‘You can lock up criminals, but it’s a fool’s errand’
Criminals, including burglars and violent drunks, should be helped rather than punished, Britain’s most outspoken police chief has insisted, as he retires after 39 years in the force. In his final interview before stepping down, Mike Barton, the chief constable of Durham, told The Daily Telegraph that sending people to prison was more expensive than sending them to Eton, and short custodial sentences perpetuated the cycle of crime and misery.
Mr Barton, who has previously courted controversy by advocating the legalisation of cannabis, said the public did not necessarily want to see burglars locked up, but simply wanted them to stop reoffending.
He said his views had softened during his lengthy career, but he was now convinced that persistently locking up people for the same offence was a “fool’s errand”.
Mr Barton, whose radical approach has had startling results, establishing Durham constabulary as the country’s best performing force, according to
Her Majesty’s Inspectorate, said: “I suppose you can punish people if you want, but really what we are here for is to prevent reoffending.”
Mr Barton, who pioneered the Checkpoint programme, allowing criminals to avoid prosecution by signing up to a restorative justice programme, urged other police chiefs to learn from Durham’s successes.
And he said that if the police wanted the public’s trust, they had to improve their performance.
“We actually attend between 80 and 85 per cent of jobs whereas there are some forces that feel they can only attend between 25 and 30 per cent … so if you continually only go to 30 per cent of jobs then public confidence is going to ebb,” he said.
Mr Barton said he was distinctly uncomfortable about being labelled soft. “I don’t want anyone to think I am a trendy, pinko liberal,” he said, earnestly. “I’m a straightforward, northern bloke.”
As if to illustrate the point, he described his initial reaction when he and his wife were burgled recently: “I was all for a bit of Old Testament retribution. My definition of restorative justice would have been every toenail pulled out one by one.”
But if four decades in policing have taught him anything, it is that justice needs to be about more than just revenge. In his last interview before retiring from the force, Mr Barton urged the police to stop sending so many criminals to prison and start working with them in order to break the cycle of reoffending.
“When I started in policing 39 years ago, I had a much more simplistic view,” he said. “They’re villains, we are going to lock them up. We are going to put them before the courts, they are going to go to prison, job done.
“But then when I started locking up the sons and grandsons of the first burglars I had put away, I started to think this is a fool’s errand.
“All we are doing is regurgitating the same families to inflict further pain on future generations of victims. Well, that isn’t what [Sir Robert] Peel wanted us to do.”
Mr Barton believes passionately that the police’s principle job is to stop people committing crime. “I suppose you can punish people if you want, but really what we are here for is to prevent reoffending,” he said.
In order to try to achieve this, Durham police has pioneered a scheme that offers certain categories of criminals, including burglars and violent offenders, the opportunity to avoid prosecution. By enrolling on the four-month Checkpoint programme, the clients – as Mr Barton insists they must be called – work with professionals in an attempt to stay on the straight and narrow.
“We don’t charge a lot of people now. You have got to catch them, not charge them. They have got to fear getting caught and once you have caught them you have got to stop them reoffending,” he said. “We now divert people, but if you look at the detection rate for burglary we are better than any other force.”
Mr Barton, who began his policing career engaging in “rough and tumble” with drunks on Blackpool promenade in 1980, insists that, far from being controversial, the approach is supported by the public.
“When we have done all our surveys of victims in this force area they all say that the one thing they want is that that person should not commit any more crimes. The public are remarkably wise if you ask them.
“If we send someone to prison for six months how does that help the economy? It costs more to send someone to prison that it does to send them to Eton.
“If they are in a job they are likely to lose it. You dislocate the family.”
More than 2,000 people have taken part in the Checkpoint programme and according to analysis, those who complete it are 20 per cent less likely to reoffend. Around 5 per cent fail the course and are immediately prosecuted for the original offence.
Another initiative in Durham is aimed at shaming violent drunks into changing their ways. “What we do is show them the video of them being arrested and what we found in a study when we first did it was that 100 per cent … immediately asked to apologise to the [arresting] officer.”
While his radical approach during his seven years in charge at Durham, as well as his controversial views on overhauling the country’s drugs laws, have not always been popular, few can argue that it has not been effective.
“We used to mine coal, make steel and build ships, we now sell heroin. We [the police] have certainly got our challenges because the miners’ strike is still raw in some communities, but over the last 10 or so years we have seen significant improvements in public confidence,” he said.
“You can certainly track that to the fact that we pick the phone up on time, we go to jobs and we try to resolve people’s problems.
“I believe this model should be national but I am not going to impose it on anyone. What I see now when I look at a lot of chiefs is that they are beleaguered. I do think austerity has been a major challenge.”
Mr Barton, who officially retired last week – receiving a CBE for services to policing – has handed over the baton to his deputy, Jo Farrell, who is keen to continue his innovative approach.
Despite being 62, Mr Barton said he was retiring while still at his peak. And although he says his focus will now be on the “greenhouse and grandchildren”, he has agreed to get involved with a number of restorative justice and drug reform programmes that he hopes will help shape the future of policing.
“I agreed to take on something else last week and my wife said, ‘Great, so you will be down to just eight days a week now you have retired’.”