The Rehabilitating Probation project is exploring the impact of years of structural reforms, including part-privatisation and its reversal, on probation in England and Wales. Funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, over the past three years the research has involved interviews with people working in the Probation Service at all different levels and people from outside agencies such as the police and courts, who work with probation. Virtually all describe a service and a workforce under pressure. Staff working in community teams report high workloads and feelings of pressure to meet the multiple demands of the role. The decision to bring probation back into the public sector under one national organisation, the Probation Service, has been broadly welcomed. However, as the research has progressed the team has come up against a more fundamental question, prompted by the data gathered and the peer researchers involved in the project – What is Probation for?

For some people, the answer may be clear – probation’s function is to protect the public. While others strongly believe that probation is a service whose purpose is to promote rehabilitation. Of course, these two aims don’t have to be incompatible, but the different opinions and experiences of probation do say something about the complexity of the job and the way in which probation practice has changed over the years. In order to explore these broader questions – What is Probation For? and What Should Probation be For?  – the team have been holding a series of workshops with different people who have experience of probation. These workshops have been co-designed by the peer researchers involved in the Rehabilitating Probation project, who were keen that we go back to look at these fundamentals and try to envisage what probation should be for. 

The research team has also been working with the Prison Radio Association on a podcast series, based on this work. Paula Harriott and Phil Maguire, the hosts of the Secret Lives of Prison podcast, attended a workshop participants, and recorded the first episode of the series on the day. You can listen to it here:  The Future of Probation – Part 1.  The second episode of the series features Dr Matthew Millings who is the Principal Investigator of the Rehabilitating Probation project and Professor Nicola Carr, one of the co-investigators and CEP board member, reflecting on what has come out of the workshops and talking about some of the emergent research findings. You can listen to this episode here: The Future of Probation – Part 2.  The final episode of the series is in preparation and will be released in autumn.