Ian Austin – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Ian Austin on 2016-03-01.

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what assessment he has made of the effect of the introduction of the National Probation Service on the supervision of offenders found guilty of domestic abuse.

Andrew Selous

The National Probation Service (NPS) is responsible for initial risk assessments in all cases, including domestic abuse. Following sentence, it allocates each case either to a Community Rehabilitation Company or to the NPS itself, depending upon the assessed level of risk. The NPS is responsible for the supervision of all offenders assessed as presenting a high risk of serious harm and those who are subject to multi-agency public protection arrangements (MAPPA). These will include higher-risk and MAPPA offenders convicted for offences of domestic abuse.

The performance of the NPS is closely monitored through a set of performance measures. In addition, HM Inspectorate of Probation has carried out a series of inspections of the early implementation of the previous Government’s Transforming Rehabilitation reforms.