Karl Turner
Main Page: Karl Turner (Labour - Kingston upon Hull East)Department Debates - View all Karl Turner's debates with the Ministry of Justice
(5 years, 8 months ago)
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Order. Speaking to school students in Twickenham on Friday, and subsequently giving a talk at Royal Holloway College, London University, in Egham, I referenced the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull East (Karl Turner), not least for his tendency to yell “Shocking!” “It’s a disgrace,” or, alternatively, “Be’ave!” at the Treasury Bench. I think that the hon. Gentleman’s profile is now substantially higher at both those institutions, and I am sure that, if they are listening, they will listen to him with great interest.
This situation is indeed shocking. [Laughter.] I do wonder: either very senior civil servants follow the right hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling) around giving him really bad advice, or he is in fact just incredibly incompetent. Which is it?
Yes, it is. Big lessons need to be drawn from it, not just for the purpose of probation reforms but for the purpose of any other reforms that we make in government. One of the big issues concerned is our ability to predict the consequences of large-scale system change, and in particular to predict the shifts in caseload. As the National Audit Office points out, there was a modelling of a 2% shift, and the reality was a 48% shift. Drilling down into how that advice was given and responded to is one of the ways in which we can draw those lessons.