ABSTRACT
Chapter 2 discussed attempts in the Probation Service to develop work with racially motivated offenders, and suggested that there had been progress towards more informed and sensitive practice, but that this had been slow and remained uneven, with many probation officers remaining uncertain about their ability to work effectively with this group of offenders and, as a result, inclined to avoid doing so. Practitioners were not helped by inconsistent messages from the centre, which, following the publication of the Macpherson Report (1999), initially appeared committed to the development of specialist programmes that could be delivered both to groups and one-to-one (Dixon 2002). For various reasons, however, including uncertainty about the number of racially motivated offenders likely to be available to be worked with, and the lack of evidence that the criminogenic needs of such offenders were substantially different from those of generalist offenders, it was concluded that there was no case for accrediting a specialist programme. Instead, on advice from the Correctional Services Accreditation Panel, the National Probation Directorate decided in 2002 that work should progress down three ‘pathways’. First, the impact of general offending behaviour programmes on the attitudes and beliefs of racially motivated offenders was to be tested over a two-year period. Second, new elements that might be relevant to racist motivation were to be gradually incorporated into existing programmes. Third, if experience with the first two approaches suggested it was necessary, a new one-to-one programme specifically for offenders convicted of racially aggravated offences could be added to the established One-to-One programme (Pillay 2003). By the end of 2004, it appeared that the official line was that One-to-One was the programme recommended for racially aggravated offenders, and it was being adapted, with a ‘practical guide’, to improve its relevance for work with this group (NPS 2004).
