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Smart Questions about Justice
SmartJustice MP Briefing
Background
MPs always need to be reminded that a common sense, problem-solving approach to crime is going to deliver better results for our communities than rabble-rousing rhetoric.
Find out who your MP is here.
Questions for your MP
1. Where are public resources most effectively invested to prevent crime and reduce re-offending?
2. Can we afford to build more prisons if we are aiming, as a society, to reduce crime?
3. How can we ensure alternatives to custody benefit victims and communities?
4. How can we equip communities to make their neighbourhoods safer?
5. What should we do about the link between drugs and crime?
6. Do ASBOs work?
What we think
Whilst we don't claim to have all the answers, we think that the Criminal Justice System needs to focus on keeping all those but the most serious and violent offenders out of prison.
Our Smart Solutions to crime are
1. Invest in support for struggling parents, measures to reduce under-achievement and drop outs from school, targeted youth work in high crime areas, increased drugs treatment in the community, more provision for people with mental health problems and well resourced alternatives to custody which are effective at reducing re-offending. The emphasis must be on best value and evidence-based solutions.
2. Building new prisons and increasing the prison population is an expensive option, which may cut crime in the short term, but is storing up more problems for the future. In the last ten years 13 new prisons have been opened. Of these, nine are now overcrowded.
When 80% of shoplifters and car thieves are back inside prison within two years of their release, then we must question the effectiveness of prison to deter crime or rehabilitate.
3. We think community punishments should ensure that offenders pay back to society for the damage they have done, through compulsory work in the community. Both the Probation Service and Youth Offending Service have a variety of work placements in the community, from scrubbing off graffiti, cleaning up church yards, delivering leaflets for charities to more skilled work such as fitting improved security measures to pensioner's homes.
Many areas now have restorative justice schemes whereby offenders undertake to make reparations directly to their victims. As well as making the offender understand the impact of their crime, this has the added benefit of reducing their victim's fear of crime too.
It would be smart justice if communities had an increased say in the work they would like offenders to carry out in their areas, perhaps using the networks established by local volunteer bureaux.
4. Communities need to feel that local authorities and the police are responsive to their needs, and will respond proactively to their concerns about crime. The best organised communities, with the thriving community centres or village halls, are often the most effective in preventing crime. But they need resources to deliver local solutions to their crime issues, for example, by organising activities for young people who complain of 'nothing to do and nowhere to go', or by providing more information and support on a range of issues from domestic violence and sexual abuse, to alcohol and drug treatment.
Involving communities in the process of delivering justice is a key element in raising public confidence in the Criminal Justice System. An excellent example of community involvement in local justice issues are the Youth Panels established by the Youth Offending Teams, which involve local people in making decisions about the best solutions to stop individual young people from committing crime.
5. The link between drugs, alcohol abuse and crime is well known, but there are still insufficient resources for treatment in the community. A Home Office survey found that 73% prisoners had taken illegal drugs in the year before entering prison, and 55% prisoners report committing crime connected to drug taking. The highest rates of reoffending are for prisoners using Class A drugs.
Although more resources are going into drugs treatment in prison, short term prisoners are especially unlikely to receive support and overcrowding means that treatment may be disrupted as prisoners are moved around the system.
The emphasis has to be on diverting offenders out of the Criminal Justice system and into treatment at the earliest point. If users are prescribed heroin they are less likely to commit crime to feed their habit.
6. We need more research on the impact of ASBOs, and what constitutes good practice in issuing and enforcing these civil legal measures. Although the numbers of adult male and female prisoners has stabilised over the past year, the numbers of young offenders in prison is rising.
Could this in part be the result of young people breaching Anti Social Behaviour Orders? In the first half of 2004 the numbers of juveniles in prison increased by 11%. Perhaps there is some connection with the fact that over 50% of the 2,635 ASBOs issued last year were served on under 18s; and that 36% of all ASBOs are breached, and 40% of breaches result in a custodial sentence. This means that 15 - 20% all ASBOs imposed on juveniles leads to custody.
There is evidence that where there is a tiered approach to tackling anti-social behaviour through Acceptable Behaviour Contracts, letters and cautions from the police, and support for parents, then there can be a substantial reduction in complaints about anti-social behaviour. However, if the effect of an ASBO is to result in a criminal conviction and accelerate a young person's passage into the criminal justice system, then this may backfire in creating more hardened, anti-social law-breakers.
SmartJustice MP Briefing
Background
MPs always need to be reminded that a common sense, problem-solving approach to crime is going to deliver better results for our communities than rabble-rousing rhetoric.
Find out who your MP is here.
Questions for your MP
1. Where are public resources most effectively invested to prevent crime and reduce re-offending?
2. Can we afford to build more prisons if we are aiming, as a society, to reduce crime?
3. How can we ensure alternatives to custody benefit victims and communities?
4. How can we equip communities to make their neighbourhoods safer?
5. What should we do about the link between drugs and crime?
6. Do ASBOs work?
What we think
Whilst we don't claim to have all the answers, we think that the Criminal Justice System needs to focus on keeping all those but the most serious and violent offenders out of prison.
Our Smart Solutions to crime are
1. Invest in support for struggling parents, measures to reduce under-achievement and drop outs from school, targeted youth work in high crime areas, increased drugs treatment in the community, more provision for people with mental health problems and well resourced alternatives to custody which are effective at reducing re-offending. The emphasis must be on best value and evidence-based solutions.
2. Building new prisons and increasing the prison population is an expensive option, which may cut crime in the short term, but is storing up more problems for the future. In the last ten years 13 new prisons have been opened. Of these, nine are now overcrowded.
When 80% of shoplifters and car thieves are back inside prison within two years of their release, then we must question the effectiveness of prison to deter crime or rehabilitate.
3. We think community punishments should ensure that offenders pay back to society for the damage they have done, through compulsory work in the community. Both the Probation Service and Youth Offending Service have a variety of work placements in the community, from scrubbing off graffiti, cleaning up church yards, delivering leaflets for charities to more skilled work such as fitting improved security measures to pensioner's homes.
Many areas now have restorative justice schemes whereby offenders undertake to make reparations directly to their victims. As well as making the offender understand the impact of their crime, this has the added benefit of reducing their victim's fear of crime too.
It would be smart justice if communities had an increased say in the work they would like offenders to carry out in their areas, perhaps using the networks established by local volunteer bureaux.
4. Communities need to feel that local authorities and the police are responsive to their needs, and will respond proactively to their concerns about crime. The best organised communities, with the thriving community centres or village halls, are often the most effective in preventing crime. But they need resources to deliver local solutions to their crime issues, for example, by organising activities for young people who complain of 'nothing to do and nowhere to go', or by providing more information and support on a range of issues from domestic violence and sexual abuse, to alcohol and drug treatment.
Involving communities in the process of delivering justice is a key element in raising public confidence in the Criminal Justice System. An excellent example of community involvement in local justice issues are the Youth Panels established by the Youth Offending Teams, which involve local people in making decisions about the best solutions to stop individual young people from committing crime.
5. The link between drugs, alcohol abuse and crime is well known, but there are still insufficient resources for treatment in the community. A Home Office survey found that 73% prisoners had taken illegal drugs in the year before entering prison, and 55% prisoners report committing crime connected to drug taking. The highest rates of reoffending are for prisoners using Class A drugs.
Although more resources are going into drugs treatment in prison, short term prisoners are especially unlikely to receive support and overcrowding means that treatment may be disrupted as prisoners are moved around the system.
The emphasis has to be on diverting offenders out of the Criminal Justice system and into treatment at the earliest point. If users are prescribed heroin they are less likely to commit crime to feed their habit.
6. We need more research on the impact of ASBOs, and what constitutes good practice in issuing and enforcing these civil legal measures. Although the numbers of adult male and female prisoners has stabilised over the past year, the numbers of young offenders in prison is rising.
Could this in part be the result of young people breaching Anti Social Behaviour Orders? In the first half of 2004 the numbers of juveniles in prison increased by 11%. Perhaps there is some connection with the fact that over 50% of the 2,635 ASBOs issued last year were served on under 18s; and that 36% of all ASBOs are breached, and 40% of breaches result in a custodial sentence. This means that 15 - 20% all ASBOs imposed on juveniles leads to custody.
There is evidence that where there is a tiered approach to tackling anti-social behaviour through Acceptable Behaviour Contracts, letters and cautions from the police, and support for parents, then there can be a substantial reduction in complaints about anti-social behaviour. However, if the effect of an ASBO is to result in a criminal conviction and accelerate a young person's passage into the criminal justice system, then this may backfire in creating more hardened, anti-social law-breakers.
