Social Policy - My Arse!

A glance at the stats shows that another blog has flagged up a post I wrote last week about payment by results entitled Smoke and Mirrors. As is invariably the case with the internet, I found myself inexorably drawn into what this other blog Guerilla Policy is all about. It turns out that it's an initiative to try and stimulate a different way of designing social policy by the novel method of asking people that might be affected, or are in some way involved professionally.

I have to say my immediate reaction is one of immense scepticism, and especially when I learn that 'open policy' is officially endorsed by the current coalition government. You see the track record isn't good and I'm getting older and grumpier all the time. Despite having a strong belief that everyone has the capacity to change, in probation we also have a mantra that says past behaviour is a strong indicator of future behaviour.

Actually, when considerably younger and greener, I held onto the naive belief that because the probation service was so close to the 'frontline', we were able to act as an invaluable conduit straight back to government via the Home Office as to what social policies were and were not working. Clearly I was naive enough to believe that it was a two-way dialogue and not simply a command and control system that has got steadily more powerful under successive governments.

It's quite ironic really as I can't help noticing what store the people behind Guerilla Policy place on the computer as it was precisely the widespread introduction of this device that enabled central control by management to flourish so completely, turning our formerly small and benign Head Office into a vast and sprawling micro-managing command bunker.

Before I get too excited about this supposed new way of developing social policy, I feel I need a few answers to some questions that have been nagging away at me for years. How is it that I can go to the pub with some of my mates and over several pints of the landlords finest we can solve most of this country's pressing social problems? How does knocking down hundreds of thousands of homes do anything for a chronic housing shortage? How does withholding money from a 'failing' school help make things better? How does closing youth clubs assist with teenage delinquency? 

You get the gist. On the day when former housing minister Grant Shapps admits he 'made a mistake' in signing-off thousands of house demolitions in Liverpool illegally, I want to hear some more real explanations and grovelling apologies before I can begin to believe in a better way of making social policy.     
          

The Revolution Has Started

Ken Clarke promised us a 'rehabilitation revolution' and with his Green Paper published only a week late due to some uneasiness on the part of the Prime Minister, without a doubt penal policy has finally returned to a saner path. At last we have a Justice Secretary willing and able to challenge Michael Howard's ridiculous soundbite 'Prison Works' that unleashed 20 years of punishment inflation, all too-willingly stoked up by Tony Blair's government.  Anyone who doubts why criminal justice policy really shouldn't be part of party political knockabout should have a look at the comments generated by Mary Riddell's article in the Telegraph. 

I happened to be in my usual haunt last night supping several glasses of winter ale and mulling over Ken's ideas with friends. It was pointed out to me that Ken might be doing the right thing, but it was for the wrong reasons. This is all about saving money supposedly, but I'm not so sure. Ken Clarke is pretty liberal by nature and he was an inspirational choice as Justice Secretary. As a seasoned Tory big-hitter, only someone of his stature is going to be able to steer these true penal reforms through Parliament and be able to take on all the reactionary forces they are bound to generate in his own party, the tabloid press and the House of Commons.

My only real dismay is that Ken clearly has no time for the Probation Service and is doggedly sticking to his ideological belief in punishing us for some reason. I feel it is incredibly sad that at the very moment when we have a minister intent on instigating thoughtful policies that accord with much of our historical beliefs and values, we are being marginalised at best and set on the path of destruction at worst.

Interestingly I doubt that these plans will get much opposition in the House of Lords where their Lordships have a long history of being a far more reasoned bunch than their Lower House colleagues. If there is to be any opposition at all it will be over the treatment of the Probation Service as we have considerable support in the Upper House. I repeat what I have said previously. I really do think it is sensible to try and have a dialogue with the Justice Secretary concerning our role in these plans and that does mean the Unions reviewing their blanket opposition to 'Payment by Results'. For goodness sake, look at the bigger picture here and in particular what this Green Paper is proposing in the round.      

Lessons from History

In the week that the government publishes its Green Paper on sentencing policy and rehabilitation, Monday nights second episode of Ian Hislop's 'Age of the Do-Gooders' on BBC2 made fascinating viewing for several reasons. I was particularly struck by the piece on Mary Carpenter who published a report in 1852 entitled 'Juvenile Delinquents, their Condition and Treatment'  and which contributed to the passing of the Juvenile Offenders Act of 1854.

As with so many Victorian social reformers of the time, she was driven by strong religious faith and a firm belief that child offenders could be reformed by compassionate care and love. She put these beliefs into practice by opening the first Girls Reformatory in Bristol in 1852 and in effect was responsible for ushering in a more enlightened approach towards child offenders that exists to this day. But what the programme made clear was that the path was not easy or straightforward and along the way Mary found it particularly upsetting when certain girls failed to respond to compassionate treatment.

Some 150 years later we find that the issues are pretty much the same. Some children have very poor upbringings that lead into poor life chances and inevitably for some, anti-social behaviour and criminal activity. As I discussed the other day, Frank Field's recent report confirmed all this and stressed just how vital good parenting is. But as Mary found all those years ago, today some child offenders have been so damaged that they remain difficult and challenging for society. Better that they are not damaged in the first place.

The difference nowadays is that, unlike in the age of the reforming pioneers, there no longer seems to be a universal acceptance as to how to treat delinquent children, or indeed what the causes are. I suppose with the general demise of a religious belief in compassion, the public have not been convinced by more recent sociological arguments. We have a vociferous right wing 'punishment' lobby which whole-heartedly supported the 'ASBO' approach, coupled with increases in the use of custody. Happily though, I continue to see signs that the coalition government is intent on returning us to a more intelligent and compassionate approach to the whole subject, even if motivated by the imperative to save money. The 'Age of the Do-Gooders'  would repay viewing on i-player for those interested in the historical background to current penal policy.