The Penal Landscape by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 1173102
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Group

Figure 6.1 Volume of community order starts by top requirement combinations (Ministry of Justice 2012c)

Napo – the Probation Workers’ Union and Professional Association – has recognised that there is potential for such measures where there is a risk of repeat offending in relation to certain types of crime such as domestic violence or other predatory sexual offending, stalking and harassment, as well as suggesting that such measures could be used more frequently in order to reduce remands (Napo 2012). However, others argue that ‘current evidence suggests that electronic monitoring has at best a neutral effect on reoffending and there was no significant difference in compliance levels of electronically monitored curfew orders compared to a comparison group serving other community penalties’ (Criminal Justice Alliance 2012). Perhaps, therefore, the harnessing of new technologies should be used to complement other community interventions that are designed to challenge behaviour and address the underlying issues behind offending. Simply restricting a person’s liberty is unlikely to be successful at reducing reoffending in the longer term.

Recent research into the impact of curfews and electronic monitoring as experienced by youth gang members in the West of Scotland (Deuchar 2012) has found that such measures often had a number of unintended negative consequences and led to additional strains between the young men and their families leading to further criminality. Where such measures had a limited success in reducing antisocial behaviour and criminality, they were complemented by additional mechanisms for rehabilitation and care. As such they were largely used to augment and support broader offender management and other interventions in order to reduce the risk of serious harm and/or to reduce the likelihood of reoffending. Nellis (2010), in reviewing the global literature on the use of electronic monitoring (EM) in offender supervision, bemoans the tendency (especially in England and Wales) for probation and EM to develop along ‘parallel tracks’, suggesting that the disintegration of EM from wider processes of offender management may undermine the utility of both. Others have similarly argued that ‘[t]echnological solutions are not an adequate replacement for the face-to-face supervision and the relationships that underpin effective interventions with offenders’ (Humberside Probation Trust 2012). In its response to the consultations, Napo (2012: 7) has raised concerns about the uncoordinated manner in which electronically monitored curfews operate with other community order requirements and the fact that the current contracts in England and Wales are operated completely independently of the Probation Service. This contrasts sharply with other countries where this provision is operated in-house by some European Probation Services. As Nellis (2010) notes, this seems to offer a less complicated and more effective integration of EM into community sentences, though not necessarily a cheaper one.

Whether relying on the use of new technologies or not, the displacement, diversification and intensification of community sentences has ultimately had limited success in reducing the use of custody, as has been highlighted in recent research:

• Sentences introduced as explicit alternatives to custody have failed to act as like for like replacements for prison sentences.

• Community

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