Technological advances in monitoring offenders are hailed by government as being cost-effective and foolproof. However, the system is only works to benefit big business. Dr Craig Paterson monitors...

The continued growth of commercial criminal justice in the UK[1] has shone increasing light upon the relationship that exists between big business and politics. One example of this is provided by the development of electronic monitoring offenders. The history of electronic monitoring dates back 17 years and highlights the way in which neo-liberal privatisation policies can develop without any clear evidence in support of their use. Instead, the drive behind electronic monitoring has been fundamentally political, ideological and technological. The electronic monitoring of offenders has been part of a gradual shift towards the use of surveillance technologies in community punishments. The evidence base to support this shift has emanated from out of the Home Office and the commercial contractors that administer electronic monitoring-based sanctions. Unsurprisingly, there are questions to be answered here about the neutrality of the findings as well as the way in which they are presented to the public through the media.

In reality, there is a dearth of information about how commercial contractors implement governmental policy and how this is recorded and audited. This was acknowledged by the Audit Commission in January 2006 which acknowledged a lack of ‘rigour’ on behalf of the Home Office when measuring the performance of commercial contractors[2]. The human consequences of insufficient regulation and monitoring are all too clear. The tragic death of Marian Bates in Nottingham in 2003 involved Peter Williams, an offender subject to electronic monitoring-based restrictions. An investigation into the supervision of Williams found that he had not been monitored by Premier Monitoring Services, a subsidiary of Serco, for two weeks and that the relevant Youth Offending Team were only informed of his absense on the morning of Mrs Bates’s murder[3]. The report concluded that the commercial contractor involved had misunderstood its responsibilities as laid out in the contract with the Home Office.

When questioned about this failure to report breaches in front of The Committee of Public Accounts on 15 March 2006, the boss of Serco’s Home Affairs division, Tom Riall, could not have been clearer about the reasons for the ‘misunderstanding’[4]. Riall admitted that they “...were not subject to performance deductions under the old contract for failures to report breaches on time." In other words, there was no incentive as penalties were not high enough under their old contract.

Riall's brazen admission will not come as a surprise to those who keep a close eye on developments in the world of commercial criminal justice. The Home Office started looking at electronic monitoring in the mid 1980s and having found no clear evidence from the U.S. about its effectiveness, started unsuccessful trials in the UK in 1989. The failure of the 1989 trials did not halt the development of further pilots in the mid 1990s which again failed to provide undisputed support for the utility of electronic monitoring. This did not stop electronic monitoring-based curfew orders which were rolled out across England and Wales in 1999 to accompany the early prison release project that had also started that year.

The Offenders Tag Association, an organisation with intimate connections within the Conservative Party, had been advocating the use of electronic monitoring since 1982. In the mid-1980s, the idea of electronic monitoring was picked up by John Patten MP, an ambitious junior minister in pursuit of an eye-catching policy to make his name with. Despite the failure of the original electronic monitoring trials in 1989[5], Patten continued to advocate their use as an effective alternative to imprisonment[6]. New Labour’s election success in 1997 brought renewed growth to the electronic monitoring industry at a time when stagnation had seemed inevitable. From 1999 onwards, the number of offenders subjected to electronic monitoring-based restrictions grew exponentially as successive Home Secretaries encouraged its use and technological developments introduced biometric systems and satellite tracking. Despite this, there was still no clear evidence-base that identified what electronic monitoring actually achieved[7].

Understanding the reasons behind the growth of electronic monitoring and other areas of the public sector requires an appreciation of the networks of power that stimulate pro-privatisation policies. Corporate Watch has previously highlighted the role of the Scottish Executive in donating nearly three quarters of a million pounds to Serco in 2002 to make the running of a private prison seem more economical[8]. In 2005, John Williams, a former executive of Serco found himself moving to a senior role overlooking public service reform within government[9]. Then, in June 2006, Serco director Margaret Ford was made a Labour peer, only three months after Tom Riall had admitted that Serco had not been complying with its Home Office contract because it did not receive sufficient financial penalties for not doing so[10]. It seems that it is not evidence of effectiveness that stimulates growth in electronic monitoring but the development of key relationships in the corridors of power at Westminster.

References
[1] Paterson, C. (2006) ‘Virtual Private Prisons’. Corporate Watch. Issue 29.
[2] National Audit Office (2006) The Electronic Monitoring of Adult Offenders. London: The Stationery Office, p.12-13.
[3] HM Inspectorate of Probation (2005) Inquiry into the Supervision of Peter Williams by Nottingham City Youth Offending Team. London: HMIP.
[4] House of Commons Minutes of Evidence Taken before The Committee of Public Accounts, Transcript of Oral Evidence to be published as HC 997-I, (www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200506/cmselect/cmpubacc/uc997-/uc9). 15 March 2006.
[5] Mair, G. and Nee (1990) Electronic Monitoring: The Trials and their Results. Home Office Research Study 120. London: HMSO.
[6] Patten, J. (2006) Speech to the House of Commons. 22nd February 1990. Parliamentary Debates. Commons. Fifth Series, Columns 1060-61. www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm198990/cmhansrd/1990-02-22/Orals-2.html.
[7] Mair, G. (2005) ‘Electronic monitoring in England and Wales: evidence-based or not?’. Criminal Justice. Vol.5, No.3, pp. 257-277.
[8] Corporate Watch (2005) ‘Scotland PLC: Immigration and Asylum in Scotland’. www.corporatewatch.org/?lid=1364. Accessed 26/7/06.
[9] Nathan, S. (2005) ‘CBI Influencing Public Service Reform’. Prison Privatisation Report International. No.68, May/June 2005.
[10] National Regeneration Agency (2006) ‘The Baroness Ford of Cunnighame’. English Partnerships. www.englishpartnerships.co.uk/baronessford.htm. Accessed 26/7/06.