WELCOME TO
COMMUNITY JUSTICE GLASGOW ANNUAL REPORT 2021/22
REFLECTING ON A YEAR IN COMMUNITY JUSTICE IN GLASGOW
WELCOME – A NOTE FROM THE EDITOR
BY MARGARET SMITH, Policy, Planning & Development Officer, Community Justice Glasgow
Welcome to our digital Annual Report for 2021-22. This past year, not unlike 2020-21, has been both challenging and interesting for our team and our partners. Re-building and shaping services for the newly emerging ‘norm’ has been in sharp focus and tested our collaborative skills – prompting much creativity and innovation. That re-building and shaping for the future has captured some of the positive changes that were accelerated during the worst of Covid restrictions.
For those familiar with previous Annual Reporters, you may have or will notice a different layout. We wanted this year to take an opportunity to highlight the range and depth of services that sit across the various ‘touch points’ of the Justice System – by this I mean the more identifiable points at which people who commit or are suspected of committing offences come into contact with the justice system:
- Prevention / Earlier Interventions – generally coming to the attention of the Police and/or statutory services on the basis of offending, or in some instances wellbeing (Children’s Reporter Administration, Social Work Services, Diversion or other alternatives to prosecution etc.)
- Arrested – charged with an offence or coming into contact formally with the Police.
- Sentenced or awaiting sentence (Remand / Bail / Carrying out a Community or Custodial Sentence).
- Re-integration – generally back into society following a custodial sentence but also in the context of Community Justice or following a period of other interventions (re-settling and re-connecting with community).
That said, we know that change does not happen in a straight line and many of the people who touch these points in the system will do so on a number of occasions, and at different points. Many are complex and have complex needs – often stemming from an upbringing blighted by trauma and adverse experience. Many are vulnerable and will have harmed themselves, been harmed by others and have harmed others, leaving behind them victims and damaged communities.
We wanted to give you as a reader, a feel for the depth and range of partners, initiatives, projects etc. from grass roots to public sector, that contribute to reducing the risk that the people who come into the system will re-offend across these junctures and indeed for our partners to be able to demonstrate across their own organisations how they contribute to this agenda.
Having that focus at each point contributes to either halting altogether or reducing the severity and occurrences of any future offending. By doing so we aim to pull more of the resource upstream to earlier interventions which we know are more effective at achieving better outcomes for people, the system and the public purse.
We have also brought together a range of resources which present a substantial evidence base across the Community Justice themes:
- Communication / Engagement
- Families
- Protective Factors (such as employability, health & wellbeing, housing/homelessness)
- Service & Resource Re-alignment
- Service User Voice
- Throughcare
- Victims
- Women
The evidence presented is rounded in that it brings together, research findings, evaluations, stories from the people with lived experience, digital, written and audio content from across the substantial eco-system that plays its part in reducing re-offending at both a national and local level.
You can find these in the HOME TAB under USEFUL LINKS & RESOURCES. This not only sets out the case for the work that we do but also serves as its own learning resource and will, I hope, increase knowledge and understanding about the work of the Community Justice Partnership in Glasgow and why we do what we do. I hope you find in these resources the very real need, commitment and passion for this work across that eco-system.
Our Previous Annual Reporters are still available and can be accessed by CLICKING THE PICTURE LINKS OR SCANNING THE QR CODES BELOW: