As reported on this blog on 7th July there was news of parliament deciding to investigate the Ministry of Justice’s National Framework Agreement for interpreting and translation services for courts and tribunals across England and Wales.
If you have any evidence to submit of failures with the contract please see the information below which calls for evidence. Further information about how to make a submission to the Committee can be found on the link provided below.
The provision of registered interpreters that lack legal experience or who are unsafe to practice in legal settings is not a breach of contract so this type of evidence has to be submitted in terms of an agency failing to have the correct experience to undertake the contract.
What can be submitted is evidence, similar to that reported in this blog, which could include the following: the wrong provision such as interpreters provided when it should have been lipspeakers, bookings not made by courts or released too late to source an interpreter, provision of unregistered interpreters, costly delays and adjournments from failures to source an interpreter, interpreters asked by judges or panel members to interpret on their own or for different parties when another interpreter can not be sourced.
If you are submitting evidence it will strengthen the case if you can add dates and the court or tribunal in question. This then makes evidence real rather than anecdotal. It is understandable that confidentiality is a concern. Please make this clear when submitting evidence.
Due to work done by PR company Involvis on behalf of the Professional Interpreters for Justice campaign the issues have remained public with another flurry of reports of failures in the news.
An interpreter who could not attend a murder trial sent along her husband instead as she was too busy. If you wish to read some of the latest news there is an excellent round up on the LinguistLounge.org website.
Alongside the G4S Olympic games scandal with security, it can only be a matter of time before this contract is seen by all for what it is. Another expensive and dangerous outsourcing mistake by government.
http://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/justice-committee/news/interpretation-and-translation-services/
New Inquiry: Interpretation and Translation services and the Applied Language Solutions contract
18 July 2012
The Justice Select Committee is launching a call for written evidence on the provision of interpretation and translation services since Applied Language Solutions (ALS) began operating as the Ministry of Justice’s sole contractor for language services in February 2012.
Specifically we will seek to explore six areas:
The rationale for changing arrangements for the provision of interpreter services
The nature and appropriateness of the procurement process
The experience of courts and prisons in receiving interpretation services that meet their needs
The nature and effectiveness of the complaints process
The steps that have been taken to rectify under-performance and the extent to which they have been effective
The appropriateness of arrangements for monitoring the management of the contract, including the quality and cost-effectiveness of the service delivered.
The deadline for submissions is Monday 3 September 2012.
Further information on how to submit evidence is on the website stated above.