Bail Schemes: The Failure of Reformism
| Date | 01 June 1989 |
| DOI | 10.1177/026455058903600212 |
| Published date | 01 June 1989 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Bail Schemes:
The Failure of
Reformism
By participating in bail schemes,
probation officers collude in
the denial of rights to uncon-
victed defendants, provide
inappropriate advocacy
and delay action on the
real issues of pre-trial
criminal justice, argues
Jeremy Cameron,
Probation Officer in
Walthamstow,
N E London.
ebates about bail schemes have
~
rumbled on for well over a year now,
yet NAPO has got nowhere with the
.
issue.
’
Quite e~rdinarily, after three
,
debates at NEC and one at the AGM the
&dquo;
union still does not have a policy on bail
schemes: all the votes have been against so~nething, none for something. Thus,
despite a clear majority at the 1988 AGM against participation in the schemes,
management is entitled to believe that there will not be significant resistance from
NAPO
to participation. The schemes are therefore being introduced, and it is rea-
sonable to assume that people will apply for the jobs.
The Home Office wants bail schemes. That, one might think, is a bad start.
Imprisonment is very expensive, and all governments are interested in cutting
expenditure. The Home Office would therefore like to cut the numbers of people
in prison, both before and after sentence. There are two problems about this,
however, First, their supporters want people locked up. Second, they might have
to tackle the
78
cause of
the problems.
After sentence, the government therefore proposes PIC. We know that the
problem is sentencing practice, but this
be granted bail without all this infor-
is too tricky to handle. The Green
mation :
no-one
would
seriously
Paper .on Punishment in the Communi-
pretend that anyone not entitled to bail
ty therefore puts forward something
will suddenly be granted it, so they
even worse than imprisonment, but
should be granted it anyway. Instead,
much cheaper, in the hope that courts
though, they are suddenly having to
will use it. And
why is it much cheaper?
prove why they should be granted bail.
Partly because it doesn’t involve resi-
Surreptitiously the whole theoretical
dential costs, and partly because they
...
To continue reading
Request your trial