Diane Shepherd was the Chief Probation Officer for Devon, a post she
held since 1996.She has spent 27 years in the Probation Service as a
practitioner.
The head of the £70m government agency which looks after children in the
court system has been sacked after an eight month disciplinary inquiry.
Diane Shepherd was suspended on full pay last November from her
£80,000-a-year job as chief executive of the children and family court
advisory and support service
(Cafcass), less than a year after she was appointed in January
2001 by the lord chancellor, Lord Irvine.
Yesterday Cafcass announced that its board had terminated her contract
"with immediate effect" after a "full and thorough disciplinary process"
Neither Cafcass nor the lord chancellor's department would reveal
the reasons for Mrs Shepherd's dismissal but the inquiry is thought to
have centred partly on a large unauthorised payoff for an executive she
sacked.
A source said the executive had complained to the lord chancellor's
department after Mrs Shepherd suspended him. She then sacked him with
the payoff. She is also paying the price for the chaos which has beset
Cafcass since it was launched last April to combine three existing
services representing childrens interests in divorce, child care and
adoption cases.
Management became locked in a damaging battle with the children's
guardians and family court reporters who were supposed to transfer to
the new service.
Susan Bindman, chairwoman of Nagalro, the association for guardians and
court reporters, said the service had still not recovered.
"The situation is in grave crisis now. We have waiting
lists for the first time all around the country. Employed staff can't
manage the flexibility that's required and self-employed staff were
discouraged and continue to be discouraged. The children are suffering.
"The first public acknowledgement of problems in the service came when
Lord Irvine told the Commons home affairs select committee three weeks
before Mrs Shepherd's suspension: "There are problems with the quality
of management, and I do not want anything that I say to worsen a
situation that exists."
He added: "I am allocating no blame whatsoever, because this is a very,
very fraught situation for which none of us around this table would have
liked to have been responsible." Mrs Shepherd, who is married with four
children, worked as a probation officer for 27 years and was chief
probation officer for Devon between 1996 and her appointment at Cafcass.
David Cameron, Conservative member of the select committee, said: "It
is wrong not to give taxpayers an explanation for the termination of Mrs
Shepherd's contract, and it is typical how things like this happen just
the day after parliament has gone into summer recess.
"This news has also emerged just two days after the permanent
secretary to the lord chancellor's department appeared before our
committee to give evidence.
"The lord chancellors department should be open and frank about the
problems with Cafcass and not try to sweep them under the carpet."
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