Is Restorative Justice helping to create a Paradigm Shift in our

Justice and in our Communities?

Assistant Chief Constable Garry Shewan

Facing Up To Offending?• UK spends over £35 billion on public order and safety

with half on policing• Reoffending rate of 49% - rising to 61% for short

sentences• Cost of crime is over £60 billion with an additional £6

billion (health costs and lost output)• Crime in UK has dropped by almost half in past 10

years, but crime per 1000 population still too high• We should not accept more of the same – there is a

need for a paradigm shift

Policing, Justice & Communities – Old Money?

• Emphasis on targets and statistical measurement• No embedding of working together• Dislocation from our communities• You got a problem? We have a service whose ‘promise

is to fix it• Culture of entitlement and dependency• A policing culture of reactive delivery by rote not

preventative according to need• Over-reliance on justice focused on the offence rather

than offending

Shifting Our Spend – Not Doing Less! – The Austerity

Tipping Point?“We keep going back to the same offenders, the same families, the same vulnerable people, and often to the same locations. Performance indicators have rewarded increased activity, such as more offences brought to justice but we need a far greater emphasis on demand reduction and problem solving – a real emphasis on tackling repeat business”

A Changing Policing Vision?• External aim – ‘Protect Society and Help Keep People

Safe’ – by creating a place based ‘end-to-end’ approach to both policing and complex dependency helping to transform communities with less crime and more active citizens

• Internal cultural aim – To create a journey from a reactive organisation working in silos responding to high crime and high offending, to one which is proactive, problem solving, integrated with partners and involving the citizen in creating safer communities

The Power of Dialogue

“Hope for relationship and community healing comes when dialogue focuses on personal stories, emotions and identities. It can counter the effects of the stories told of others that shred relational and communal bonds and the emotions that inflame or imprison”

Robert R Stains 2014

Restorative Justice

• A new lens through which we see crime & our response to it• Starts with the question what harms & conflict befalls our

communities when people commit crime• Can be used to deal with non-serious offending or integrated

with retributive justice• Re-introduces communication and apology into our society• RJ serves both a communitarian and conservative view of

offenders• Reframes ‘community’ and builds essential Social Capital

Neighbourhood Justice – role of Victim & Community?

• ‘Justice’ achieved through arrest and prosecution is not enough to satisfy victims

• ‘Detection’ without understanding, reparation and restoration can be a blunt tool

• Opportunities for communities themselves to informally resolve the crimes impacting upon their daily lives

• ‘Re-integrative shaming’ requires the presence of supporters whilst impacting upon recidivism requires community acceptance

The new RJ Challenges

• Can communities be engaged where there is history of conflict with authority and social marginalisation

• Police reluctant to allow others a key role in justice and the dangers of assimilation

• How do we tackle the difficult issue of complex crimes – Domestic Abuse, Hate Crime?

• The transition from justice to restorative approaches

Being Restorative – not doing RJ

• Relationships, co-operation and transformation

• Cultural change based on understanding• Day to day skills to build and maintain

healthy positive relationships• Respectful, accountable and responsible

RA shifting the justice in communities emphasis?

• Communities with less crime & more active citizens basd on early intervention

• New relationship CJS/public – one which identifies commonality & agreement – shared added value

• Co-production creating community change agents• An Asset Based approach to Community Safety