Nacro's response to Breaking the Cycle Green Paper

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Breaking the Cycle: Nacro’s response | 34• move away from stereotypical ideas of what constitutes a personality disorder and ensuretraining and awareness raising among generic practitioners (eg, psychiatrists, offendermanagers and prison officers)• use specialised and focused interventions as part of a dedicated service that also considerswithin its treatment options dual diagnosis and/or multiple complex needs in order tomaximise positive outcomes• create practice guidance to ensure improved practice in relation to early identification,assessment and timely referral and support• ensure access to a range of specialised criminal justice/health services• ensure a focus on specialised resettlement services with due regard to the unique role of thevoluntary and community services• adopt a commissioning framework which recognises the complexities involved in workingwith this offender group and creates an adequate balance between enforcement andtreatment, acknowledging that services are likely to be both labour and resource intensive.
Breaking the Cycle: Nacro’s response | 35Section 6Payment by resultsQ22 Do you agree that the best way of commissioning payment by results forcommunity sentences is to integrate it within a wider contract whichincludes ensuring the delivery of the sentence?Nacro supports the notion of payment by results. It brings simplicity to an inherently complexworld and puts a clear focus on outcomes. But, it would be inappropriate to ignore thesecomplexities as we move to the detailed implementation of payment by results on a wide scale.In reality there is the in-built complexity of a sentencing framework, embodied in statute andpredicated on four distinct principles for the community sentence, namely:• punishment• attitudinal and behavioural change• control• help for the offenderWhereas it is hoped that reduced reoffending will be the ultimate outcome when the courtpasses a community sentence on an offender, this is not the only purpose the sentence has inmind. The court’s paramount concern is that the sentence will be applied as intended and theoffender will comply. Therefore ‘success’ in the eyes of the court is measured in terms of howpunitive the sentence may be, whether or not the offender complies, as well as the impact ithas on offending behaviour going forward.In the light of this, Nacro considers that the sentence and the associated interventions have tobe delivered as one fully integrated process. The rehabilitative effect of the sentence has to beborn out of the offender’s success in fulfilling the primary contract with the court: complyingwith the statutory terms of the order and stopping offending in the future. Separating theseitems out leads to confusion on the part of the court, the offender and the public at large:• The court order is the hook upon which to base the intervention in the first place.• Success in one part of the order has to be mirrored by success in the other.• Work which focuses on removing barriers to compliance is often equally relevant toremoving barriers to building a crime-free lifestyle going forward.
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Nacro's response to Breaking the Cycle Green Paper

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