Doing with or doing to – what now for the probation service?

Abstract

In January 2008, the latest organisational restructuring involving the Ministry of Justice saw NOMS split between ‘delivery’ and ‘strategy’, with responsibility for the former being assumed by the Director General of HMPS. The full implications of the latest restructuring are not yet clear, but there are concerns that the probation service as a distinctive ‘voice’ within the criminal justice system will be lost in the name of greater harmonisation with a much bigger and politically more powerful prison service. We have arrived at a critical moment in the history of the Probation Service but one that has been foreshadowed for some time by a range of politically driven imperatives. Among these, we consider that three have had and will continue to have a particular impact on probation. These are: moving centre stage, correctional drift, and modernisation.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Lol Burke

Senior Lecturer in Criminal Justice, Liverpool John Moores University and Editor of the Probation Journal

Steve Collett

Chief Officer, Cheshire Probation Area and Honorary Fellow, University of Liverpool, UK