PAC fears effect of prison cuts on reoffending rates

5 Mar 13
Cuts to the National Offender Management Service could hit rehabilitation programmes in prisons, the Public Accounts Committee warned today.

By Richard Johnstone | 5 March 2013

Cuts to the National Offender Management Service could hit rehabilitation programmes in prisons, the Public Accounts Committee warned today.

In a report examining the work of the Ministry of Justice agency, MPs found that Noms had met its savings target of £230m in 2011/12 while maintaining its overall performance.

However, its targets to reduce costs in future years were ‘challenging’, according to PAC report, Restructuring the National Offender Management Service. Noms has to save £246m in the current financial year, followed by £262m more in 2013/14 and a further £145m in 2014/15.

The agency believes it has scope to make the prison estate more efficient by closing older, more expensive prisons and investing in new ones. Its savings plan has also assumed that the prison population will stay at its current level and that no progress is made on reducing overcrowding.

However, the PAC found Noms had not yet secured upfront funding for the redundancy packages for prison and probation officers that are needed to bring down the pay bill. This could further restrict budgets, the report concluded.

If overcrowding is not addressed, it is increasingly likely that rehabilitation work to help reduce prisoner reoffending would not be provided, and prisoners would not be prepared properly for release, the MPs said. ‘We were not reassured that the agency has done enough to address the risks to safety, decency and standards in prisons and in community services arising from staffing cuts implemented to meet financial targets.’

PAC chair Margaret Hodge said cuts could mean training and rehabilitation activities suffer ‘even though we know these reduce reoffending after release’.

She added: ‘The agency needs to seriously consider the long-term consequences of short-term cuts.’

The committee also concluded that prison overcrowding had become ‘institutionalised’. Hodge predicted it would get worse if Noms went ahead with plans to close six older prisons in favour of newer, cheaper ones. ‘Given that the current prison population is the maximum it considers safe, the agency should look again at the consequences of closing these prisons,’ she said.

Commenting on Justice Secretary Chris Grayling’s plan to increase the role of private firms and the third sector in probation services, Hodge said the conclusion of the committee was: ‘Probation trusts don’t have the skills they need to get the best deal out of contracting services.’

She added: ‘For example, we received evidence suggesting that the UK is paying 60% more for electronic monitoring than the US. The MoJ needs to work with probation trusts to ensure that the taxpayer isn’t paying over the odds to the private sector.’

Responding to the PAC’s concerns, Grayling said: ‘We will continue to drive down running costs by replacing old prison accommodation with new places that are better value for money and provide better opportunities to reduce reoffending.

‘Our Transforming Rehabilitation proposals will change the way we deal with offenders on release and help us to stop the depressing revolving door of reoffending. Our plans do not involve probation trusts having an expanded role in commissioning.’

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