Developing a Strategic Approach

Helen Attewell – Chief Executive, Nepacs

Dr. Chris Hartworth – Barefoot Research

Rob Brown – Head of Stronger Communities, Middlesbrough

A prisoners family perspective …

Nepacs role in advocacy

Support available at the prisons

What happens in the community?

Rome wasn’t built in a day!

2011 Policy and Representation partnership: interviews with probation and children’s services

Recommendations

• The guidance identified IOM (Integrated Offender Management) projects as the most effective multi-agency opportunity to join up resources to support families and improve outcomes for children.

• Recommendations included:– Each IOM should have a specific Children and Families of

Offenders Strategy and action plan outlining responsible agencies– IOM projects should be expanded to include children and families

services– Criminal Justice System workers should be trained to ‘Think Family’

and equally, professionals of all backgrounds should receive training on Hidden Sentence.

Further recommendations

• Recognised the importance of a recording system to detail numbers of children and families affected

• Recognised the importance of involving specialist voluntary sector agencies which have built up a level of understanding and expertise on work with this group

• Concluded that an offer of support should be made to the family at the point of imprisonment.

In Teesside

• Initially four prison officers seconded to local authorities to provide continuity of support for offenders and their families

• Middlesbrough ‘Sent to Prison’ leaflet developed

• HMP Holme House Children and Families pathway extended to include representatives from Children’s Services

Police and crime commissioners (PCCs)

• Elected in 2012• PCCs ensure community needs are met as

effectively as possible, and are improving local relationships through building confidence and restoring trust. They work in partnership across a range of agencies at local and national level to ensure there is a unified approach to preventing and reducing crime.

• Community Safety Partnerships (CSPs)

Troubled Families 2011

Local Authorities – the fiscal case

HousingEviction proceedings = £13,000 for one eviction

SchoolsPupil Referral Unit = £15,000 for 1 child for 1 year

CareFoster placement = £40,000 for 1 child for 1 year

Residential care home = £130,000 for 1 child for 1 year

The Families

• Families had on average 9 problems

• 40% had 3 or more children, compared to 16% nationally

• 49% were lone parent households, compared to 16% nationally

• 82% of families had a problem related to education – such as persistent unauthorised absence, exclusion from school or being out of mainstream education

And …

• 71% of families had a health problem

• 54% of families were involved in crime or anti-social behaviour

• 42% of families had had police called out to their address in the previous six months.

• 29% of troubled families were experiencing domestic violence vs 7% nationally

And …

• 35% had a child who was either a Child in Need or subject to child protection arrangements

• 21% had been at risk of eviction in the previous six months

• 74% families there was no one in work vs 17% nationally

• 83% of families receiving out-of-work benefit vs 11% of the population nationally

• 70% were living in social housing vs 18% nationally

Same cohort?

Offenders:

• 27% of people in prison have been taken into care compared with 2% of the general population

• 42% of prisoners had been expelled or permanently excluded from school

• Thirteen times as likely to have been unemployed

• Two and a half times as likely to have had a family member convicted of a criminal offence

• Six times as likely to have been a young father

2013 NOMS / ANEC research

Recommendations:

• NOMS, prisons and local authorities should work together with key partners to develop a shared, ‘whole family’ approach to the children and families pathway for the North East.

• NOMS, North East prisons and local authorities should consider ways that families are currently engaged in the offenders’ sentence and recovery plans and seek to strengthen engagement with families at all stages of the criminal justice process. A starting point would be working with prisoners’ families where there is already a ‘team around the family’ or ‘team around the household’ in place.

• Prisons and local authorities should pilot the Troubled Families ‘common offer’ as a first step to strengthening working relationships. NOMS should continue to facilitate a task and finish group to monitor the pilot.

2015 Transforming Rehabilitation

• New Community Rehabilitation Companies (CRCs) tasked with supporting resettlement of ‘low risk of harm’ offenders

• Safeguarding children is a key public protection issue and both the NPS and CRCs will be expected to have in place arrangements that reflect the importance of safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children. This expectation will be reflected in the NPS Service Level Agreement (SLA) and the contracts of CRCs.

Strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats?

• How can we promote further co-ordination?

• Who takes ownership / leads the process?

• How do we ensure that all the key players are involved?

• How do we sustain links with prisons which are outside our local authority area?

• Where does investment come from for existing good practice?