Professional doctorates are becoming increasingly well established in UK higher education, with a growth in the number and diversity of programmes being offered.

This article explores the higher education contribution to the qualifying training of police officers and probation officers and asks whether university study is an essential, desirable or indulgent ingredient in the education of people entering these careers.

The possibility of a consistent approach to the training of probation officers throughout Europe has been discussed for some time.

This paper explores the current training of youth justice practitioners and suggests that there is now a polarisation between the teaching of youth justice in England and Wales into an unhelpful vocational-academic dichotomy.

In the last decade, the number of people in drugs treatment in England has more than doubled to a total of 207,580 in 2008/9. The increasing access to drugs treatment has been accompanied by an expansion and development of the drugs workforce.

Given the government's commitment to localism, social inclusion and transfer of power from politicians to communities embodied by the Big Society agenda, we question whether these principles have been adequately translated within 'Payments by Results' and the supposed 'Rehabilitation Revolution' Green Paper.

The coalition government have pledged a commitment to a shift from 'Big Government' that presumes to know best, to the 'Big Society' that trusts in people for ideas and innovation to mend Britain's 'broken society'.

Recent proposals for a new approach to criminal justice policy have been heralded by the coalition government as 'radical' and 'revolutionary'.