Labour announces creation of new Community and Victim Payback Boards as party gets tough on anti-social behaviour

Monday, 11 April 2022 00:01

Keir Starmer will today (Monday) announce Labour’s pledge to create Community and Victim Payback Boards (CVPBs) to strengthen community and victim involvement in community sentences, get tough on antisocial behaviour and stop more serious reoffending at source. Labour’s plan to get tough on low-level offending through unpaid work will begin to rebuild communities’ trust in the criminal justice system, after a decade of court closures, criminal case delays and the...Request free trial

Labour’s plan to get tough on low-level offending through unpaid work will begin to rebuild communities’ trust in the criminal justice system, after a decade of court closures, criminal case delays and the decline in community payback under the Conservatives. The new orders and CVPBs will help to reassure communities that crimes are being punished, offenders are being rehabilitated and communities are being paid back.

Community and Victim Payback Boards will be operated by Community Safety Partnerships (or other existing similar local infrastructure), with guidance from the Criminal Justice System, the Local Authority or other key agencies.

CVPBs will operate through existing local infrastructure at no additional cost and create a new level of involvement for community leaders and victims of crime in deciding what unpaid work offenders must undertake, such as removing graffiti, clearing wasteland or re-decorating community centres.

Local data will be published on the nature of unpaid work offenders and showing whether community payback has been completed so that communities and victims can be sure that justice is being served and offenders are paying areas back for their crimes.

Labour’s announcement comes as the party releases new research about the failure of community sentencing under the Conservatives. Labour’s research found that:

The number of community sentences handed down fell by one quarter in three years between 2017 and 2020
The number of hours of community payback hours being completed by offenders as part of community sentences fell by three quarters in the last five years
The number of hours of existing community payback being completed by offenders has been falling in every region in nearly every year since 2016
The East Midlands and West Midlands saw the largest falls in the number of community service hours completed.

Keir Starmer MP, Leader of the Labour Party, said:

“After 12 years of Conservative government, which has seen record criminal case delays, police officers disappearing from our streets, police station closures and court sell-offs, communities have no faith that the criminal justice system is keeping their communities safe from crime.

“Community payback can stop more serious reoffending, but Judges have stopped handing it out because this soft-on-crime Conservative Government cannot be trusted to make sure offenders pay back for their crimes.

“Labour will put security at the heart of its contract with the British people. We’ll put communities and victims at the heart of how offenders repay society and make sure justice is being seen to be delivered locally.”

ENDS

Notes to editors:

Community and Victim Payback Boards: Background

Community and Victim Payback boards are bodies made up of representatives of ward Safer Neighbourhood boards, nominated community members, victims’ representatives, and professionals who either live and/or work in the borough.

Community and Victim Payback Boards will determine how the unpaid work components of community sentences that see offenders giving back to their communities and victims are delivered.

Safer Neighbourhood boards usually comprise local councillors, lay members, members of voluntary groups and other local community members to help guide police priorities for crime prevention in their areas. Each board will nominate a representative to join the borough-level Community and Victims board.

Community and Victim Payback Orders will be ranked by degrees of severity, reflecting the judgment handed down in each case. Each level of severity will reflect the number of hours of community payback assignment handed down by the judge, ratcheting-up the length of punishment delivered. The level of victim payback order would be decided by the court.

It could be the case that voluntary groups play a role in the delivery of the unpaid work assignments alongside the probation service. This would be defined by local circumstances.

For non-attendance or failure to be punctual, the severity of the payback order would be referred to the presiding Judge to be ratcheted up. The probation service would then re-determine how the order is fulfilled, again based on the types of work and projects identified by the Community Payback Boards, ensuring that community payback is completed.

The aim of this is both to reduce reoffending by increasing the use of community order and rebuild trust between communities and the Criminal Justice System that crimes are being punished, offenders are being rehabilitated and communities are being paid back.

Today’s new announcement is part of Labour’s local election Community Crime Crackdown. Labour will:

Make offenders pay back to the communities they’ve harmed with new Community and Victim Payback Orders. Local people and victims will have a say in how offenders pay back through new Community and Victim Orders.

Set up new Police Hubs in our towns to put police back on the streets. We’ll give residents direct access to share their concerns and secure their communities. This will be paid for by switching taxpayer money from Boris Johnson’s £250 million yacht.

Create new Neighbourhood Prevention Teams bringing together police, community support officers, youth workers and council staff to tackle the causes of anti-social behaviour. Teams will crack down on repeat offenders of anti-social behaviour or nuisance crime, and will tackle broken windows, graffiti, fly-tipping, and drug dealing.

Hours of community service given as part of community sentences have offenders completed in each probation region in England and Wales in each of the last five years.

Unpaid Work Hours Completed
Region	2016/2017	2017/2018	2018/2019	2019/2020	2020/2021
East Midlands	350,743	364,784	362,224	343,598	53,204
East of England	585,447	626,417	598,237	561,479	333,990
Greater Manchester	343,824	329,494	292,432	273,089	53,643
Kent Surrey Sussex	363,817	396,187	379,879	223,899	108,536
London	784,657	849,456	848,044	730,593	153,917
North East	197,914	190,688	197,153	194,296	59,546
North West	387,368	498,787	511,721	473,152	100,766
South Central	321,110	305,893	298,835	281,182	89,032
South West	376,013	333,668	353,762	326,969	87,749
Unknown	311,460	17,287	31,176	116,035	19,435
Wales	423,975	370,010	404,983	374,075	107,223
West Midlands	566,772	548,595	515,484	479,075	90,318
Yorkshire and The Humber	569,343	550,905	516,595	491,548	98,704
National Total	5,582,445	5,382,173	5,310,526	4,868,990	1,356,061

Source: https://questions-statements.parliament.uk/written-questions/detail/2022-03-17/141995/

Labour analysis: percentage falls in the number of community payback hours completed per region:

East Midlands	-84%
East of England	-42%
Greater Manchester	-84%
Kent Surrey Sussex	-70%
London	-80%
North East	-69%
North West	-73%
South Central	-72%
South West	-76%
Wales	-74%
West Midlands	-84%

Number of offenders that completed a community sentence in each year between 2016 and 2020, by region, England, and Wales

Region⁽³⁾	2016⁽⁴⁾	2017	2018	2019	2020⁽⁵⁾	Percentage Change
North East	..	14,336	13,807	13,775	10,613	-25
North West	..	11,326	10,519	10,758	8,546	-24
Midlands	..	12,970	11,604	10,846	8,793	-32
London	..	9,289	10,302	10,202	7,952	-14
South East and Eastern	..	12,842	11,620	11,776	9,037	-29
South West	..	11,478	10,373	10,473	8,628	-24
Wales	..	5,190	4,774	4,867	3,786	-27
England and Wales	..	77,431	72,999	72,697	57,355	-25

Source: https://questions-statements.parliament.uk/written-questions/detail/2022-03-17/141994/

According to a Written Parliamentary Answer on 10 February 2022, 244 courts and tribunals have been closed in England and Wales since 2010.

Source: Written questions and answers - Written questions, answers and statements - UK Parliament

164 courts were sold by HM Courts and Tribunals Service since 2010

Source: Written questions and answers - Written questions, answers and statements - UK Parliament

Delays in prosecuting suspected criminals have hit a record 708 days for the average time it takes to go from offence to completion of a case. In the three months to September 2021, the average time it took to deal with a crime rose 15%, up from 620 days.

Source: Criminal prosecution delays hit record 708 days - BBC News