My Lords, this has been an excellent and important debate. The noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, said that he wanted a debate on the probation service and he has got one. However, there have been a number of criticisms of the Government’s approach. Among other things, they are said to have
delayed but then gone too fast. It is said they have not been sufficiently transparent and that the contract management is not sufficiently secure or not prospectively secure. I will deal with some of these criticisms without wearying the House too much. I have dealt with them in a number of meetings and documents sent to noble Lords but, for the convenience of those who may not have had those documents—or had a chance to read them—I will try and summarise some of our answers.
Since my noble friend Lord McNally committed to placing documents in the House Library, we have deposited 12 sets of letters, papers and publications about the reforms, including most recently all the draft contracts for the new CRCs. The noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, raised the question of how CRCs will interact with statutory and non-statutory partnerships. We published a consultation paper about this and all his concerns are now reflected in the operating model.
Many Peers raised concerns about big private providers outmanoeuvring smaller charities. We have made changes to the number of contract areas to allow for smaller bidders; placed a cap of 25% on market share; engaged with potential tier 2 and tier 3 organisations so that 800 are now registered; and we have decided to accept the suggestion made by my noble friend Lord Marks to set up an independent institute.
It is said that the approach has lacked transparency and there was reference in debate to the risk register. Both this and the previous Government have agreed that there is a strong interest for the Government in having a safe place to formulate and develop policies for extensive reform. To remove that space and to challenge and manage risks internally would risk damaging confidence in the programme and could lead to a culture where risks are not even raised and properly managed through fear of the implications of doing so.
I should emphasise that the risk register is by no means a list of things that will happen, only of things that might conceivably happen if we take no action and we should therefore plan for and mitigate the possibility of happening. That is simply good management. The risks are given an inherent score: the score when the risk is first identified without any controls or mitigations in place, and a current score with controls in place. A target score is also agreed. Risks are reported weekly to the departmental board, and throughout the course of the programme Ministers have been kept closely informed of emerging risks and actions being taken to mitigate them. Programme officials regularly meet Ministers—on average twice weekly—on various aspects of the programme, as well as having close and regular informal contact with Ministers’ private offices.
It is said that there is a lack of clarity about the costing of these reforms. The Cabinet Office and Her Majesty’s Treasury are full members of the programme board before the reforms and attend regular monthly meetings. They have been closely involved with our decision regarding the launch and the invitation to negotiate. The Chief Secretary to the Treasury approved the payment mechanism, the launch of the invitation to negotiate and the outline business case. The programme has been given Treasury approval.
The question of scrutiny was raised. How, the question was effectively asked, will we make sure that the new system is open to public and parliamentary scrutiny? The reform system will be regulated and held to account through a combination of independent inspection, audit and commercial account management. Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Probation will inspect services delivered by both the National Probation Service and contracted sectors. NOMS will have the right to audit CRC delivery, and the CRC contracts will also allow the National Audit Office access to CRCs’ financial systems where public reassurance is needed.
The audit schedule in the draft contracts, which the NAO approved and commented that it provides far-reaching audit powers, provides NOMS with wide powers of access to information, IT premises and personnel, including emergency audit. The NAO scrutinises public spending on behalf of Parliament and holds government departments to account for the way they use public money by reporting the results of its audits direct to Parliament.
There was a suggestion that staff were not being well managed and that some of them, at least, were reporting to individual noble Lords that they were unhappy with the process of transition which will inevitably happen. We have transition managers working with every probation trust, whose sole role is to be the link between the MoJ and trusts. There are weekly updates sent to probation chiefs; weekly teleconferences are held with senior leaders; testing and pilots of key elements of the programme have been and are taking place; and experts from probation have been seconded to the programme to add their valuable experience.
In addition, the new heads of CRCs have now been appointed and meet on the MoJ’s sounding board, which is helping to manage the transition process. The Secretary of State corresponds regularly with probation chiefs both through letters and via video message. Ministers and the programme management regularly visit trusts and maintain informal contact with probation chiefs throughout the programme.
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The noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, referred to engagement with the unions. I did grimace slightly because there has been agreement and complete liaison with the unions. Officials meet regularly with the unions—every two weeks—through a specially established forum devoted to discussing the reforms. Alongside the meetings with the forum—which is our formal engagement body—fortnightly meetings with the unions have taken place since September to look specifically at our pensions proposals. Trade union officials have attended a number of workshops, training sessions and meetings with programme officials to look at specific elements of our reforms. Informal discussions have also taken place on a regular basis and negotiations over the national agreement on staff transfer always took place with a departmental representative in attendance. Ministers have regular meetings with unions every eight to 12 weeks.
The matter of local partnerships was raised. As was already indicated, CRCs will be contractually required to participate in the relevant statutory partnerships.
I indicated in my opening remarks that Section 5 of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 means that CRCs will be designated as a responsible authority and will have a contractual duty to co-operate with MAPPA. They will be expected to have in place arrangements that reflect the importance of safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, and will be designated as board partners for child safeguarding boards. They will be required to support the NPS to ensure the continued effective implementation of both the statutory and probation victim contact schemes and associated statutory responsibilities. They will also have to follow the established good practice in relation to discretionary victim contact, including identifying and providing key information about offenders to NPS staff so that they can communicate this to victims and, if applicable, allow them to make representations. The same goes for non-statutory partnerships, such as the IOM with the police: CRCs will be contractually required to engage in non-statutory partnerships with working arrangements aimed at protecting the public from harm, safeguarding vulnerable adults or potential victims of domestic abuse and promoting service integration. I hope that I can allay any anxiety that may exist in that respect.
There has been, ironically, little criticism of what this Bill is about. The through-the-gate idea—to change the system to allow there to be support through the process of resettlement and beyond—is generally accepted as highly desirable. That is what this Bill is about; it is accepted that it is not just about cutting costs. I know there was some concern that perhaps there might be some perverse incentive for sentences to send people to prison whom they might not otherwise have sent there—a point made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, at an earlier stage—because they would then have the benefit of the support that would now be provided. My answer to that very understandable concern is that, of course, no judge or magistrate would send someone to prison unless they had passed the custody threshold. Furthermore, there are a number of sentencing options by way of community orders which would give offenders the same benefits of support without actually having to send them to prison. The judiciary and Sentencing Council are very much engaged and aware of that possibility, so I hope I can allay that fear.
It is difficult to understand why there is apparently—so the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, says—discontent among the staff, because a deal has been negotiated with the unions. We have been undertaking negotiations with probation trade unions and the employers’ representatives over a national agreement for staff transfer that will protect the terms and conditions of staff transferring to the CRCs or the NPS. Probation trade unions and the Probation Association, which represents trusts, ratified the national agreement on staff transfer on 29 January 2014. Trade unions have also withdrawn all local trade disputes.
The national agreement offers a very good deal for existing staff, and demonstrates our commitment to fairness by going much further than we are legally required to do. Staff will transfer to the new probation structures with their existing terms and conditions in place. The additional protections set out within the
agreement include a guarantee of employment in the new probation structures from 1 June 2014, no compulsory redundancies for a period of seven months following share sale and an enhanced voluntary redundancy period of up to 67.5 weeks. Alongside our negotiations, the programme has put in place a dedicated consultative forum for effective engagement with trade unions and employers’ representatives. We will continue to engage closely with trade unions and employers throughout the transition to the new probation structure.
I want to deal with the anxiety about the pace of these reforms. It is said that they have been going too quickly, although we say that that is not the case. We have drawn significant learning from earlier initiatives and have tested aspects of the reform programme. For example, our experience with the payment-by-results pilots at Her Majesty’s Prisons Peterborough and Doncaster has increased our confidence about designing robust payment-by-results contracts that drive the required behaviours and help generate improved value for money.
There is a suggestion that we should have piloted the scheme further. I gave this answer to the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, across the Dispatch Box when he asked a question. There is a difficulty about providing different sentencing options in different parts of the country. Nevertheless, we of course accept that it is important to pilot the system to make sure that it will work, and that is what we have done. We have engaged extensively with probation trusts to ensure that their operational expertise informs our approach. Twelve trusts have helped shape our policy approach through five test gates, including trusts that have built significant expertise in payment-by-results approaches and new delivery arrangements in preparation for participating in our planned community payment-by-results process. The pilots tested operational systems, including the risk assessment tool and live systems testing.
The noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, asked: what is the risk if the market fails and some contract package areas do not have sufficient interest? What will the Government do if no bidder meets the required standard? We have a robust and diverse market: 30 bidders passed the prequalifying process in December 2013, representing more than 50 organisations of various types, including the private sector and potential mutuals. I am sure that a number of noble Lords will be well aware of the explosion of interest and innovation available in all sectors to deal with the apparently intractable problem of rehabilitation. It is most important that we should be able to take advantage of that.
Approximately one-third of the bidders include a potential mutual organisation within their consortium. We have a minimum of three bidders in each contract package area. We will work intensively with bidders during the competition to help them understand our requirements, engage with local stakeholders and understand the issues in their CPAs. We are assessing bids on both quality and price, not simply seeking the lowest-cost provider. In the long term, the best value for money for the taxpayer will come through having rehabilitation providers who can deliver reductions in reoffending.
In the event that there are no acceptable bids in a CPA, we do not need to award contracts in that area. One of the benefits of our approach is that the CRCs
will be operating as going concerns in public sector ownership before share sale, and it will be possible for the CRC to continue in public sector ownership for longer if needed, pending further competition.
There was a suggestion that we had not consulted sufficiently. The list of those consulted is very long, so I am very surprised that that was suggested. It included probation trusts, members of the public, voluntary and charitable organisations, local stakeholders, the judiciary, offenders, victims and the market, including private, PCS, trust fund and social innovators and police and crime commissioners.
There are many other points that I could make in response to noble Lords’ comments. I hope that the House will forgive me if I do not answer every point, although answers are contained in all the documents that we have provided.
I am concerned about the nature of the amendment and—to put it this way—at the very least the ambiguity as to what will be required in terms of going before Parliament for even a relatively slight alteration. If that is right—and this is a last-minute amendment—such a provision could bring the probation service to a grinding halt. I know that that is not the intention of the noble Lord but I am concerned that that might be the effect.
I said in my opening remarks that there was a prize to be had in this Bill. We should not lose sight of that prize. Support for offenders released from short sentences, as part of our wider plans to reform the supervision of all offenders in the community, will change the lives of thousands of people. It will reduce the 85,000 crimes that those in this group commit within a year of leaving custody. It will also provide long-overdue support to some of the most vulnerable people in our criminal justice system, who are affected disproportionately by mental health issues, by lack of education or training and by drug and alcohol abuse.
We need to get on with the changes in the Bill to make that difference. I come back to the recent speech of the Lord Chief Justice that I quoted in my opening remarks, in which he said that,
“we simply do not have that luxury of time. The financial imperative that is part and parcel of the recasting of the State does not give us the time to take such an approach”.
We have not rushed this change. However, we must move on. Most of all, we have the need to reduce the number of victims who suffer as a result of our current reoffending rates. I hope that the House will give its support to Commons Amendment 1, just as it gave its strong support to the Bill at Second Reading.