Elaine Ellis

This article explores probation practice through the architecture and arrangement of a probation office led by a Community Rehabilitation Company. It presents findings from an ethnographic study of a probation office in a large city, combining observations of the research site with data derived from interviews with 20 members of staff. Drawing on Foucault’s art of distributions, the article highlights how the managerial dynamics of recent decades have filtered into the physicality of the office to influence probation practice. It argues that probation practice under Transforming Rehabilitation can be situated along a managerial continuum, as standardized, computer-based work has become further entrenched within the office.

Multi-agency partnership working is becoming increasingly prevalent, particularly within and between the public and voluntary sectors. However, it is widely accepted that while this method of working brings the prospect of benefits, it also has the potential to be problematic. This ...

ABSTRACT The Offender Engagement Programme (OEP) within National Offender Management Service (NOMS) has been built on our collaborative approach with probation trusts to develop approaches which can support more effective offender engagement. Drawing areas of potential practice development from our early fieldwork and literature review, events for trusts and reference groups with practitioners and middle managers, we identified where more focussed work with trusts would develop learning and evidence which could be shared. In response to an invitation to express an interest, 22 trusts committed themselves to taking forward an OEP pilot, starting between March and May 2011. External evaluation is planned for nine trusts in total and is being undertaken by our research partners: a team from the Institute of Criminal Policy Research (ICPR) Birkbeck College London and Leicester University, and a team based at Sheffield University which includes Fergus McNeill from Glasgow University.This chapter looks at how we implemented pilot work on approaches to involving offenders in Sentence Planning; Developing Effective Engagement Skills through training and continuous professional development; and a model for Reflective Supervision by senior and middle managers to support effective engagement. It also examines how the methodology for the external and internal evaluation was developed, and what we are hoping to get out of the evaluation. In short, the purpose of this work is to investigate and test the core proposition that the relationship between the offender and the practitioner can be a powerful means of changing behaviour.