Marion Stevenson was awarded Commended in the 2026 Mike Guilfoyle Essay Prize.
I come at this question from a considerable distance: I was a probation officer for 6 years in the 70s and again for a further 4 years in the 80s. As a result I have always felt affection for the probation service. Some of the best people I have met were probation officers. I have watched developments in the service with interest and – sometimes – with concern, particularly in relation to core values and practice.
When I joined the service in 1972 the original motto - ‘advise, assist, befriend’ - set the compass for our practice. Relationship skills were central: the focus was on building understanding of an individual’s narrative and offering support to make changes. Positive relationships were the foundation for helping people define their aims and make practical plans. Sanctions were available which gave authority to probation officers, providing a ‘red line’ in terms of compliance which could also be helpful to the supervision process.
Social Enquiry Reports in the 70s were an opportunity to bring to the Court a rounded understanding of an individua’s circumstances and of the many factors - personal, social and systemic - that were relevant to the offence. By the 80s. when I returned to the service. reports were required to focus mainly on ‘offending behaviour’. To my mind this was a move away from a holistic understanding of individuals, for many of whom ‘offending behaviour’ is likely to have been the tip of the iceberg.
Perhaps this was the beginning of a paradigm shift, where ‘keeping the public safe’ is now a primary focus for probation. Recently HMPPS Inspectorate have announced a six month programme of inspection activity, focussing only on the service’s delivery of public protection. Interestingly, in the (recently released) first report 75% of probation personnel said they felt largely or wholly responsible for managing risk of harm.
In one sense, nobody could argue with public safety as an aim - but how can it be achieved? It involves extensive monitoring: checking compliance with reporting conditions; inputting data on different platforms; coordinating information from other agencies; making regular risk assessments; making fine judgements about recall. People are unpredictable and free, so that there is rarely going to be a certain ‘right’ answer. Meanwhile officers are open to the possibility of blame for further offences, in a world where many more clients have licence conditions and officers are managing high levels of risk.
How could probation be more effective? This depends on what it aims to achieve. A core challenge is surely this: can probation officers perform the short-term task of ‘keeping the public safe’ without damage to the longer-term task of building positive helping relationships with clients? Two questions arise in relation to this balancing act.
Firstly, how does the monitoring task affect relationship-building?
Secondly, how does the public safety focus affect probation officers themselves, faced with possible failure to achieve the aim?
In terms of the monitoring task, data-inputting and sharing with other agencies is time-consuming: on the most basic level it much reduces the time that officers can spend working with clients. More importantly, an overemphasis on control can undermine the relationship with a probation officer. People often resent too much monitoring and seek multiple ways to play the system, damaging trust.
The effect on probation officers’ motivation and morale is also in question. Job satisfaction comes from the positive and productive relationships officers are able to form with their clients. The recent report ‘Constrained Voice and Complicated Loyalty’ examines the complex question of retention in the service and finds that staff are struggling with box ticking and pressure to ‘avoid the calamity of being held accountable for ‘missing something’ if a further serious offence occurred’. This ‘lead to practices driven by defensiveness and a diminution of what they considered to be their core role’. Many staff ‘talked about staying because of feelings of loyalty …not to their employer…. [but] to the people they work with, the idea of probation as a vocation’.
A new (4 February) report from the Public Accounts Committee makes similar points, describing the probation service as ‘teetering on the brink’. It concludes that HMPPSS’s planned change/ improvements to digital systems could place yet more pressure on overstretched staff.
It is no wonder that retention and recruitment are becoming increasingly challenging. The writing is on the wall.
What needs to change in order for probation to be more effective? We must ask: effective in what way? My contention is that the two aims are in conflict with each other and hard to balance. We need to bring this dilemma clearly into the light, going back to basics and questioning the main purpose of the service. There are no easy answers - but that does not invalidate the need for open debate.
If indeed public protection is paramount, how can that be achieved? ‘More of same’ in terms of tools and platforms for monitoring is not the only option. If the probation service is responsible for monitoring and assessing risk then the officer profile and recruitment might need to be addressed, because this is essentially a policing role.
If relationship-building and community connection are the focus of the service, then this calls for a different profile. Desistance studies demonstrate that no single intervention can cause desistance, and that relationship skills are consistently behind success across all interventions.
Probation officers can offer people a bridge back into the community, as the most likely way to promote long-term positive outcomes. To ask them to build positive relationships and to be responsible, equally and at the same time, for high levels of public safety, is to risk low performance, low satisfaction and a high attrition rate.
The Mike Guilfoyle Essay Prize is annual competition, co-hosted by the Centre for Crime and Justice Studies and Napo, that honours the legacy of Mike Guilfoyle. Mike was a dedicated probation officer and active Napo member, and this competition aims to encourage reflections on all that is valuable and important in probation.
This year’s essay question was What needs to change for probation to be more effective?
