Probation Service to get $20m boost

By ANNE BESTON

The agency that failed to keep track of RSA triple-murderer William Bell has been given a funding boost.

Acting Corrections Minister Margaret Wilson yesterday announced the Probation Service would get a further 110 staff over the next three years.

Its $81.3 million budget would be boosted by $8 million in the coming year, an increase of 9.8 per cent. In 2004/5, funding would increase by $11.3 million, a 13.8 per cent increase.

The service, which employs 500 probation officers nationwide, has been dogged by allegations of mismanagement and failure to do its job properly, most notably over RSA killer Bell. A Government-ordered review found the service failed to recall Bell when he faced assault charges a week before he bashed three people to death at the Panmure RSA.

The Mangere office that dealt with Bell did not make basic checks on his home address, did not set up required appointments and did not recall him when it could have done.

Ms Wilson said while the service was not entirely to blame for the Bell case a key part of the new funding was a 79 per cent increase in the service's training budget.

"Hopefully it will never happen again," Ms Wilson said.

The training budget for probation services would rise $1.7 million in the coming year and a further $1.8 million in the next. It now stands at $2.1 million.

It was too early to say which regions would get the new staff, she said. The details of the extra funding will be set out in the May 15 budget.

Probation Service general manager Katrina Casey said that decision would be made in the next two months.

PSA national secretary Lynn Middleton welcomed the new funding and said extra officers would alleviate some of the pressure on staff.

Late last year a female probation officer was disciplined after telling a Titirangi man he was a "pretty boy" who would be gang-raped in prison. The man, charged with drug offences, later committed suicide.

Last month a sacked probation officer was given more than $50,000 in lost income and compensation by the Employment Tribunal after complaining of having her home "staked out" by a supervisor.

National's Corrections spokesman Tony Ryall said the funding boost would not solve the Probation Service's problems and instead called for it to be privatised.

He said the service did not hold people accountable for their mistakes and did not demand enough responsibility from individuals.

"Contracting out parts of the Probation Service to community-based organisations would achieve a lot more than putting more public servants on the payroll," Mr Ryall said.