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In this month's edition...
Covid-19 prison preparedness: What does this mean for voluntary organisations?
Clinks’ CEO Anne Fox has written a blog concerning Covid-19 prison preparedness and how it may affect the voluntary sector working in the criminal justice system. The blog outlines the Minister of Prisons and Probation, Lucy Frazer QC MP’s statement on the prison system’s preparedness to deal with Covid-19, guidance on advice for visitors to prisons, and how to contact Clinks about any concerns. The information in this blog was published on 13th March and the situation is changing rapidly, so please refer to government guidance for the most up-to-date information on prisons and Covid-19. Together with Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS), Clinks have set up a dedicated mailbox for criminal justice organisations' Covid-19 related questions: covid19@clinks.org. Clinks will endeavour to answer as many of these as possible, together with HMPPS, and plan to develop some specific FAQs for the most commonly received which we will include in a new web page with other sector-specific information. Read the full blog here
Clinks restructure
We are restructuring our senior staffing to provide dedicated leadership on each of our five strategic objectives. As part of this restructure Jess Mullen has taken on a new role as Director of Influence and Communications and Vic Sadler has taken the role of Head of Corporate Services. We are also saying goodbye to two staff who have each been with us for almost 12 years, Kate Aldous and Richard Nicholls, who have taken voluntary redundancy. Kate and Richard have worked tirelessly as part of our senior team to deliver consistent support to the sector in the face of major challenges and changes facing the sector and Clinks, and have contributed to Clinks' growth. Read more about the restructure here
Vacancies at Clinks
Following the restructure of our senior team we are recruiting a Director of Support and Development [£58,545, full time, London] and Head of Business Development [£51,324, full time, London]. Applications close at 9am on 27th March. Find out more about these vacancies here
Budget announcements
Chancellor of the Exchequer the Rt. Hon Rishi Sunak MP has announced Her Majesty’s Treasury’s annual budget. The government has committed to a programme of investment in communities across the country who experience high levels of need, through committing £46 million from the Shared Outcomes Fund – an initiative to promote cross-departmental programmes – to provide improved support to individuals overcoming multiple disadvantage, such as homelessness, re-offending and substance misuse. There were also specific commitments to justice in the budget, including an additional £156 million in 2020-21 to tackle prison maintenance issues, helping to maintain prison operating capacity and improve conditions for those living and working in prisons in England and Wales. You can read the full budget here
New support plan to improve safety and rehabilitation in prisons
The Minister for Prisons and Probation, Lucy Frazer QC MP, has announced a new intensive support programme to help challenging prisons improve safety and rehabilitation. The Prison Performance Support Programme (PPSP) replaces Special Measures, and will offer a significant package of tailored support managed from a dedicated operations room. PPSP will use data to focus on reducing violence and self-harm with the aim of raising standards as quickly as possible. Measures will include additional staff, enhanced standards trainings and ‘airport-style’ security. Six prisons - HMPs Pentonville, Wormwood Scrubs, Bedford, Bristol, Hewell and Feltham A - will initially receive this support, having been chosen following a detailed assessment. The initiative will sit alongside Government’s £2.75 billion commitment to transform the prison estate. Read more here
Target Operating Model for the Future of Probation Services
Her Majesty's Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) has published a targeting operating model (TOM) for probation, which provides further information on how the future probation system will work. Under the new model all responsibility for sentence management will move back to the National Probation Service (NPS) which will be split into 11 regions across England and one NPS area covering Wales. In each area, NPS operational delivery will be reorganised around ‘Probation Delivery Units’. In relation to health specifically, the TOM refers to probation’s responsibility for Community Sentence Treatment Requirement, to support people to get treatment in the community and avoid a custodial sentence. The TOM reiterates that HMPPS is working with NHS England on its RECONNECT – the care after custody service – pilots. Read the full TOM here and Clinks’ briefing on the TOM here
Use of hospital care for people in prison
The Nuffield Trust has published a research report, Locked Out? Prisoners’ use of hospital care, which aims to understand prisoners’ physical healthcare needs; how and why they access hospital services; and whether their health needs are being adequately met. Key findings include that 40% of outpatient appointments were not attended – double the rate of missed appointments in the general population. Six women gave birth either in prison or on their way to hospital, representing more than one in 10 of all women who gave birth during their prison stay. Recommendations from the report include collecting and publishing data on pregnant women in prisons, increasing access to outpatient services via telemedicine consultations, and identifying and monitoring avoidable health outcomes for people in prison. Read the full report here
Racial disparities in mental health
The Race Equality Foundation as part of the Health and Wellbeing Alliance has published a literature and evidence review of racial disparities in mental health. The report notes the lack of robust data looking at ethnicity, contact with the criminal justice system and mental illness is problematic in understanding prisoner experiences and addressing inequalities. Nevertheless, it notes that Ministry of Justice data shows that once in prison, black African and African Caribbean people were more likely to be identified as having a mental health need than those from other ethnic groups. Recommendations include policy makers and commissioners taking action to improve the experience of black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) people in prison and improve timely access to mental health services and taking action to support the families of people in prison. Read the report here
Marmot Review
10 years on from the landmark report Fair Society, Healthy Lives: The Marmot Review, which provided an in-depth study of health inequalities in England, the UCL Institute of Health Equity and the Health Foundation have published Health Equity in England: Marmot Review 10 Years On. Along with noting worrying deteriorations in health and widening health inequalities in England since 2010, the report notes that involvement in the criminal justice system has a direct negative impact on health, particularly with regards to stress and mental health. Recommendations included for government to develop a national strategy for action on health inequalities, early intervention to prevent health inequalities, and reducing high levels of in-work poverty and precarious employment. Read the full report here
Independent review of drugs
Appointed by the Home Office in 2019, Professor Dame Carol Black has published an evidence pack from an independent review into drugs. The review found that as of March 2019, there were 20,815 people in prison receiving substance misuse treatment. Nearly 75% received treatment for six months or less, due to short sentences. With some substance misuse treatments lasting up to two years, short sentences mean that treatment is often not received for long enough to be effective and patterns of drug use and offending are likely to continue post-release. Furthermore, drug treatment requirement community sentences decreased by 40% between 2009-2016, despite the fact that the most expensive community order (at most £5,000) is half the cost of imprisoning someone for six months (approximately £11,000). Read the review here
Multiple disadvantage and gender
Gender Matters, a new report by Lankelly Chase Foundation and I-SPHERE, examines the experiences of women who face multiple disadvantage in their lives and how these differ from men’s experiences. The report uses a new primary definition of multiple disadvantage which includes four measures: poor mental health, experience of interpersonal violence and abuse, homelessness and substance misuse. In Gender Matters, contact with the criminal justice system is considered a secondary, rather than primary form of disadvantage. The report finds that that women who have had contact with the criminal justice system at some point in adulthood, although few in number, are much more likely than men to report experience of other forms of primary disadvantage – particularly violence and abuse. Read the full report here and Clinks’ blog on this here
Delivering health and care for people who sleep rough
The King’s Fund has published a report, Delivering health and care for people who sleep rough: Going above and beyond, on the health and social care implications of rough sleeping and how local areas can address rough sleeping. The report states that people sleeping rough are likely to have repeated contact with public services – health, criminal justice, housing and care – as well as voluntary and community groups, but can struggle to engage with service providers that are often unable to support them to address their complex, intersecting needs. The report notes that local leaders need to understand the interdependencies of different sectors, including health and criminal justice – warranting a shared belief that solutions lie in coordinating system-wide action. Read the full report here
New £3m fund for healthy communities in England
The National Lottery Community Fund and The King's Fund are jointly supporting partnership-working in local areas between the voluntary and community sector, the NHS and local authorities to improve the health and wellbeing of local communities. The Healthy Communities Together programme will fund leadership development support to develop effective and sustainable partnerships to improve health and wellbeing, reduce health inequalities and empower communities. The programme may include co-producing ways of commissioning and delivering services for people who are marginalised, have complex needs or live with long-term conditions. Successful partnerships will receive up to £450,000, as well as ongoing learning and development support from The King’s Fund, over a further three years. Stage 1 applications must be submitted by 27th March. Read more here
What’s on the horizon for health and justice
In this blog, Clinks’ Health and Justice Policy and Development Officer Zahra Wynne talks about the specific health inequalities that people in contact with the criminal justice face, and what Clinks is hoping to do as a member of the Health and Wellbeing Alliance this year to support the voluntary sector to address these issues. The blog discusses the Marmot reviews findings that involvement in the criminal justice system has a direct effect on health – particularly mental health and stress, as well as other statistics relating to health and criminal justice. It also notes the key health and justice initiatives programmes listed in the NHS Long Term Plan that Clinks will be seeking to engage with, including the RECONNECT service and the Community Sentence Treatment Requirement programme. Read the blog here
The latest on the probation reform programme
Clinks Policy Officer Lauren Nickolls has written a blog on the recently published target operating model (TOM) for probation. The TOM includes a welcome language shift away from stigmatising vocabulary, with ‘offender practitioners’ now referred to as ‘probation practitioners’. It is also positive that the TOM made reference to the fact that commissioners will be able to award both contracts and grants via the Dynamic Framework. Nevertheless, there are concerns with the lack of progress on the use of pre-sentence reports, the complexity of the dynamic framework, a lack of transition planning, and the impact on day-one service availability for black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) people. Read the blog here
New HMPPS grants for 2020-22 announced
This blog outlines details of the organisations that will receive funding through the Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) grant programme 2020-22 and the projects that they will deliver over the next two years. HMPPS awarded grant funding for 16 new projects to support partnerships with prisons and probation areas nationwide. Organisations were asked to submit bids for funding to provide short-term projects under four themes: improving support for families and significant others, improving outcomes for those with protected characteristics, improving safety in custody, and improving health and well-being. For improving health and wellbeing, organisations funded include Age UK, Food Matters, Cruse Bereavement Centre and Lancashire Wild Trust. Read the blog here
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About Clinks Health and justice bulletin
This regular bulletin provides Clinks members with the latest news for voluntary organisations involved in the health and care of people in the criminal justice system. It currently has 2,428 subscribers.
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