The Need for a Probation Library
| Date | 01 April 1931 |
| Published date | 01 April 1931 |
| DOI | 10.1177/026455053100100701 |
| Author | Gertrude Tuckwell |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
1
Probatiod
The Journal of the National Association of Probation Officers.
The Need for a Probation Library.
By MISS GERTRUDE TUCKWELL, C.H., J.P. (
Vice-President, National Association of Probation Officers
).
&dquo;
Just as the coming of the dawn brings colour and
In England and Wales there are 770 probation officers,
life into the landscape, so science and education bring
while the Probation of Offenders (Scotland) Bill which
light into human problems.&dquo; Thus wrote a scholar of
has just passed the second reading in the House of
the nineteenth century, and the present century bids
Commons will, we hope, extend to Scotland the inestim-
fair to bring increasing light into all our social problems.
able benefits of an efficient probation service. I cannot
One of the least understood and most perplexing of
estimate the number of probation officers who will be
those problems is delinquency. The indignation we
appointed under the Scottish Bill, but there are 70
all feel at crime, particularly brutal crime, fills us with
Royal Burghs in Scotland each of which presumably
so much
emotion that we are compelled to action if only
would require its probation service.
to relieve our pent-up feelings, and the easiest release to
In England and Wales many courts are still waiting
that emotion was always by retaliation. Perhaps it
for women probation officers, and it is therefore within
was the brutality of the community in its retaliation
reasonable probability that before many years are past
against the delinquent that fired the imagination of the
the probation system in the United Kingdom will
first social workers and lighted the enthusiasm of the
embrace the service of more than a thousand workers.
missionaries.
A glance back to the conditions of fifty years ago
In 1876 the Howard League circulated a letter
shows what totally changed conceptions we all now have
written by Mr. Kynnersley (a well-known Birmingham
of delinquency and of effective ways of...
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