Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many prison officers have left service due to (a) ill health and (b) lack of capability in each of the last eight years.

HM Prison and Probation Service has robust policies and mechanisms in place to support staff where medical retirement requires consideration. Similarly, the poor performance policy provides a structured programme for staff to achieve specific goals within a specified time to support and improve their performance.

For this response, ill health is taken to mean medical retirement and lack of capability is taken to mean dismissal due to poor performance.

The number of band 3-5 prison officers who have left HMPPS as a result of medical retirement and dismissals due to poor performance can be found in table 11b of the latest HMPPS workforce statistics publication tables at: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/708056/hr-publication-tables-march-2018.xlsx