Make Restorative Justice available for all, demand practitioners
Restorative Justice groups around the country have called on the Ministry of Justice to change its newly-issued “presumption of unsuitability” guidelines that exclude many people from participation because of the category of their crime, and not their personal circumstances.
Organisation Why Me? and the Common Ground Justice Project have written to Lord Timpson to call for urgent changes and gathered signatures from like-minded people.
The guidelines, now being implemented, have a “presumption of unsuitability” for some categories of crime, apart from where there are “special circumstances”. This is similar to the vetting process for permission to work within prisons introduced at the same time. This excludes sex offenders, murderers, and terrorists, amongst other groups. The signatories give examples where such perpetrators have participated in the past with significant positive results.
Under the new guidelines, victims as well as perpetrators will be prevented from taking part in Restorative Justice programmes, which supporters say help bring understanding and often closure to victims following a traumatic incident. The groups want this “presumption” to be changed to a condition that, while in some cases a higher standard of checks of suitability to take part may be required, the decision is based on the individual concerned and not the entire class of crime. Otherwise, they say, victims who wish to participate will be denied the opportunity to confront their harmer, and the harmer loses the chance to apologise face to face and to confront the outcome of their original crime.
The groups want the Restorative Justice sector to be involved in looking at the thresholds that should be used. They quote examples of successful examples of Restorative Justice that could no longer occur under the guidelines.
They describe the guidelines as a “significant setback” for the Restorative Justice movement, from which the widely used Sycamore Tree was discarded last year. They have circulated a letter to Prisons Minister Lord Timpson describing their concerns and calling for urgent discussions on guidance that will meet the MoJ’s need for safety and wellbeing of participants.
Why Me? and the rest of the signatories say they recognise the need for safety but say that access to this important provision should be for all other than those who may be a danger, and that a previous crime is insufficient to determine that. They also highlight that, as practitioners in Restorative Justice, they are well aware of the need for careful risk assessment and have experience in ensuring this. What is effectively a blanket ban on some significant categories is, they say, preventing what the Government say is a priority from taking place.
You might be right. I suppose I try to do the rapier, rather than the cudgel.
Thank you Airlane, I speak very highly of your views! The point is, that there’s a lawyer’s argument on this, as well as the obvious argument of what works best.
This argument now, seems to be mostly on grounds of manifest individual (greater) reasonableness, – but there is also some questioning of whether Parliament has granted in clear, direct and unambiguous language, a right to disengage from a generally entitled position. In my humble opinion, this might even turn into the major argument.
Does that comment, humble or not, express anything at all? Your ambiguousness and obvious fear of taking a controversial stand on anything at all are turning your comments into verbose mush.