Report criticises social work services in Scots prisons

Social work services in some Scottish prisons lack direction and staff often have little idea how effective they are being, according to inspectors.

A series of reports from the Social Work Inspection Agency (SWIA) painted a varied picture of performance across Scotland.

In many cases, inspectors said, prison-based social workers were working effectively with governors and officers in the prison to help prisoners with offending behaviour and other issues such as addictions, and to address the risk posed by prisoners in order to protect the public.

The best teams were well led and well integrated with the wider prison system, and prisoners knew what they could expect from social work.

However a number of reports, including those on Glasgow’s Barlinnie jail and Edinburgh, Shotts, Kilmarnock, and Greenock prisons called on councils to develop ways to measure the differences social work makes to the lives of prisoners.

Prisons were told to do more to measure the impact of the services on prisoners and on the risk they pose to the public.

Meanwhile the report on Cornton Vale women’s prison and young offenders institution says social workers there were failing to meet some performance targets due to long-standing staffing problems. Around a fifth of prisoners in Cornton Vale who were likely to need supervision on release did not yet have an allocated social worker.

Chief Social Work Inspector Alexis Jay said the reports would help local councils, the Scottish Prison Service and private prison providers to improve services.

She added: “Overall, the performance of prison-based social work services was mixed. Good performance was characterised by local services having a clear up-to-date remit for their work and a competent, well established and well managed staff group. Services that did not perform as well tended to be unclear about what they were there to do, had experienced staff recruitment or retention difficulties, and had weaker leadership and oversight from senior managers.

“Each council will be required to produce an action plan to address the areas for improvement identified in their report, and SWIA will continue to monitor the progress that is being made by each council in implementing its action plan.”

The inspection process included interviews with a cross-section of prisoners from across the Scottish jail system, to find out their views on the quality of prison-based social work services they received.

Social work staff in the prisons and their local communities were surveyed, including those supervising offenders after they were released from custody.

The findings from the local reports will be drawn together, alongside other information from key stakeholders, into a national report.

Ms Jay said: “This national report, which is the concluding part of the inspection itself, is scheduled to be published by the end of 2010. The national report will be of interest to a wider audience and help inform and develop policy and practice across Scotland.”

www.swia.gov.uk.