Interpreter firm still missing target, official statistics reveal
The company contracted to provide court interpreters has failed to reach its performance target after six months, statistics released today reveal. The overall success rate for jobs completed by Applied Language Solutions between 30 January and 31 August was 89%.
The contract’s performance target is 98%.
The Ministry of Justice statistical bulletin claims that: ‘Presenting a single success figure hides a very marked trend over the seven months of increasing success rates for requests for language translation services.’ The statistics show that the success rate for the service provided by Applied, now called Capita Translation and Interpreting, rose from 66.5% in February to 95.3% in August.
But giving evidence to the parliamentary Public Accounts Committee earlier this week, the MoJ’s head of procurement Ann Beasley accepted that, while performance had improved, ‘it is not yet in a good enough place’.
During the first six months of the contract, Applied completed 72,043 requests for language services, covering 163 different languages. Of those 53% were for criminal cases, 39% for tribunals and 8% for civil or family cases.
Within that time there were 3,937 complaints relating to requests. The majority of complaints, 57%, came from tribunals; of those the most common complaint (26%), was that the interpreter was late. The data does not indicate how many complaints concerned an interpreter failing to attend, or the quality of the interpretation.
Polish, Romanian, Urdu and Lithuanian were the most frequently requested languages and accounted for more than a third of all requests.
For the 20 most requested languages, the MoJ briefing note says that the success rates for criminal court and prison jobs varied between 78 and 97%. The lowest success rates (below 80%) for criminal cases were for Lithuanian and Czech cases.
When the first set of performance data on the contract was published in May, the figures were provided to the MoJ by Applied and had not been independently checked. The Gazette has sought clarification from the MoJ as to whether that is the case with the latest figures. The Gazette has also asked the MoJ what financial penalties it has imposed on Applied for its failure to meet its performance targets after six months of the contract.
The figures provided do not include the number of cases where courts did not use Applied but went directly to interpreters, under provisions allowed by the MoJ following the contract’s initial problems.
Comments
Lieslieslies
Nobody seems to want to ask how many actual requests there are from courts...why is that?
ALS receives a percentage of all requests for interpretrs and has a problem filling them. I suggest it is unlikely they are fulfilling more than 50% of the total requirments.
May I suggest the MoJ collect some statistics which are actually worth something and not take at face value the filtered dross provided by a tainted company running an unsalvageable contract, which Mr Hodge called "the worsth I have ever seen".
Cue more silence from the MoJ and Capita running away from unpleasant truths.
Buzzcocks
I'm overwhelmed with a sense of nostalgia for an age yet to come.
*Mrs Hodge. Oops and
*Mrs Hodge. Oops and apologies!
The lack of quality under ALS is incomparable to the old system
The point repeatedly being missed is this: these statistics are utterly meaningless given that they say nothing about the QUALITY of interpreting provided by ALS/Capita.
The new arrangements mean that non-English speaking defendants and witnesses, along with CJS practitioners and court users, can no longer be assured that court interpreters are professionally qualified, experienced and suitably vetted.
Just take a look in the MOJ/ALS contract at the myriad qualifications now being accepted as an instant route into court interpreting (appendix A, p 106) and understand that the previous minimum standard was registration on the National Register of Public Service Interpreters. NRPSI interpreters are qualified in interpreting to at least degree level or equivalent.
ALS was exposed by the media for making no checks of its workers and for stealing the personal data of professional interpreters for its database. It was then further exposed by the National Audit Office for lying during the procurement process, making experts' reports disappear or say the opposite of what they said, and then ultimately putting the MoJ in the position where it went live with the contract despite only 280 of ALS's workers having been through the correct checks - the rest of the people they sent to courts were any old riff-raff the agency had dragged off the street. It was also clearly exposed by the NAO report that the 'customer cancelled' figure hides a multitude of agency failures.
When an outsourcing contract makes the contractor responsible for monitoring its own performance, and when that contractor is shown already to have lied and acted in breach of contract, those performance figures have to be approached with caution.
I urge you to watch the Public Accounts Committee hearing from 15 October and ask yourself how reliable are the figures, and the people putting them forward. http://www.parliamentlive.tv/Main/Player.aspx?meetingId=11492
Public Accounts Committee hearing 15 October 2012
Uncorrected transcript
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201213/cmselect/cmpubacc/uc620-i/uc62001.htm
Madeleine L is right in spades on all counts. The functionaries were tasked with this crock by previous MOJ ministers. Has the new ministerial team decided to endorse this hollow sham masquerading as justice for non-English speakers? Deafening silence to date.
New on Parliament.uk: Court Language Services Forum
The House of Commons Justice Committee invites anonymous feedback from those with experience of ALS:
http://forums.parliament.uk/court-language-services/index.php?list,1
"The Justice Committee has heard that some stakeholders may be reticent to provide formal written evidence. These may include: court and tribunal service staff; members of the judiciary and magistracy; legal practitioners and other practitioners; defendants in criminal cases and parties in civil and family cases and interpreters providing services on behalf of ALS. We would encourage these individuals to submit their experiences through this web forum using an anonymous user name.
The Justice Committee would like to hear from individuals with direct experience of the provision of interpreting and translation services by Applied Language Solutions (ALS). The Justice Committee would particularly like to hear about direct examples of recent performance issues (during September and October 2012) surrounding the operation of the Framework Agreement between the Ministry of Justice and ALS."
The deadline is 2 November 2012