This article is about the networks of relationships (between people and between organisations) that underpin probation supervision. Drawing on evidence from a study researching these interactions, it develops two models of supervision (‘thin’ and ‘thick’) by taking themes that shape supervision and charting the interplay between them. The article develops these models in the increasingly fragmented landscape that has followed the Transforming Rehabilitation (TR) reforms in England and Wales. The concepts of ‘thin’ and ‘thick’ are used here to describe the supervisory network. Thin supervision describes a minimal and administrative approach to supervision. By contrast, thick supervision requires a network with strong and purposeful links. The article acknowledges the impact of public sector spending cuts on probation services and concludes by reflecting on the challenge of building and sustaining thick supervision in the current context.

This article is about the experience of telephone supervision from the perspective of practitioners. It is set in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic, which changed and challenged the nature of probation supervision and required service users and supervisors to communicate remotely, using the telephone, rather than by meeting face-to-face. The article explores some of the impacts and consequences of telephone contact and examines the extent to which this approach has a part to play in future, post-pandemic, ways of working. The article draws on findings from a research project examining remote supervision practice during the pandemic. Fieldwork (comprising an online survey and a series of semi-structured interviews) was conducted between July and September 2020 in three divisions within an English community rehabilitation company. The article reinforces the importance of face-to-face work in probation practice but suggests that there is scope to retain some use of telephone supervision as part of a future blended practice model. Further thinking about telephone supervision might consider these three themes identified in the research: remote working limits the sensory dimension of supervision, relationships remain at the heart of practice, and good practice requires professional discretion.

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Considering the current review of probation services in England and Wales, this comment piece acknowledges the disappearance of supervision as a cornerstone of effective rehabilitation and the emergence of Rehabilitative Activity Requirements (RARs) replacing supervision. The authors raise concerns about the effectiveness of RARs and at this juncture argue the importance of retaining supervision within the responsibilities of National Probation Service case managers and safeguarding against it becoming an intervention that is delivered by external providers.