A report published today by HM Inspectorate of Probation is highly critical of the work that Community Rehabilitation Companies (CRCs) carry out with domestic violence offenders. The role of CRCs is to supervise and provide structured programmes for low risk offenders in the community (including post-custody supervision). The report found that although there has been a 23 % increase in offences related to domestic abuse recorded by the police in the year to March 2018, (representing nearly 600,000 offences), a small proportion of these offenders are being offered perpetrator programmes, the number of perpetrator programme starts had decreased in the two previous years for which figures are available and an increasing proportion of offenders were failing to complete the programme<\/p>\n
The inspectors found that there were too few referrals to the nationally accredited Building Better Relationships programme, and that a range of non-evidence based programmes were being delivered. Overall there was found to be a lack of \u00a0staff knowledge and confidence to properly manage domestic violence offenders or to deliver the requisite programmes. The report found that: \u2018The lack of knowledge, skill and time dedicated to managing domestic abuse led to considerable shortfalls in the quality of case management\u2019<\/p>\n
You can download the report\u00a0here. <\/a><\/p>\n You can see an article in the Guardian covering this topic here.<\/a><\/p>\n