pay tribute to him for the incredible work he does in the voluntary sector and for the powerful insights that he brings to our debates. Too often, we lose that and fail to understand the wealth of experience of noble Lords who speak on this subject. As I waited while noble Lords made their points, I reflected that this House benefits greatly from that experience. We should look at some of these issues in that spirit of informed criticism and engagement, because they are important and I understand that people who work in the different services are nervous as we as a government continue to encourage the commissioning role and other forms of contestability. I understand the sensitivity of these issues and their importance to how the services will develop. We have discussed this matter in the past and there is not actually a great deal of difference between most of the contributors to this debate. We are all trying to get to the bottom of these issues. As I listened carefully to the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, when he quoted Ellie Roy of the Youth Justice Board, I did not think that we were in great disagreement. We obviously need to address the issues raised in those comments, and we feel that we are doing so and that there is no difference between us. Our experience of the contestability process over the years and the way that the Youth Justice Board has worked have served us well in informing our approach to probation services and how they develop. Clause 2 gives to the Secretary of State responsibility for ensuring sufficient provision for probation services, and Clause 3 sets out how he may go about that task. It enables the Secretary of State to make contractual or other arrangements with any person for the making of probation provision. Amendments Nos. 38 and 40 propose that these arrangements should be on the basis of ““contractual negotiated partnership””. In effect, this is the model that we intend to follow, whereby both regional and local commissioners will encourage joint bidding. The legislation already allows for this and we intend to take that forward through the commissioning and procurement processes. It is already very much part of our thinking. We are there. There is no disagreement between us and there is a comity of view. It is not really a matter for legislation, because we want to build on the basis of valuable and valued experience. Amendment No. 39 relates to Clause 3(2), which enables the Secretary of State to make contractual or other arrangements with any other person for the delivery of probation services. I can reassure my noble friend Lord Judd that the definition of ““person”” in this subsection includes institutions or organisations. Those reassurances should perhaps satisfy my noble friend’s concerns. Today, my noble friend Lady Scotland and I visited drugs projects in my home city of Brighton. Much of that drugs-related work is commissioned and relies on contractual arrangements with NGOs—voluntary organisations. A wealth of experience is already out there in the drugs field, and that is where the flexibility and initiative required for tackling these profound problems rests. We rely on that sort of experience in taking forward this new approach to the development of probation services. We are not afraid to engage with that because we think that we can always learn lessons from it. The process enables us to focus much more strongly on outcomes and, picking up some of the terminology in the debate, it is about cost-effectiveness and not just cost-efficiency. The service will benefit greatly from this new approach. We can rely on the experience that has already developed in other sectors within the criminal justice system and we are learning all the time. The noble Lord, Lord Hylton, asked a specific question about contracts, and I understand his point. As part of my learning this morning, I asked the group of drug service-related contractors whether they felt bound by the length of their contracts. Their response was interesting. They said, ““Of course we’d like a longer contract because that would create greater certainty, but we think that the length of contract that we have now is one that we can work with, and it has benefits because it enables us to focus on performance over that period and it enables those who commission to hold us properly to account””. That is what we are attempting to achieve here. With regard to the length of contracts, we are committed to replacing annual funding regimes associated with grants, which I am sure we all appreciate can at times have a stultifying effect, and we are committed to replacing them with multi-year contract terms to help to develop and maintain longer-term capacity. This is not a guarantee for all cases; in other words, it will need to be supported by evidence of what works and future demand data. However, the need for more sustainable funding terms is widely recognised by providers from all sectors. That approach is very much in line with the 2004 spending review, which announced the introduction of full three-year settlements for local authorities. They now have the opportunity to cascade down this stability, where it represents good value for money to do so, through third-sector organisations. That is our general approach on length of contracts and funding arrangements. The other question, to which the noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, drew attention, was also important and I shall try to provide some clarity on it. We have said that we will not contract for offender management outside the public sector before 2010. The Clause 4 concession relates only to court work. It is not time-limited and it can be lifted only by order. I hope that that clarifies the noble Baroness’s point. I see the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, twitching; I think that he wants to ask a question.