Management Board Briefing
Key points from the Management Board briefing held on the 24th September 2009
Matter arising
Ministerial approval had been received for judges to come out of the OCPA process. This was a major step in the right direction and should make it easier for the Board to recruit more judges. However, it was important for there to remain a process of interviewing those who expressed an interest to ensure that they understood the role of the Parole Board and what was involved. The Parole Board is seeking the equivalent of 6 full time judges and this has been accepted as reasonable by the MOJ. Retired judges will have their fees adjusted so that they reflected the going rate for the job.
It was confirmed that as Linda McHugh was retiring, her vacancy on the Management Board needed to be advertised without delay. It was also agreed that Huw Vaughan Thomas should be appointed as Chair of the Audit and Risk Management Committee. In view of the uncertainty about the future it was agreed that the appointment should be for an initial period of one year and then subject to review. He would also be an ex officio member of the Management Board.
Policy Issues
The Future of the Parole Board
Arrangements were now in place to consult with members and staff about the future and there had been an encouraging response to attend the meetings taking place in October. The meeting agreed that the paper prepared by the Chairman had been very helpful. It was now a matter of awaiting the results of the meetings before finalising the Boards response.
NAO Report/Public Accounts Committee
The meeting noted the current position concerning the NAO/PAC recommendations. The Chairman said that he would soon be meeting with Dominic Grieve and had recently corresponded with Lord Corbett who had raised concerns about delays.
Report on Monitoring, Evaluation and Feedback
Consideration was given to the experience of panels receiving feedback which was negative and too detailed; although the assessors had become more practiced and less picky, it was acknowledged that feedback which assessed reasons as not up to standard could undermine the confidence and commitment of members. It was agreed that the future of assessment and monitoring lay in concentrating on the overall quality of the judgements and analysis produced by the panel, and that the reasons quality should not rest on one detail or error.
Report on the Review Committee
The Paper reviewed the role and composition of the Review Committee. The current remit was too wide and should concentrate on serious cases which attracted public concern. Clarification of the role of the Review Committee would help particularly with the high profile cases. The meeting supported the general direction of change contained in the paper. There was general agreement that learning from cases should be taken forward via the Joint Review Panel as suggested. It was agreed that the Review Committee should take the detailed decisions at its meeting in November.
Performance
Performance and statistics
Performance in most areas remained good. However, oral hearings continued to suffer due to lack of judges. The backlog was wholly and completely unacceptable and could not be tolerated. It was anticipated that some improvement would be seen as the number of IPP chairs increased. Performance was also affected by late dossiers and problems with IT.
Intensive Case Management
The ICM process was working well and the figures in the paper supported the general approach and decisions made. Members and staff had worked extremely hard to improve the position and it was agreed that a letter should be sent expressing appreciation.
Situation Report on the Representations for Re-Release Team
The problems faced by the Re4Re team were being addressed. In particular, MOJ Internal Audit had carried out a review of the work and an action plan had been formulated which was aimed at improving efficiency and communication. Many of the problems emanated from PPCS who were faced with staff shortages and an office move and this had contributed to them submitting papers very late.
Financial update 2009/10
The key number in the accounts is that expenditure is below budget by £307k. Further work has to be done on the mid year forecast, in particular on the number of three member oral hearing judges, to assess what the year end outcome will be. The Board is constrained by the number of judges in the amount of hearings it can list. There was a deficit brought forward at the beginning of the year of £176k and the Board therefore needs to be in surplus this year.
Judicial Reviews
The Board had lost the case of Pennington heard in the High Court on 14.9.09 which concerned an IPP prisoner. The court ruled that there had not been a speedy determination of the case and the delay was in breach of Article 5(4) and compensation should be awarded.
Recruitment
72 applications had been received for the Director of Performance and Development post. 15 went through the assessment centre and of those 5 were to be interviewed.
Equality and Diversity
The Equality and Diversity Steering Group met on 14.9.09 and good progress had been made. This was Linda McHughs last meeting as Diversity Champion. After some discussion Alison Stone said that she was willing to take on the role of Diversity Champion on an interim basis.
Health and Safety Risk Register
The meeting discussed the Risk Register and some surprise was expressed that work related driving was the top risk. Advice in the Members Handbook did warn against excessive driving times. The rating in the risk register showed that the likelihood was low but the severity could be high should an accident happen. The meeting agreed the Health and Safety Risk Register.
Any other business
The revised Members Handbook which had recently been circulated was excellent and a vote of thank was recorded for the hard work that had clearly been involved.
Vote of Thanks
The Chairman expressed his appreciation on behalf of the Management Board to Linda McHugh for all her hard work in several different capacities over the past 7 years. Linda said that she had thoroughly enjoyed her time on the Parole Board and expressed her appreciation to the staff and her fellow members for the support and encouragement that she had been given.
The Parole Board. Working with others to protect the public.