This article explores the relationship between the current model of community sex offender management, which is underpinned by mechanism of control and enforcement, and desistance from sexual offending. Utilizing data from qualitative interviews with 20 men convicted of sexual offences, we found that while existing practices offer some reassurance to those managing the public protection arena, they do little to encourage the substantive processes of identity change which is necessary for long-term desistance. This raises important considerations for how current risk management practices may be improved to encourage desistance and community reintegration.

This article examines the changing nature of public protection police work in a climate of continued austerity and increasing prosecutions for sexual offending, which have made a significant impact on the workloads of police teams who manage and monitor registered sexual offenders in the community. This increase has run parallel to a decrease in the general policing budget, which has seen it cut by an average of 22% across England and Wales [BBC. (2017). Utilizing data from observations and in-depth qualitative interviews with police officers from a force in England, this article highlights the effect which cost-saving measures have had on the professional standards of the police service in the management of sex offenders; how collaborative working practices have been hindered by these austerity measures, and finally how continual cuts have had a detrimental effect on the police’s ability to protect the public.