Towards a model regime for Approved Premises

Abstract

This article, based on a review of the literature both from Britain and North America and findings from the Approved Premises pathfinder, will explore the key issues in establishing a model regime for Approved Premises. It will suggest that face-to-face work with residents is an essential component for Approved Premises, and that there is a danger of this vital work being pushed into a secondary function by the need for surveillance and monitoring. The article will argue that working in a rehabilitative manner with residents assists in their risk management.

Intermediary workers: Narratives of supervision and support work within the halfway house setting

“…Interviewees’ narratives suggest that halfway house workers deeply care about ex-prisoners’ well-being and seek to offer support during the early stages of release. Consistent with other research, their narratives show that value is placed in particular on building good relationships with former prisoners – to act as ‘people-people’ (Worrall and Mawby, 2014: 352) – and that halfway house staff appear to feel well positioned to fulfil this role, particularly because of their frequent face-to-face work with residents (see also Cherry and Cheston, 2006). Whether ex-prisoners in fact feel supported and heard by halfway house staff and whether staff’s intermediary position actually plays a role in shaping staff–resident relationships are questions that go beyond the purpose of this article but are important in order to gain a better understanding of ex-prisoners’ post-release experiences with different agencies and actors.…”

Staff-resident relationships in Approved Premises

“…To achieve success in these broader termsto transition from 'formal' to 'substantive compliance' (see Robinson and McNeill, 2008) members of staff working in APs must move beyond a narrow focus on surveillance, monitoring and enforcement to the facilitation of rehabilitative regimes centred on constructive relationships with hostel residents (Cherry and Cheston, 2006). Indeed, previous research has highlighted that if criminal justice workers can establish and maintain constructive relationships with those they are supervising, this can play a central role in supporting desistance (Farrall, 2002;Maruna and LeBel, 2010;King, 2013).…”

“…Members of staff working in APs, however, aim to achieve much more than securing residents' formal compliance with licence conditions or hostel rules. In a broad sense, they aim to support residents' desistance by providing a wide range of help and advice around the potential needs of residents, for example, through access to learning and vocational training, employment-related services, drug and alcohol counselling and treatment services, GP and mental health services and access to interventions to improve life and social skills (Cherry and Cheston, 2006).…”

Routine practice in staffed community accommodation (approved premises) in England and Wales: Quantitative benchmarking from the first year of a longitudinal study

“…A number of authors have provided accounts of ‘effective practice’ in APs based on detailed reviews of the literature (Burnett and Eaton, ) and reviews coupled with practice initiatives (Cherry, ). In addition, two related studies have been published that examined the incidence of mental health difficulties in this population and provided an example of specialist service provision for such a group (Hatfield et al, ; Ryan et al, ).…”