Tag Archives: national offender management service

Opinion: The future of the probation service

In 2004, the last government merged the prison and probation services into one gigantic super-agency: the National Offender Management Service (NOMS). The changes exacted by NOMS have led to the systematic fragmentation and demoralisation of probation, whose purpose has been altered beyond all recognition.

Unrepresented at the highest management structure of NOMS, neglected and misrepresented, the probation service has for years plodded along in the shadows, only to be thrust into the limelight when the spotlight fell on individual tragedies amid media frenzies.

The creation of NOMS bought with it the mantra of ‘managerialism.’ Staff at all levels experienced a loss …

Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , and | Leave a comment
Advert

Recent Comments

  • David Raw
    It appears that the lessons of 2010-15 have not been learned for people who weren’t around when all of that occurred, and as someone whose dad was involved in...
  • Nigel Jones
    The comments here are just the kind of discussion that should have taken place before considering any such announcement. When we debated FPC's planned program l...
  • Colin Brown
    I was a bit shocked to hear this. It struck me as a very poor idea. I understand it to be, actually, regressive in nature, nowhere near as progressive as it sou...
  • Nonconformistradical
    @expats "I live in a semi rural Suffolk village with an hourly bus service" Lucky you. Some of us have no regular bus services at all....
  • expats
    @Tristan Ward 23rd Sep '26 - 7:36pm.. The idea that Daily Telegraph readers are a viable source of future LD votes made me choke on my coffee.....