Policy paper

A response to the ICIBI's report on monitoring foreign national offenders electronically (March to April 2022)

Published 7 July 2022

This was published under the 2019 to 2022 Johnson Conservative government

The Home Office (HO) is grateful to the Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration (ICIBI) for his report into our use of electronic monitoring of foreign national offenders (FNOs).

The department has accepted all five of the ICIBI’s recommendations and has already commenced delivery through a timed action plan.

We are dealing with a technologically and logistically complex programme involving a high harm and potentially non-compliant community but recognise that there is more work to do.

The duty placed on the Secretary of State to electronically monitor FNOs in England and Wales commenced on 31 August 2021 and our service is still in the early stages of mobilisation.

We are therefore pleased that the inspection recognised a number of positive aspects relating to our work, especially that our staff are hardworking and dedicated and that they report feeling well supported by their managers within a positive workplace culture.

We are passionate about improving the service and accept that there are areas that require improvement, including introducing a data quality strategy and a quality assurance framework. Work on these has already started and we will shortly commence the training needs analysis.

The HO welcomes the fact that the ICIBI have been consulting with stakeholders, and we accept that there will be those who have apprehensions about our work, which are highlighted in the section about stakeholder concerns on pages 13 and 14 of the report. We would, though, have welcomed the opportunity to have provided a broader list of stakeholders for the ICIBI to have met with, in order to provide a wider external view of our work.

The HO notes that paragraph 1.19 of the report states that the non-fitted device ‘may’ be removable. Since the inspection we have signed a contract to provide non-fitted devices; the HO can confirm that the non-fitted device is portable and will be carried by a person and not fitted to them. The device is a handheld fingerprint biometric one.

The Home Office response to the recommendations:

The Home Office should:

1. Introduce a data quality strategy and framework for the electronic monitoring (EM) hub to maximise the use of electronic monitoring data and to ensure it is being managed properly and meets quality standards, in line with the government data quality framework. This should include:

• identification and mitigation of data quality issues, including any gaps in data such as vulnerabilities and protected characteristics

• oversight of the handling of data sharing requests including by Capita Electronic Monitoring Services (EMS).

1.1 Accepted

1.2 The HO has already published a data protection impact assessment (DPIA). We are currently working with the Ministry of Justice (MOJ) to develop a joint data quality strategy in line with the government data quality framework that protects the management of user’s data. On completion we will revise our DPIA as necessary.

2. Implement a quality assurance framework to evaluate the consistency of decision making in the EM hub and to identify opportunities for improvement.

2.1 Accepted

2.2 Once developed, the quality assurance framework will be integrated into the main quality framework already established in the Foreign National Offender Removals Command (FNO RC), our parent unit.

3. Conduct a training needs analysis for the EM hub and produce a training and development plan. This should consider:

• provision of training to all hub staff relevant to their specific roles and responsibilities

• bespoke training to staff engaged in responding to legal challenges to better equip them to make evidence-based and accountable decisions

• provision of guidance to FNO RC case workers to ensure consistency and quality of referrals and requests to the hub.

3.1 Accepted

3.2 All staff underwent training based upon their specific role and existing skills, prior to joining the EM Hub. We are acutely aware training was impacted by the pandemic, yet we effectively utilised virtual technology to ensure all staff were equipped with the fundamentals, building on existing skills sets where practicable, to carry out their jobs for us to mobilise at pace. Further developments are underway to create a training needs analysis, to ensure the Home Office produces a comprehensive training package that is tailored to the needs of all current and future staff.

4. Maintain a joint issue log and risk register with the MOJ to identify supplier performance issues and enable timely improvements.

4.1 Accepted

4.2 A service delivery team has already been created to manage the relationship with the MOJ for the HO, and members from this team are working with the MOJ to ensure that a joint risk and issues register is used to identify and address issues and improvements, utilising the existing governance framework between HO and MOJ to propose, approve and manage service improvements.

5. Develop an operational plan for the hub that reflects projected staff resources, forecast service volumes and device availability (fitted and non-fitted devices) with clearly defined milestones and success factors.

5.1 Accepted

5.2 We have already started work on the production of our operational delivery plan which sets out what will be delivered by our EM hub based on the resources available to them. We have the benefit of being able to reflect on and apply the learning since mobilisation and will link our plan to person/team goals.