Ms Ita Burke:

We in the Probation Service absolutely agree with the Deputy that it is not simply a matter of putting on a tag and walking away. As the Deputy stated, it is about its management, the human resources involved and its monitoring. We feel that introducing electronic monitoring as part of a risk management strategy as a planned programme of intervention would be the most effective way of doing that. That has been proved in other jurisdictions. When it is integrated with a supervision package it can be at its most effective. The legislation is advocating the possibility, as part of a post-release supervision order, that somebody would be electronically tagged for a period of six months. We in the Probation Service see a value in exclusions in some instances. If we knew the person's risk behaviour was associated with children, we see the value in having an exclusion zone around playgrounds or in keeping somebody away from a victim. There can be value in that. It is very much about monitoring that and it needs to be part of a planned package. As Ms Counihan stated, there could be instances of a person in custody who will be coming out on a post-release supervision order and certain risk factors were noticed while the person was in custody. We see a value in electronic tagging in those instances to encourage reintegration for the period of six months and tighter monitoring.