Improved Outcomes

My best seasonal wishes to all our readers.

What motivates the SONAR team is the chance to improve outcomes for people in the criminal justice system through better healthcare. As such, I will praise three individuals and organisations for their work in 2025 so far.

The first is Dame Carol Black, who has carried out several independent reviews of drugs policy for successive governments. Her aim has rightly been to make sure that vulnerable people with substance misuse problems get the support they need to recover and turn their lives around, in the community and in prison.

Speaking in February, she set out in detail how a lack of joined-up healthcare information for prisoners hampers efforts to recover from drugs. To quote her important words in full:

“For a drug-dependent person leaving prison there are at least six individuals or bodies that participate in trying to get them safely from the secure estate into treatment in the community. How well it is done varies from prison to prison.…

“The treatment inside the prison, the treatment in the community and the community probation service are the three crucial things, but there are six groups involved. On the whole, their computer systems do not talk to each other. They are all very well-intentioned people, and they all want the prisoner to leave and to go to their treatment appointments.

“I am sure you are aware that the number of deaths of drug-dependent people in the three-week period after leaving prison has been on the increase.”

The second is the Independent Sentencing Review commissioned by the Ministry of Justice in London. Its interim report, also published in February, bravely challenged the idea that penal policy should be primarily driven by punishment:

“The reality is that our prison population has grown very rapidly over the last 30 years … It is an approach that has emphasised the importance of punishment understood primarily as incarceration – an important aspect of sentencing policy – but has been insufficiently focused on the most effective ways to reduce crime. The rise in the prison population, for example, has meant that resources have been diverted away from activities that could reduce reoffending.”

The third is the very similar independent Commission on sentencing, in this case set up by the Scottish Government. The Scottish Justice Secretary, Angela Constance, gave a strong message in favour of rehabilitation:

“Prison will always be necessary for those who pose the greatest risk of harm, and protecting victims and the public is my absolute priority. However, evidence shows that short prison sentences are often not the best way to reduce reoffending, with those released from short custodial sentences reconvicted nearly twice as often as those sentenced to a community payback order. While crime is at one of its lowest levels in 50 years, we all want to keep crime down and communities safe, and effective rehabilitation to reduce reoffending is a key part of that.”

SONAR CMS can help all of these initiatives through its Custody module, which collects all healthcare information for prisoners and for ex-offenders respectively. I would be delighted to discuss the features with all interested commissioners. I hope we can play an increasing role in the new criminal justice system, ever more focused on the wellbeing of users and citizens.

John White

Founder & CEO