Trick or treatment? Is the Government reneging on its sex offenders' programme? Adam Sampson reports

• Published in: The Guardian (London)
• Main Author: Sampson, Adam
• Format: Newspaper Article
• Language: English
• Published: Manchester (UK) Guardian News & Media Limited 23.09.1992
• ISSN: 0261-3077

The initial plans were far-reaching. All sex offenders sentenced to over four years were to be assessed at one of six assessment prisons, and offered treatment either there or at one of another 14 participating institutions. There were to be two levels of treatment: a core programme offered to everyone and an extended programme reserved for the most dangerous and intractable cases. Participation would also be open to offenders serving shorter sentences if their histories were deemed serious enough to warrant it. The whole programme would be closely evaluated, and ministers talked grandly of achieving a 50 per cent drop in recidivism rates. Moreover, unlike the core programme, which could be run by suitably trained uniformed staff, the assessment and extended programmes would depend upon the participation of specialist staff - mostly psychologists and psychiatrists - in order to perform sensitive tasks such as the measurement of offenders' arousal patterns. These specialists will have to be recruited: the head of psychology at Albany estimates that he would need at least two extra staff. As the letter says: "The full implementation of assessment and the extended programmes and the extension of the programmes to greater number of offenders, we believe, would require additional resources." The Prison Service is preparing a bid for these in the latest public spending round. Despite these worries, the Prison Service can be pleased with what it has achieved. The core programme is running, and the indications are that most offenders value and support the initiative. But it is only a start, and if the scheme is to succeed, more money must be provided. In the sixties and seventies, attempts at "treating" offenders in prison foundered on this very issue. The Prison Service letter itself admits that: "One of the principal reasons, historically, for the failure of rehabilitative treatment programmes is inadequate resources." If the sex offender treatment initiative is to succeed in its declared aim of protecting future victims of rape and abuse, the Government must ensure that history does not repeat itself.