Government reforms,performance management and the labour process: the case of officers in the UK probation service

Introduction

Government reforms of UK public services introduced changes to achieve increased ‘economy’, ‘efficiency’ and ‘effectiveness’. Between 1979 and 1997 Conservative governments pursued this through marketization and cost-reduction strategies alongside initiatives designed to strengthen the ‘right to manage’ and weaken professional and trade union power (Bach and Winchester, 2003). These were associated with the international phenomenon called ‘New Public Management’ (NPM) including an emphasis on performance (Bach and Della Rocca, 2000). From 1997, the New Labour government continued this process through modernization which both incorporated and redirected similar policies (Bach and Winchester, 2003: 287). This development was demonstrated by rigorous commitment to delivering efficiencies through market-type initiatives (Bach and Winchester, 2003: 291), performance management processes (Bach, 2005) and workforce reform (Bach et al., 2006). Taken together, these developments changed the way public services are delivered with more government control over their purpose, priorities and performance. They also provoked debates regarding the outcomes for public service employees, including labour process accounts claiming increasing ‘Taylorization’, deskilling and degradation (Ironside and Seifert, 1995). However, others argued that public service professionals retained a considerable degree of control over public services that has limited the impact of reforms (Kirkpatrick et al., 2005). Of specific interest are studies that point to more variable outcomes that included both empowerment and degradation in education and social care (Bach et al., 2006, 2007). Taking a labour process perspective, this research investigates the outcomes in a relatively less known context – the National Probation Service (NPS). More specifically, it considers: the extent to which reforms facilitate managerial control over probation work and the employees that perform it; how this relates to a changing probation workforce; and whether the outcomes amount to ‘Taylorization’, with its consequences for deskilling and degradation, or to empowerment.

The following section describes the probation context; then theoretical concepts and research related to the public service labour process are considered. Then there follows a description of the research methods used before the findings and conclusions are presented.

Reforming the probation service: context and change

The UK Probation Service has undertaken offender supervision for over 100 years. Protagonists often proclaim its success, the Service being described by the Probation Boards Association as ‘a treasure for the nation’ (cf. McKnight, 2009: 341) and receiving international acclaim as ‘a role model for other countries’ (Wargent, 2007: 42). However, this enthusiasm was not shared by government ministers who criticized probation’s ‘efficiency’ and ‘effectiveness’. This was reinforced by a succession of serious high profile offences committed by offenders under probation supervision (McKnight, 2009: 329). However, while ‘efficiency’ required the twin strategies of cost reduction and improved performance, ‘effectiveness’ raised fundamental issues related to purpose. Consequently, the aims of probation were realigned to reflect changing government policy and associated outcomes. Originally, the Probation Service developed from humanitarian values based on helping offenders lead law-abiding lives. The 1907 Probation of Offenders Act put this on a statutory footing, requiring probation officers to ‘advise, assist and befriend’ offenders (Jarvis, 1972: 1). While this contrasted with the notion of punishment, offenders were held to account, albeit through helping them achieve behavioural change (Bancroft-Turner, 1946: 3). Although tensions existed around an appropriate balance between ‘care’ and ‘control’ (Bancroft-Turner, 1946: 3), it was through the Conservative government’s Criminal Justice Act of 1991 that the primary purpose came to emphasize enforcement and public protection (Whitehead and Statham, 2006: 123). Therefore, probation would no longer be aimed at befriending but at being an effective punishment in its own right (Hedderman and Hough, 2004).

Under New Labour, three developments were important. First, in 2001 following the Criminal Justice and Court Services Act of 2000, a National Probation Service was created in England and Wales in which 54 semi-autonomous Probation Services became 42 Probation Service Areas controlled by a National Probation Directorate. This promoted greater co-ordination while enhancing achievement of national policy objectives (Home Office, 2007: 14). Second, a review of prisons and probation criticized the ‘silo’ working arrangements of these two services and recommended more co-ordination between them (Carter, 2003: 23). Subsequently, they were integrated into a National Offender Management Service (NOMS) in 2004 (McKnight, 2009: 333). NOMS promoted the ‘seamless’ management of offenders while facilitating marketization with regional offender managers inviting tenders from other organizations to undertake some prison and probation work (Cavadino and Dignan, 2007: 165). Finally, the Offender Management Act of 2007 enabled Probation Areas to become Probation Trusts with enhanced responsibilities for delivering cost-effective probation services (Ministry of Justice, 2008). This change reinforced marketization since contracting work to alternative providers reduced the almost monopolistic position of the NPS (Cavadino and Dignan, 2007: 167). Judy McKnight, former General Secretary of the National Association of Probation Officers (NAPO), a trade union representing probation staff, referred to these developments as ‘never-ending structural reforms, undertaken to enable contestability and competition to be introduced’ (2009: 333).

Following the change of government in 2010, the future of the Probation Service remains uncertain. According to NAPO, it faced cuts of £44m, 2.3 per cent more than those announced under New Labour in 2009 (NAPO, 2010a: 1). Furthermore, in The Coalition: Our Programme for Government, it was stated: ‘We will introduce a “rehabilitation revolution” that will pay independent providers to reduce reoffending, paid for by the savings this new approach will generate within the criminal justice system’ (HM Government, 2010: 23).

These developments are not only critical for the NPS in terms of its future status as an autonomous and public criminal justice agency, they also contribute to an understanding of the context in which changes in the labour process occur.

‘Taylorism’ and the public service labour process

In private manufacturing, managers have sought productivity improvements by increasing employee output, for example, by extending working time or increasing work effort (Nichols, 1980). This has included initiatives such as Taylorism where work is subjected to redesign based on technology and the standardization of tasks (Taylor, 1911). However, in the public services productivity, or rather ‘efficiency’, becomes politically sensitive due to quality issues and the fact that, being relatively labour-intensive, the public services are heavily reliant on the amount of labour devoted to their ‘production’ (Baumol, 1993: 19–20). Therefore, public service managers face the dilemma of how to maintain a certain level and quality of service delivery while controlling labour costs. In education, for instance, if the teacher-pupil ratio remains constant and teachers’ salaries increase as market forces dictate, then the cost of education per pupil will rise. Yet, since quality tends to be correlated with the amount of labour involved, attempts to reduce class time or increase class size can be perceived as ‘short-changing those whom they serve’ (Baumol, 1993: 19–20). This is compounded when work requires the ‘human touch’ involving face-to-face interactions between users and service ‘producers’ with interventions determined by individual cases (Baumol, 1993: 20). These points suggest it is difficult to increase ‘efficiency’ simply by reducing costs or work standardization. However, this has not deterred governments from pursuing reforms based on the three Es (‘economy’, ‘efficiency’ and ‘effectiveness’). In other words ‘doing more with less’ by utilizing cost reductions, including labour costs (‘economy’), alongside standardized initiatives designed to ensure public service employees are both ‘efficient’ and ‘effective’. This has meant improving consistency through work design based on standards and objectives, implemented through managerial performance controls. These have resulted in some real changes for public service employees, stimulating debates as to whether this policy results in ‘Taylorization’ with associated consequences for deskilling and degradation. Before considering these debates, it is necessary briefly to outline those concepts of Taylorism that provide a focus for the ensuing discussion and empirical analysis.

Centrally conceived work design follows the dissolution of the unity of the labour process, that is, where task conception is separated from its execution (Marx, 1976). This provided the basis for Taylorism whereby managers created efficiencies by taking responsibility for work design leaving workers to carry out the work itself (Taylor, 1911). This increases the subordination of labour to managerial control, since important aspects of knowledge pass from workers to managers. Therefore, work can be divided into smaller, standardized and routine operations that are, under intense supervision, given back to workers ‘piecemeal’, facilitating the division of labour and improving productivity (Taylor, 1911). In his critique of Taylorism, Braverman argued that this attempt by managers to gain detailed control over the labour process leads to the deskilling and degradation of work (1974: 118). Consequently, not only do workers lose the ability to direct the content of work and control their effort, the fragmentation and standardization of tasks allows work to be allocated between different workers, making it possible to substitute less skilled, cheaper labour to do the work (1974: 118).

Of course, this ‘direct control’ approach is not the only option available to managers. For example, with skilled or professional employees, it is advantageous to concede a degree of control through ‘responsible autonomy’ (Friedman, 1977: 78–9). Historically, given the nature of public service work, management strategies have tended to reflect ‘responsible autonomy’ rather than ‘direct control’. This was because, while working within ‘broad financial and legal constraints’, public service professionals have been able to exercise ‘considerable de facto control’ over the means and ends of service delivery (Kirkpatrick et al., 2005: 1–2). Such autonomy was based on trust that professionals would act in the public interest and was, to some extent, unavoidable and even desirable (Kirkpatrick et al., 2005: 1–2). Consequently, where work is centred on people and their problems, this led to a particular type of labour process. Social workers, for example, worked under a type of management known as ‘bureau-professionalism’ with staff supervision based on bureaucratic procedures alongside collegial support drawn from professional practice (Harris, 1998: 843). However, since the late 1970s government ministers have criticized this autonomy, claiming it led to waste and inefficiency. Subsequently, a raft of legislation, prescriptive targets and work methods were introduced throughout the 1980s and 1990s in a bid to increase accountability (Kirkpatrick et al., 2005: 2). Furthermore, in order to promote compliance, these initiatives were accompanied by private sector human resources (HR) practices and systems for monitoring performance (Bach and Della Rocca, 2000). Particularly under New Labour, managerial control was strengthened through internal mechanisms such as appraisals (Bach, 2005: 297), alongside external audits carried out by independent inspectorates (Kelly, 2003). In the NHS, for example, Cooke points out that New Labour ‘instituted a number of managerial and regulatory changes designed to tighten control of the health professions’ (2006: 224).

It has been argued that these developments do not necessarily mean professional practice will change significantly, reporting variable, uneven applications of reform across services such as health, social care and housing. Rather, public service institutions have demonstrated remarkable resilience with some professionals retaining a good degree of collective and professional control that has resisted or mediated change (Kirkpatrick et al., 2005). While this shows how such employees are able to maintain some control over the labour process, the reforms have nevertheless produced changes that some have experienced as increasing work standardization and fragmentation while reducing autonomy. For example, nurses have reported that the holistic care of patients has been undermined by ‘Taylorist’ practices (Corby, 1991: 176). Other studies refer to nursing practices based increasingly on routine (Brannon, 1994) while Bolton refers to the ‘step-by-step detail of how nursing tasks should be carried out’ (2004: 323). In schools, it has been highlighted how a standard national curriculum reduced teachers’ autonomy, leaving them with little input into educational content (Ironside and Seifert, 1995: 184–5). Consequently, teachers were deskilled as professionals, being recast as class-minders responsible for the local delivery of a centrally conceived curriculum and their performance monitored through appraisal (Ironside and Seifert, 1995: 184–5). These examples reveal how ministers and managers are taking responsibility for work design by introducing a range of prescriptive protocols. Therefore, a degree of standardization is achieved through conformity of practice reinforced by consistency of application facilitated through performance controls that, in ‘Taylorist’ style, increase the subordination of labour to management.

As indicated above, Taylorism extends to the changing division of labour within the workforce. Therefore, managers can reduce unit labour costs by employing cheaper staff on lower grades. The growth of support grades is well documented across the public services in the UK, for example: teaching assistants in schools (Bach et al., 2006; Ironside and Seifert, 1995); health care assistants (Grimshaw, 1999; Thornley, 2003) and maternity support workers (Prowse and Prowse, 2008) in the NHS; social work assistants in social care (Kessler et al., 2007); and community support officers in the police (Seifert, 2006). New Labour promoted a positive role for such employees in that they allow professionals to concentrate on those aspects of the job for which they are qualified while helping to reduce workloads and achieve explicit quality standards (Bach et al., 2006: 2). However, the promotion of support staff fuelled debates about whether assistant grades contributed to ‘Taylorization’, deskilling and degradation or whether the outcomes were more variable. Even before New Labour increased the use of support grades it was argued that the division of labour between teachers and supporting roles contributed to the ‘Taylorization’ of teaching work (Ironside and Seifert, 1995: 185). This is because once work is subjected to redesign and standardization, a more flexible approach to the labour process can be achieved. Therefore, deskilling occurs through a reduced reliance on expensive fully qualified teachers because more work can be undertaken by cheaper and less qualified assistants. Consequently, teaching becomes degraded as evidenced by a loss of job control and teachers working harder on a narrower range of core tasks (Ironside and Seifert, 1995: 185).

However, other research suggests outcomes of empowerment for employees in terms of more positive work experiences that include autonomy, career development, job satisfaction and workload relief. Looking into changing job boundaries between teachers and teaching assistants (TAs), Bach et al. (2006) found that teachers were actually extending their activities in terms of task delegation and managing TA activities. Although it was acknowledged that some teachers were ‘sensitive’ to changing occupational boundaries and implications for their professional status, this was related to maintaining professional standards rather than a threat to the teaching role (2006: 18–20). In another article concerning the impact of assistant roles in teaching and social care they argued that, while common principles were driving the modernization agenda, the outcomes were not universal (Bach et al., 2007: 1276). They investigated whether these roles were subjected to empowerment, degradation or a mixture of both. It was concluded that, in broad terms, changes in work organization resulted in a ‘positive-sum’ game with both roles acquiring benefits that suggested empowerment. For example, assistants reported job satisfaction, career opportunities and development, while professionals felt assistants provided them with workload relief and support in the classroom. However, some suggestions of degradation were found. Although assistants had some autonomy, they also experienced pressure of work. Also, while assistants provided professionals with workload relief, there was ‘some disquiet’ regarding role overlap and difficulties in co-ordinating teaching work activities with those of assistants (2007: 1288). Therefore, rather than the tendency towards degradation prioritized in labour process accounts, the indications pointed to ‘blended and potentially contradictory outcomes’ (2007: 1267). This conclusion was attributed to sub-sector differences including opportunities for career development and the degree of workforce regulation that shaped how assistant roles developed in different contexts (2007: 1289). Yet another article, by Kessler et al. (2007), looked at the deployment of TAs and social work assistants (SWAs) based on four typologies: ‘co-producer’ (providing complementary skills); ‘relief’ (removing burdens by undertaking non-core tasks); ‘apprentice’ (development towards full qualification); and ‘substitute’ (taking over core tasks). While SWAs were used either as an ‘apprentice’ or ‘substitute’, TAs acted more as a ‘relief’ or ‘co-producer’ (Kessler et al., 2007: 1650–61). Again, this was due to sub-sector differences. For example, core tasks defined by legislation and a national workload agreement allow only specific elements to be undertaken by TAs, whereas in social care the simple distinction between ‘statutory’ and ‘non-statutory’ cases meant that SWAs could substitute as the named worker on the latter (2007: 1650–61).

Previous research has identified possible variable outcomes of reform for public service employees, including evidence that support grades are not necessarily used to substitute for fully qualified staff. Therefore, since the NPS has experienced similar reforms, outcomes in terms of degradation and empowerment can be expected. However, as will be demonstrated, the net effects also need to be emphasized in that, while variable outcomes can be found among employee experiences, there is a clear ‘Taylorist’ character to work design and workforce reform in the Probation Service. Furthermore, there are important implications for deskilling and degradation, especially for fully qualified officers and the Service itself.

Research methods

The primary research reported in this article is based on an initial 2003 case study involving two Probation Service Areas employing around 400 staff. Service Areas indicated approximately 187 officers supervising offenders in probation teams and hostels, including 126 fully qualified probation officers (POs) and 61 probation service officers (PSOs), a lower qualified grade. At this time 25 semi-structured interviews were conducted. These included: 10 POs and seven PSOs in geographically dispersed teams; six senior officers with line management responsibilities including four senior probation officers (SPOs) and two senior practitioners (SPs); and two local union (NAPO) representatives. Also, out of 156 questionnaires sent to POs and PSOs in probation teams, 78 (50%) were returned. These were input into a statistical software program and analysed using frequencies and cross-tabulations.

As probation experienced ongoing reform, further interviews were conducted with NAPO in 2009–10 including two full-time national officers and four local representatives from a large Probation Trust, bringing the total number of interviews to 31. NAPO (formerly the National Association of Probation Officers) is now the Trade Union and Professional Association for Family Court and Probation Staff. Its membership includes a large majority of fully qualified POs and a significant number of PSOs. NAPO is concerned with pay and conditions but also campaigns over professional and policy issues such as training and the direction of criminal justice policy (NAPO, 2010b). Therefore, its responsibilities regarding membership concerns and engaging with ministers and employers enable it to provide important insights into local and national issues. All interview questions were designed to investigate how government and management reforms work in practice, the implications for the experience of work and trade union responses. The interviews were recorded, transcribed and analysed using a coding system for identifying themes and patterns in the data. In addition, various government, probation and trade union documents relating to reform and performance were collected between 2003 and 2010. The data presented draws on the qualitative data obtained from the interviews only and on secondary sources of relevance to themes covered.

Changes in probation work

Increasing marketization via NOMS and Probation Trusts requires managers to promote the three Es. This includes making savings through the forging of contracts with alternative providers (‘economy’). For example, offenders sentenced to doing unpaid work in the community will be supervised by private sector organizations in the future (UNISON, 2011). It is within this ‘doing more with less’ context that NPS employees must be ‘efficient’ and ‘effective’, leading to significant changes in the probation labour process. In the mid-1990s, it was suggested that managerial control and work standardization was increasing in the Probation Service (Oldfield, 1994). This is supported by the findings below.

Traditionally, probation work consisted of grassroots innovations promoting professional development through disseminating effective practice (Raynor et al., 1994: 29–30; Whitehead and Statham, 2006: 225). While this approach continues in some respects, the author’s research revealed how officers are increasingly required to work within parameters that limit their professional autonomy. The emphasis on enforcement included the introduction of centrally determined national standards which removed some of the discretion previously exercised by officers by requiring them to comply with rules; for example, when they should breach (return an offender to court) for missing appointments (Hedderman and Hough, 2004). The aim was to achieve consistency and ensure all officers worked towards common standards and objectives (Home Office, 1999: 1). In 1998, the government launched the ‘Effective Practice Initiative’, comprised of nationally accredited offending behaviour programmes based on research evidence of ‘what works’ in reducing reoffending (Furniss and Nutley, 2000). This was followed in 2003 by a national risk assessment tool, the Offender Assessment System (OASys), replacing various tools in use around the country and requiring all officers to ‘score’ offenders against common risk criteria when compiling court reports and determining supervision arrangements (Home Office, 2002: 1). These required officers to give priority to what authority figures argued were ‘effective’ ways of doing probation work. However, not all officers interviewed had complete faith in the efficacy of these initiatives, some believing that, while useful for prioritizing important criteria, they reduced probation work to a ‘tick box’ exercise at the expense of meaningful engagement with offenders that drew on a wider range of expertise. Furthermore, since these initiatives were linked to performance indicators with funding implications, compliance was driven through performance management including appraisal, capability and disciplinary procedures, underpinned by performance data gathered via internal inspections and external audits. As a line manager explained:

The evidence is there now if people aren’t performing as they should be, if they are not enforcing orders … these days you are finding that because of the monthly audit, that files are being pulled in, it’ll show up. (SPO 1)

NAPO officers confirmed the continuance of these issues as New Labour left office in 2010 but also explained how probation cases have been organized into different ‘tiers’. This relates to the NOMS Offender Management Model where cases are assessed for risk, assigned to one of four ‘tiers’, then allocated to an appropriate ‘offender manager’ (PO or PSO) (National Probation Service, 2005). Underpinning these tiers are four approaches: punish; help; change; and control. Cases are categorized as: tier one (lowest risk); tier two (low-medium); tier three (medium-high); and tier four (very high). While all cases require some form of punishment (tier one), progressively fewer require punish plus help (tier two), punish plus help plus change (tier three) and punish plus help plus change plus control (tier four) (Raynor, 2007: 1085). Interviewees also described a more recent change regarding pre-sentence reports (PSRs) for magistrates’ courts. These were generally done in a standard delivery report (SDR) format written by a fully qualified PO over a period of days and submitted to aid sentencing. However, National Officer 2 explained that the government want 70 per cent of these done in a fast delivery report (FDR) format. He explained that FDRs are ‘done on a different template’, have a fast turn-around time of a few hours and are ‘supposedly for use in lower risk of harm cases’. This was confirmed in a Probation Circular the purpose of which was:

To provide chief officers and executives with revised instructions for determining which type of pre-sentence report to use that will ensure standard delivery reports (SDRs) are only used where it is not possible to provide sufficient information to meet the needs of the court within the fast delivery report (FDR) format. (National Probation Service, 2009: 1)

NAPO subsequently issued a response, claiming this was another attempt to reduce costs and warned that this tendency toward a ‘leaner’ sentencing process ‘builds in more risk’ and was therefore dangerous for public protection (NAPO, 2009: 2).

Practitioners generally claim that risk assessment necessarily requires the expertise and professional judgement of fully qualified POs (Whitehead and Statham, 2006: 92). This suggests a managerial approach resembling ‘responsible autonomy’ rather than ‘direct control’. While it is not suggested that this ‘high trust’ approach has totally disappeared from the probation labour process, what is clear is that work has become more standardized, rendering it more amenable to managerial control. Initiatives such as national standards, the Effective Practice Initiative, OASys, ‘tiering’ and FDR templates are centrally conceived protocols to be executed by officers who are expected to ‘conform and perform’ in accordance with ‘best practice’. The way OASys works, for example, was described by a PO:

It has a manual, a prescribed manual alongside that you work with. So, if say, for instance, you know, you were trying to define an offence … as a section 49, 47, 39, anything like that. If you had some difficulty about how you would put it down … all you have to do is click on a manual and it will come down and tell you what to do. (PO 6)

This prescription was evident in probation documentation. For example, a Probation Circular revealed how officers could only depart from national standards with managerial consent: ‘in departing from the Standards (for example by reducing the frequency of contact or not taking breach action as required) discretion can be exercised only with the authority of a manager’ (Probation Unit, 2000: 2).

Both officers and their line managers described the emphasis on securing commitment to these initiatives:

For example, we have got a financially linked target around enforcement. If somebody fails enforcement on the audit, the managers will then get a letter from the Assistant Chief Officer asking them to directly have a conversation, a face to face consultation with that officer to find out why that case wasn’t enforced appropriately. (SPO 1)

She then explained that if the situation continues, despite support and training, then ‘you are talking disciplinary aren’t you?’ A PO confirmed this, stating that ‘what happens now is purely performance, it is have you met these targets … say, for instance, why didn’t you initiate the enforcement policy within two days, as required?’ (PO 6)

For probation officers, centrally conceived work design alongside a range of managerial performance controls weakens the democratic control associated with professional autonomy. This was the general feeling among POs. For example, PO 6 stated: ‘not only has the autonomy been taken away in terms of how we manage, how we deal with people, this issue of our discretion, which I think is crucially important, has also been removed from us’. PO 1 also commented that: ‘in some ways, I feel that the professional judgement and the autonomy that we had in the job has gone completely really’. A line manager acknowledged how POs felt saying: ‘the longer serving officers feel that their professional autonomy has been eroded and it has … there is no question about it in my mind that it has’ (SPO 2).

While the developments described above are suggestive of the increasing ‘Taylorization’ of probation work, this analysis needs to be extended to include accompanying changes in the division of labour.

The changing probation workforce

Although offender supervision takes place in a statutory context, it is sufficiently broadly defined to allow volunteers and assistants to work with offenders (Whitehead and Statham, 2006: 195). This eventually opened the way for work to be undertaken by different grades (POs and PSOs). Traditionally, POs undertook a two-year social work qualification at university (Nellis, 1996). However, the Conservative government suspended this in the early 1990s as it did not reflect the revised purpose of probation work. Consequently, a more enforcement-focused qualification was introduced in the mid-1990s (Knight and White, 2001). This two-year course involved a vocational competency-based qualification complemented by theoretical knowledge gained through an approved degree programme (Knight and White, 2001). As for PSOs, interviewees explained training was unregulated and therefore subject to geographical variations, but generally involved a 12-day in-house course with ongoing development through lower level vocational qualifications. Therefore, PSO training is much shorter and has less academic depth.

Historically, POs undertook core tasks such as writing court reports (PSRs), risk assessments and offender supervision with probation assistants undertaking a supportive role (May, 1991: 100). However, it transpired that this supporting role had not only developed but its remit had extended. The new ‘assistant’ now represented an officer grade in its own right (PSO) and one taking a more strategic role in probation work. In particular, PSOs were delivering accredited programmes and supervising low-medium risk cases. POs, on the other hand, appeared to be experiencing a reduction in the scope of their role, working more intensively on report writing, lengthy OASys risk assessments and supervising higher risk offenders. This arrangement was uncomfortable for longer serving POs who complained of spending less time engaging with offenders due to workload demands associated with paperwork and other performance requirements:

Again, you’ve got PSR targets to meet, you know, enforcement, OASys, it’s so time consuming and we’re being hammered the whole time … to meet these targets because they’re linked to funding. So, you’ve probably got less time to spend with the offender, in my opinion. (PO 8)

Another PO recalled a conversation she had with someone who was interested in joining the Service but was not sure whether to go for a PO or PSO job:

He said he actually wanted to work with people and I said well be a PSO then … because they seem to get more time to work with people than we do. It’s almost as if that time has been taken away from us … for us to be able to concentrate on doing the paperwork. (PO 10)

It was not only experienced officers who felt this way. For example, a relatively new PO explained that while she found the time to do ‘proper work with people’, she felt that when offenders presented problems she was always ‘clock-watching’ and conscious of time (PO 7). PSOs, on the other hand, reported a more positive experience, claiming they had plenty of offender contact and had varied and interesting work. As PSO 2 stated: ‘I like the variety in the job … there’s always a satisfaction seeing an offender come in on day one and move on … their life has changed, you know, it’s always satisfying to see how much it’s changed’. Furthermore, some PSOs described how their role provided opportunities to gain recognized qualifications. Therefore, alongside relatively higher levels of job satisfaction, this suggests an experience of empowerment for this grade of officer. This stood in contrast to the experience of POs who tended to talk more in terms of deskilling and degradation. However, PSO 6 commented that ‘PSOs could eventually become cheap POs’ and that he would rather be regarded ‘as a good PSO’.

Interestingly, under New Labour, the ratio of PSOs to POs increased. An experienced PO commented on this:

At the staff meeting yesterday what was so awful for many of us was we felt, where are the probation officers? At this staff meeting it seems to be all PSOs, programmes advisers and partnerships and the actual existing probation officers felt a very small part … it was just this notion, the actual probation officer bit of the Probation Service is just, sort of, like, shrivelling away in front of your eyes. (PO 9)

There was a suggestive hint of some resentment among POs, not towards their PSO colleagues personally, but at the way the PSO role was extending into aspects of their work. For example, PSO 3 referred to how POs think ‘PSOs are taking over the world’, while SPO 1 said that POs ‘felt a little pushed out because the PSO role has increased in importance’.

For those familiar with the realities of probation work, professional judgement involves analysis including: offence seriousness; risk of harm and re-offending; aggravating and mitigating factors; relevance of previous convictions; and individual needs (Whitehead and Statham, 2006: 224). This requires complex cognitive and interpersonal skills such as: building and sustaining relationships; listening; negotiation; and understanding the interplay of different factors (2006: 224). Consequently, the knowledge and autonomy of the fully qualified PO are considered critical. However, most interviewees commented that PSO numbers were increasing and that, while they now constitute a valuable staff group, the falling ratio of POs to PSOs was primarily related to cost and the potential savings to be made by hiving off aspects of probation work to other providers. For example:

I think that, for reasons of cost, linked to the fact that there’s an agenda to put out to tender to either private or voluntary sector organizations sections of probation work, it will diminish in the short term, I only see a growth in the PSO section. (Local Rep 3)

A report by the Centre for Crime and Justice Studies covering the period 2001–8 shows that, despite an overall rise in operational staff by 32 per cent, PO posts rose by 12 per cent while the number of professional trainees fell by 34 per cent. In contrast, there has been a 53 per cent rise in PSOs (Oldfield and Grimshaw, 2010: 3). For managers maintaining service delivery within tight budgets, such employees offer an attractive solution to an expensive ‘labour problem’. Furthermore, this cost logic has ideological underpinnings in that while the terms PO and PSO are still in use, they are sometimes generically referred to as ‘offender managers’. As Local Rep 4 explained, ‘It suits a certain ideological viewpoint to say that because you could be a PSO and be an offender manager. So, by having offender managers as the title, you can blur the boundaries very easily.’ This terminology is revealing in terms of supporting the broader managerial ideology of control over the labour process. In the quest for ‘efficiency’ through labour flexibility and lower labour costs, the ‘offender management model’, based on fragmented interventions by various ‘offender managers’ serves to legitimize the allocation of work between different grades.

Under the ‘tiering’ framework the majority of cases can be expected to accumulate around the low-medium range of the risk spectrum (tiers one and two) where PSOs already find most of their work. However, there is potential for PSOs getting involved in higher risk cases. NAPO officers described how this happens:

When it first started off PSOs, who could be offender managers, but only in low risk cases, straight unpaid work, stuff like that. Maybe ‘drink drivers’ or low intensity alcohol work … but now they’re being briefed on ‘sex offenders’ and ‘domestic violence’. So, the level of work they’re starting to do is creeping up. (Local Rep 4)

Increasingly … although they are supposed to only have responsibility for tiers one and two, in terms of managing risk, they do supervise in tiers three and, er, I guess in four … there’s quite a bit that slips under the radar, you know what I mean, when staffing is short and people are willing, they do take on and are, you know, sort of required by some managers, responsibility for things that they are not adequately trained or paid to do. (Local Rep 3)

It was a similar story with regard to the latest developments regarding court reports. When asked about responsibility for FDRs, National Officer 2 replied, ‘All FDRs should be done by POs, but that doesn’t happen across the country; because of role boundary erosion, PSOs also write FDRs.’ This was confirmed by Local Rep 5 who described how POs were being replaced by PSOs in magistrates’ courts in their area.

Although PSO experiences were more aligned with the concept of empowerment suggesting role variations such as ‘relief’, ‘co-producer’ or ‘apprentice’, they are nevertheless cheaper labour in terms of both pay and training. While this could be attributed to staff shortages and PO training suspension, an alternative interpretation of reducing labour costs through labour substitution is equally feasible. Hence NAPO’s concern about the potential for PSOs to take on work for which they are not suitably qualified. In a response to the required changes in court reports (FDRs), NAPO called it:

a further step on the role boundary erosion route, involving the increasing deployment of PSO staff to manage higher RoH [risk of harm] cases. It is an understandable route which Areas are following, since it is driven by extraneous cost-cutting imperatives, but it is not a sensible business risk decision for the Probation Service – or for NOMS. (NAPO, 2009: 3)

Therefore, along with the potential risks of relying on lower qualified staff, there are degradation issues related to terms and conditions. As Grugulis and Lloyd suggest, labour process researchers need ‘to widen their remit to cover broader aspects of job quality’ (2010: 107). In other words, to research what these developments mean for pay and career opportunities (2010: 107). This can be considered in the probation context.

According to the Jobs4U Careers Database, ¹ PO salaries range from £27,914 to £35,727 p.a., while PSO salaries range from £21,179 to £27,102 p.a. Therefore, at the top of the scale PSOs earn around £8000 less than a PO. NAPO officers talked about a cohort of around 400 Trainee Probation Officers (TPOs) who had completed their training. Some of them were former PSOs wishing to further their careers and enhance their earnings. However, upon qualifying they were offered only PSO contracts or faced unemployment. NAPO took a delegate of TPOs to put their case to Justice Minister Jack Straw on 27 October 2009 and subsequently some were able to transfer into permanent PO posts (NAPO, 2010c: 7). A battle won perhaps, but the tension between a professionally qualified workforce and controlling labour costs remains. In early 2008 training was deemed inadequate for the changing workforce profile and once again suspended (McKnight, 2009: 339). A new ‘grow your own’ training programme was introduced in 2010 but the extent to which this will provide PSOs with sufficient career opportunities remains to be seen. A consultation paper emphasized the need for career progression for PSOs wanting to become POs, commenting on the lack of minimum standards for PSO training despite PSOs constituting over 50 per cent of the practitioner workforce. It also acknowledged that ‘the roles they undertake are increasing in complexity and in the level of risk they assess’ (Ministry of Justice, 2009: 8). However, while it was recognized that not all PSOs will wish to progress to the PO grade, the point was made that the NPS will not require all PSOs to become POs (2009: 9). Therefore, as demonstrated by this research, changes in work design and the division of labour appear to be facilitating a Probation Service increasingly reliant on less qualified and lower paid officers.

Conclusion

Government and managerial reforms represent a conscious strategy intended to improve public service delivery. However, the ensuing changes have prompted debates as to whether the outcomes for employees (for example, in education and social care) amounted to ‘Taylorization’ with consequences for deskilling and degradation, or to empowerment. This research considered these issues in the probation context, focusing on changes in the labour process and their implications for probation work and the employees that perform it. In so doing it provides an interesting insight into the experience of work for employees in a sub-sector that is relatively less well known. It also connects with the wider trend in public services generally where, in a bid to control costs, reforms have tended to be underpinned by narrow assumptions that ‘doing more with less’ is synonymous with quality improvements.

To summarize the findings and analysis, this research shows how government reforms and NPM have facilitated a shift in the locus of control within the probation labour process with ministers and managers taking responsibility for work design. This is reinforced through performance controls to ensure officers work ‘efficiently’ and ‘effectively’ while contributing to the achievement of desired objectives. Therefore, the findings illustrate how probation work has been ‘Taylorized’, with initiatives conceived at the centre and executed locally by officers under increased subordination to managerial control. This situation is also related to changes in the division of labour evidenced by an increase in the number of PSOs responsible for more areas of probation work formerly within the remit of the PO role. The consequences for fully qualified POs included reduced autonomy along with less time to engage with offenders in order to comply with the increasing workload demands of performance management. PSOs, on the other hand, seemed more satisfied in their work, had more offender contact and increased opportunities to improve their qualifications. Therefore, the findings suggest different outcomes with POs describing experiences associated with deskilling and degradation, while PSOs described an outcome of empowerment. However, regardless of different experiences, the findings also emphasize the net effects of reforms. This is important considering the overall potential for deskilling and degradation whereby the NPS appears to be relying increasingly on a harder working, less autonomous, less qualified and cheaper workforce. This prompts important questions regarding the extent to which service quality (in this case reduced re-offending and improved public protection) will be achieved.

While this research contributes to an understanding of the implications of government reforms, further research incorporating more Probation Trusts in order to extend this analysis is recommended. Future research questions could therefore consider the potential impact of aggressive public spending cuts on the NPS. For example, in a volatile economic context characterized by increased competition, how will the recently established probation training programme contribute to the development and utilization of PSOs? Most importantly, what will this mean for existing role boundaries and the ‘efficiency’ and ‘effectiveness’ of the NPS in the future?