The Howard League for Penal Reform has warned that charities involved in the government's probation reforms will face a strong conflict of interest as short-term offenders involved in the programme risk jail if they do not engage on leaving custody.

Andrew Neilson, the Howard League's director of campaigns, has also warned that charities are unlikely to have the capacity to be primes under the new contracts.

Speaking to civilsociety.co.uk this week, Neilson, said there were big issues with the government’s plans to open up the probation market and extend support to short-sentence offenders, who currently get no help on leaving custody.

“Short-sentence offenders will be compelled to engage with charities or companies on leaving prison. If you don’t engage you can get fined, be put on curfew, or sent back to prison.

“We are dealing with often vulnerable and troubled people, people who are often not good at meeting obligations. The government is setting up people to fail.”

Neilson added that for the charity sector, there was a major ethical and conflict-of-interest issue. “Charities have traditionally worked on a voluntary basis. Though they won’t be sending people back to custody, they will be involved in a system which is.”

He said that the Peterborough social impact bond, which sees short-term offenders get extensive support on leaving prison, was used to justify the expansion by the Ministry of Justice. But he warned that the Peterborough SIB is a very different model.

“Involvement in services delivered within the Peterborough SIB is voluntary. I’ve heard people say that this is the secret to their success as they are not seen as another agent of the state forcing people, but they are offering something voluntary for people to engage with.”

Last year, speaking to civilsociety.co.uk, Alisa Helbitz, director of communications at Social Finance, who developed the Peterborough SIB, also suggested that the government’s probation reforms were different to its model. She said at the time: “Peterborough was set up to address a gap in provision for short-sentenced offenders. The government's Transforming Rehabilitation programme is primarily about restructuring present probation services, on which Peterborough offers little of relevance.”

Commenting further on the government’s reforms to its involvement with short-sentenced offenders, Neilson said: “I suspect other organisations have concerns, but charities have to engage with this, so it is not easy for them to throw up these concerns.”

G4S and Serco withdraw

There are a number of charities and social enterprises involved in consortia on the list of 30 organisations which have been shortlisted to be prime contractors on the government’s Transforming Rehabilitation programme.

It includes Catch 22; Shaw Trust; St Giles Trust, Crime Reduction Initiatives and Bridges Ventures.

Big public service deliverers G4S and Serco had been in the running, but according to the MoJ, “decided to withdraw from the competition” for rehabilitation services at a prime level late last year. Both organisations have been hit by allegations of corruption. Most recently, Serco agreed to repay the government £68.5m wrongly charged for electronic tagging of offenders. G4S has been referred to the Serious Fraud Office for a second time over a government contract.

Nick O’Donohoe, chief executive of Big Society Capital, has welcomed the “high number of socially motivated consortia shortlisted”.

He said: “We believe it is absolutely critical that charities and social enterprises continue to play a significant role in delivering probation services, and the social investment market stands ready to enable their participation through providing differing types of funding.”

However, Neilson has questioned the capacity of big voluntary sector organisations to deliver prime contracts, even in consortia: “We are not big fans of G4S and Serco, but they are the only big companies with a track record of delivering big contracts in criminal justice. They have the logistical muscle to deliver big regional contracts with thousands of people. They do not have much experience in probation, but they do in other services like running prisons.”

Neilson added that G4S and Serco pulling out of bidding at a prime level was “bad news for charities”, as “it is likely that they may bid to be subcontractors, which will mean more competition for smaller charities from G4S and Serco. Serco is likely to bid to be a subcontractor as it already delivers contracts in the criminal justice system.”

A Ministry of Justice spokeswoman confirmed that while neither G4S and Serco will play a lead role in probation services, they can bid to take part in the second tier: “The government has left open the possibility of either supplier, as part of their corporate renewal, playing a supporting role, working with smaller businesses or voluntary sector providers in order to support our objective of achieving a diverse market.”

New grant

Elsewhere, a grant worth £720,000 is to be awarded to support the government’s probation reforms. An MoJ spokeswoman said it will help voluntary organisations in specialist areas of work, for example helping female offenders.

The government’s Transforming Rehablitation programme will see contracts worth around £450m each year split across 21 regions in England and Wales, with responsibility for supervising and rehabilitating around 225,000 low and medium risk offenders.

Howard League for Penal Reform has been a vocal critic of the plans. Neilson says: “Howard League does support voluntary sector involvement in probation, but we prefer to see existing probation trusts commission out services, rather than what is being proposed – wholesale privatisation with voluntary sector involvement.”