Probation Service failing to assess thousands who pose risk to women, watchdog says

The Probation Service in England and Wales is failing to monitor and assess tens of thousands of offenders who pose a serious risk to women and girls, a watchdog has told the Guardian.

Martin Jones, HM chief inspector of probation, launching a six-month inquiry into failings in public protection, said it was inevitable there would be more murders, rapes and serious sexual offences without an improvement.

His comments come amid concerns there is a shortfall of staff in the Probation Service, and as the government increases its workload by having more criminals in the community tagged and monitored.

Jones said several inspections had found that about a third of offenders who were released into the community were not properly assessed.

He said: “What that means, in really sharp terms, is that [probation staff] do not understand enough about the risk of the people that they’re managing. Where they do have information, they’re not utilising that to mitigate and manage that risk. And what that means, sadly, is that women and children are at risk of violence in some way, largely perpetrated by men on probation.

“The probation service is managing 160,000 offenders in the community. We have found that two-thirds of those cases – around 100,000 cases – are not being managed properly … So we are talking about tens of thousands of people who pose a risk to women and girls.”

Referring to the case of Damien Bendall, who was categorised as “low risk” by probation staff before murdering an entire family in 2021, Jones warned there would be further examples of serious failings by the Probation Service without urgent reforms.

He said: “It’s inevitable that the deficit in public protection leads to increased risk to the public, and I would anticipate that unless it is properly tackled, you will see an increase in the number of serious further offences that are taking place.”

Plans were outlined in the sentencing bill to increase the number of offenders monitored through electronic tagging. Last week the government announced that up to 22,000 more offenders would be tagged each year, under its “plan for change”.

Jones said tagging should not be seen as easy to oversee or a way of reducing serious crime. He said: “Bendall wore a tag but it did not prevent his crimes. And with most offenders, they need help tackling addiction, getting somewhere to live and get a job. Tagging does not help them either.”

He said the ability to share information was vital for improving public protection. “If probation don’t understand the risk that somebody poses – that you don’t understand who, for example, is living in a house and the risk of domestic abuse – then you will end up with more tragedies.”

Jones’s team has conducted more than 40 inspections of probation offices, which assessed their duty to protect the public, and each one was rated as “inadequate” or “requires improvement”.

In one case examined by Jones’s inspectors, police had been called out to the address of a domestic abuse perpetrator 11 times in five years. The probation service knew children were in the house but had not asked the police for any more detail about the incidents and did not understand enough about how the partner of this perpetrator and their children were at risk.

In another, probation officers found that a man who posed a risk to his partner and children received no response when they visited his home three times. Staff should have questioned why he was avoiding visits but did not escalate their concerns with children’s services.

Jones said the watchdog’s inspectors would suspend all of their usual inspections of probation offices for six months to concentrate on public protection.

The MoJ has been approached for comment.

• Information and support for anyone affected by rape or sexual abuse issues is available from the following organisations. In the UK, Rape Crisis offers support on 0808 500 2222 in England and Wales, 0808 801 0302 in Scotland, or 0800 0246 991 in Northern Ireland. In the US, Rainn offers support on 800-656-4673. In Australia, support is available at 1800Respect (1800 737 732). Other international helplines can be found at ibiblio.org/rcip/internl.html