Delay hits offender risk assessment IT system

New delays have hit an IT system that is supposed to make it easier for the prison and probation services to assess the risk offenders pose to the public and their likelihood of reoffending.

A national electronic Offender Assessment System (e-OASys) was originally due to be up and running by March 2004, and this had already been delayed until the end of 2004 but the Home Office has now admitted that it will not now be delivered until autumn 2005 at the earliest.

The delay has been caused by problems with the pilot project and the need to make changes to e-OASys in order for it to support the new sentencing guidelines due to come into force in April as part of the Criminal Justice Act.

The probation service has been using the system since July 2004 and the prison service completed its rollout by the end of the year but the two deployments are still running separately.

By connecting them both up the system aims to provide a single data repository for the prison and probation services that will support a common assessment of the likelihood of reoffending and risk to members of the public when preparing pre-sentencing reports for the courts

Home Office minister Paul Goggins admitted plans to connect the two systems are behind schedule and the National Probation Service (NPS) told its staff in a recent bulletin that work to join the two systems up will now begin in April 2005 and that the rollout will be complete by autumn 2005 "if possible".

"Plans for roll out across the rest of the probation service have been put back in order to give priority to work that will enable OASys to support implementation of the sentencing provisions of the 2003 Criminal Justice Act in April," said Goggins.