From Amateur to Professional
| Date | 01 September 1976 |
| Published date | 01 September 1976 |
| DOI | 10.1177/026455057602300308 |
| Author | Murray C.L. Bruggen |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
would not want to do exactly as I used to do and I would wish to
respond to the wider opportunities, the better facilities and the more
challenging atmosphere. So to that extent there has been real change.
REFERENCES
1. This is an opportunity to thank my colleagues at Wigston for their
unambiguous welcome and especially David Straker, Senior Probation Officer,
from whom I have learnt a great deal.
2. Davies, M. Probationers in their Social Environment. HMSO 1969.
3. See, e.g. Hunt, J. Reflections on Parole in: Parole: Implications for the
Criminal Justice and Penal Systems. Ed. D. Thomas. Institute of Criminology,
University of Cambridge 1974.
4. Davies, M. Prisoners of Society. Routledge and Kegan Paul 1974.
5. I am grateful to Laurence Coates, Assistant Chief Probation Officer,
Leicestershire, for help at this point.
From Amateur to Professional
MURRAY C. L. BRUGGEN
Chairman NAPO
The early veneration of the dilettante became in industrial Britain a high
regard for the amateur and a deep suspicion of the professional. This
may well have produced a nation of sportsmen but as a national
characteristic it has given rise to many anomalies, of which some of the
most obvious are in the criminal justice system. The main burden of
enforcing laws passed by what is at most a semi-professional legislature,
falls on an almost entirely lay magistracy. At high judicial levels it is
understandable that legal training is necessary and therefore mandatory,
but sad that knowledge of criminology, penology and sociology should be
’
entirely optional.
It was as a means of intervening between the court and an almost
inevitable sentence of imprisonment that the police court missionary and
later the probation officer began to appear as an alternative supervisor
providing amateur care within the community. Early motivation of the
Probation Service was that of an evangelical Christian fighting to gain
any entry into the court procedures and prepared to make great compro-
mises for such...
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