Hidden costs of payment-by-results

5 July 2010 1 min read Ravi Chandiramani Early Years Social Care Youth Justice Youth Work Editorial

We are in an age of austerity where outcomes are critical. So it is difficult to take issue in raw principle with the government's desire to commission more public services on a payment-by-results basis.

Payment-by-results is not new. The Labour government employed the method for providers of certain health services and welfare-to-work programmes. What is striking is this government's appetite to extend it to a raft of other public services. For instance, it is cited as a way to make real the "rehabilitation revolution" spelled out last week by Justice Secretary Kenneth Clarke, where organisations are paid according to their record in cutting reoffending rates of convicted offenders. While not enough has been said about the approach to young offenders in bringing about this revolution, it will surely apply just as much to youth justice as the adult justice system.

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