Aubrey Fox spoke with Phil Bowen, the director of the Center's London office, about his new paper on "community payback" (or "community service," as it is more commonly known in the United States). What follows is a short transcript of the conversation.
Your new paper, published today, is called “Payback with a Purpose.” Why did you choose to call it that?
Community payback is the most visible way in which offenders can demonstrate that they are atoning for their crimes in the communities they have harmed. It can play a vital purpose in letting every citizen know that their justice system is making sure offenders are being held to account. Lastly, and not least, the purpose of payback can be to help offenders do a good day’s work in helping repair a community and reflect on their role in keeping that community safe in the future.
What, in your opinion, is the most important finding in the paper?
The most important reflection on the changes in payback in New York City is that its not only the things that can be measured that count. The New York City experience shows how vital it is that there is a shared vision and shared values about what role the justice system ought to play, not all of which can be captured in dollar values or performance targets.
Anything else stand out in particular?
It sounds commonsensical but, from a practice point of view, how vital it is to get offenders at court signed up to do their mandate and work it off quickly. The immediacy of the intake, right there at court, and the immediacy of getting the hours of work done as soon as possible after sentence is incredibly valuable. I think this makes intuitive sense to the bloke on the street but it does not happen in practice as much as it should.
Much of your paper focuses on improvements in practice, such as making sure that offenders given a mandate of community payback start it immediately. Why is that focus on practice important?
I think, in a time of shrinking budgets and a policy focus on new financing models like payment by results, it is important to remember why the system exists in the first place- to deliver justice through swift and sure punishment and help the offenders from never coming back to court again. That is what thousands of practitioners do every day and our job is to support them to do their jobs as effectively as possible.
Why is community payback a hot topic in the UK at the moment?
Part of the debate around criminal justice at the moment is how to open up services to new providers, normally away from traditional state providers. The hypothesis is that this will deliver greater reductions in recidivism and inspire new innovation. In the probation world, the first big contract has been to give responsibility for the delivery of payback to a private firm, Serco, in partnership with London Probation Trust. It is likely to be the first of many.
What’s next for community payback in the UK?
It’s hard to say. The New York City experience shows that opening up services to alternative providers can help raise everyone’s game. But the strength of that approach has been its fundamental commitment to understanding the needs of local communities and delivering a vision of community payback that is meaningful to them, to the offenders and to the courts. The Centre stands ready to support any provider with that commitment to delivering payback with a purpose.
October 16, 2012