A systematic review into the effectiveness of Integrated Offender Management
| Author | Emma Holdsworth,Emma Hadfield,Sarah Brown,Emma Sleath |
| Date | 01 November 2021 |
| DOI | 10.1177/1748895820912295 |
| Published date | 01 November 2021 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
https://doi.org/10.1177/1748895820912295
Criminology & Criminal Justice
2021, Vol. 21(5) 650 –668
© The Author(s) 2020
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DOI: 10.1177/1748895820912295
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A systematic review into the
effectiveness of Integrated
Offender Management
Emma Hadfield
Emma Sleath
Coventry University, UK
Sarah Brown
USC, Australia; Coventry University, UK
Emma Holdsworth
Coventry University, UK
Abstract
Integrated Offender Management was introduced by the Home Office and Ministry of Justice in
2009. Since its introduction, it has been piloted, developed and implemented across probation
and policing areas within England and Wales. The scheme aims to reduce reoffending through the
targeting of specific cohorts of offenders within local areas. Understanding its overall effectiveness
would therefore be paramount in supporting its ongoing development. This article presents a
systematic review of the research regarding the effectiveness of Integrated Offender Management.
There were 15 articles reviewed in this regard, using a search criterion and assessment of the
research aims. The findings revealed key areas which impact upon effectiveness: partnerships;
locality and offender cohorts; finance; and workforce.
Keywords
Effectiveness, female offending, Integrated Offender Management, policing, Prolific and other
Priority Offender, systematic review
Corresponding author:
Emma Hadfield, Coventry University, Coventry CV1 5FB, UK.
Email: hadfiele@uni.coventry.ac.uk
912295CRJ0010.1177/1748895820912295Criminology & Criminal JusticeHadfield et al.
research-article2020
Article
Hadfield et al. 651
Introduction
The Ministry of Justice and Home Office introduced the Integrated Offender Management
(IOM) policy in 2009. Its purpose was to provide a broad framework for Local Criminal
Justice Boards (LCJBs) and other relevant partnerships to manage adult offenders within
the IOM framework. The policy stated that with existing partnerships, such as LCJBs
and other such bodies, improvements in community safety, crime reduction and effi-
ciency had been achieved. More specifically, at a localised delivery level, operational
partnerships involved in programmes such as the Prolific and other Priority Offender
(PPO) and Drug Interventions Programme (DIP) ‘. . . had been associated with a period
of sustained reductions in crime’ (Ministry of Justice and Home Office, 2009: 5). Thus,
the policy advocated for the development of an IOM framework based upon current and,
arguably, successful partnerships and offender schemes.
IOM is ‘an overarching framework for bringing together agencies in local areas to
prioritise interventions with offenders who cause crime in their locality’ (Home Office,
2010: 1). The Home Office (2010) suggested that local IOM arrangements would be
most effective when they involved all local agencies, inclusive of statutory and volun-
tary, with the latter playing their own role in tackling the factors and risks associated with
offending behaviour. In addition, the IOM framework would become more structured
and co-ordinated once the local PPO and DIP programmes/schemes were embedded,
allowing for the continuation of their successes (Home Office, 2010). More broadly, it
was argued that IOM would help to (1) reduce the number of people becoming victims
of crime, (2) reduce the negative impact of local crime and (3) improve the public’s con-
fidence in the criminal justice system (Home Office, 2010: 2). Furthermore, an IOM
framework would be one in which local partnership arrangements prioritised those
offenders who caused the most damage to their local communities. Such offenders could
include targeted offenders on statutory supervision who required additional support to
hold them in compliance, that is, PPO and DIP offenders (Home Office, 2010).
In essence, the IOM framework was not planned to create additional structures with
partner agencies, but to provide an ‘umbrella’ under which existing management struc-
tures and schemes could be delivered in a more coherent and consistent manner. Within
the Home Office’s (2010) principles, it was stipulated that partners would be working
together (i.e. multi-agency partnerships) to focus on offenders as individuals, rather than
their offences, in order to effectively reduce reoffending. This would be achieved through
delivering a local response to local problems (Principle 2). A further three principles
were included: (1) offenders facing their responsibilities, knowing what is expected of
them (i.e. their engagement requirements which would be balanced with efforts of moti-
vating offenders to change), as failure to do so would result in them facing the conse-
quences (i.e. intensity of punishment necessary to disrupt their criminal lifestyles); (2)
making better use of existing programmes (such as PPO); and (3) all offenders at high
risk of causing serious harm and/or reoffending are ‘in scope’ (intensity of management
directly relates to severity of risk, whether statutory or voluntary).
A new set of Key Principles was introduced in 2015, which reproduced the details
outlined in 2010, but also included additional elements, specific to each of the five key
principles (Home Office, 2015). For example, it was stipulated that local IOM processes
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