Dáil Éireann debate -
Tuesday, 2 Mar 1999

Vol. 501 No. 3

Adjournment Debate. - Probation and Welfare Service.

Mr. Higgins

(Mayo): The logic of starving the probation and welfare service of adequate and urgently needed resources is difficult to understand. It is totally incomprehensible when it is compared with its sister organisation, the prison service. The probation and welfare service deals with 5,000 offenders each year. The prison service deals with 10,000 offenders. It costs an average of £52,000 to keep someone in prison for one year. It costs a mere £2,000 to keep someone under the supervision of the probation and welfare service. An average of 70,000 of those who go through the prison service re-offend. On average, the probation and welfare service supervision of offenders has an 80 per cent success rate. While it takes more than 1,600 prison officers to manage a prison throughput of 10,000 per annum a mere 148.5 probation and welfare officers look after the welfare of 5,000 offenders placed under their care. The salaries, wages and allowances for the prison service will cost the Irish taxpayer £119 million in 1999. Some prison officers will take home £45,000 in overtime alone. Salaries, wages and allowances for the probation service will cost £7.2 million. The results in terms of efficiency, efficacy and economy are there to be seen. Yet, the Minister continues to pour £118 million every year into the running costs of the prison system and to add another 1,000 prison spaces at a cost of £125 million to a system which is a proven failure. At the same time the probation and welfare service which is a proven success is starved of money and of personnel.

In 1984 the Whitaker report on the penal system reported that "a progressive strengthening of the service is essential for more effective and extensive use of alternatives to imprisonment". In November 1997 the Government set up an independent expert group to look into the probation and welfare service. The group's first report was published on 2 November 1998. Its main recommendation was "that the number of basic rate probation and welfare officers be increased from 148.5 to 225 with appropriate increases in the number of senior and clerical support". This would cost £2.5 million. It represents excellent value for money and is absolutely essential. Yet, the Government and the Minister have failed to make any allowance for this in the Estimates for the public service. The net result is that more than 600 prisoners who were released from prison into the care and supervision of the probation and welfare service are free. Surely this is farcical in view of the fact that supervision was a strict condition of their release? Nevertheless, they remain totally unsupervised.

There are insufficient probation and welfare officers to deal with the rehabilitation of sex offenders and drug offenders in prison. The official neglect of both these categories borders on the criminal. The service is unable to cope with the demand from the courts for probation reports and has been unable, for the past number of years, to do any assessment reports for family law court cases.

What is the point in setting up a review group and commissioning a report if the Minister disregards its main recommendation? Will the Minister tell the House the reason for his failure to make the crucial appointments so urgently recommended by the review group? Has he sought any financial assistance from the Minister for Finance? Is the Minister prepared to seek a Supplementary Estimate? This should present no problem. We recall that last year a Supplementary Estimate was introduced for Garda pay and overtime in the wake of the blue flu.

Does the Minister realise that a strike is now imminent and is inevitable unless he moves now? The Minister must move. He must also move from the blinkered approach that has characterised his penal philosophy that incarceration takes precedence over rehabilitation. The Minister must see that there are viable, cost efficient and effective alternatives which work and which reduce re-offending. One of these – and a very important one – is the probation and welfare service. For far too long this service has been undervalued and under resourced. The moment of truth is at hand and the service is not prepared to play Cinderella any longer.

Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform (Mr. O'Donoghue)

I thank Deputy Higgins for raising this matter. On 27 November 1997 I established an expert group to review the probation and welfare service with the following terms of reference. The expert group was to examine the role of the probation and welfare service having regard to recent and current developments, the needs of the service, in the context of its proper role, to deliver an effective and efficient service and the organisation and status of the service.

The first report of the group was published early in November 1998. It set out the present role of the probation and welfare service, the problems within the probation and welfare service and made a number of recommendations. The group recommended that the number of staff serving be brought up to levels previously approved by Government decisions – this would have included the Government led by Deputy Higgins's party. This will mean an increase in the number of basic grade officers serving from 148.5 on 31 December 1997 to 225, with appropriate increases in the number of senior staff and clerical support. It recommended that the current system for the recruitment of staff be streamlined. The review group found that there is a need to invest in a comprehensive public information and awareness programme and recommended that funding be set aside for this purpose. The group also recommended that an invitation to tender for a new IT system issue immediately and a dedicated IT section be established within the probation and welfare service as soon as possible.

It was recommended that a comprehensive staff training needs analysis should be undertaken including an analysis of the training needs associated with the introduction of the new information technology system. It was also recommended that the recommendations of the ESRI in relation to research needs should be implemented as soon as possible. It was further recommended that the Criminal Justice (Community Service) Regulations, 1984 [Regulation 4(a)] which require groups participating in the community service order scheme to carry their own insurance be amended.

In relation to staffing matters, there are 15 vacancies in the basic grade of permanent probation and welfare officer and the Civil Service Commission is currently recruiting staff to enable these posts to be filled in the first half of 1999. As regards the additional 65 probation and welfare officers and the ten other senior staff and clerical support staff recommended in the expert group's report, my Department is considering the recommendation made by the expert group in consultation with the Department of Finance.

In relation to providing a comprehensive public information and awareness programme, I am sure the Deputy would agree that much of the excellent work done by the probation and welfare service goes unnoticed and I will examine how best a public relations initiative can be progressed to promote knowledge about the current and future development of the service.

As regards an IT package for the service, it has been possible to make progress by putting in place local area networks in the probation and welfare offices. These are being installed at present and a considerable amount of computer hardware has been purchased. I hope that by the end of 1999 there will be a comprehensive information technology system in place. My Department will also implement a comprehensive training programme for the new IT system and take into account other additional training needs as they arise.

The probation and welfare service has a small research unit and when the extra staff and the improved IT system are in place this will allow for the development of more detailed statistics and data.

As regards to community service projects and related insurance issues, I am examining this whole area with a view to providing easier and more cost effective insurance cover for people doing community service work.

In its first report the group also set out the parameters for the next report which is to include the future role and needs of the service, the service's role in relation to juvenile justice, family law and related children's issues, including adoption, drugs, pre-court, mediation and reparation, the necessary changes in legislation and the organisational status of the service. It is expected that the final report will be ready mid-1999.

I trust that from what I outlined the Deputy will appreciate that far from having a blinkered view of the probation and welfare service I have been looking out onto the horizon for some time with a view to improving the service. I have been doing that ever since the Government in which he served rode off into the sunset.

I want to inform the Deputy that last week I met IMPACT, the union representing the probation and welfare officers, to outline the current position and to assure them of my commitment to the service. It goes without saying that I would hardly have bothered to set up an expert group to examine the probation and welfare service unless I intended to bring about substantial improvements, which could have been brought about by the Government in which Deputy Higgins served as Chief Whip.

The Dáil adjourned at 10.45 p.m. until 10.30 a.m. on Wednesday, 3 March 1999.