Prison Officers: Older Workers

(asked on 24th July 2019) - View Source

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what assessment he has made of the physical ability of prison officers to work in front-line roles above the age of 60.


Answered by
Lucy Frazer Portrait
Lucy Frazer
Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport
This question was answered on 3rd September 2019

To become a prison officer you must attend an Area Recruitment Centre (ARC) and pass all elements consisting of literacy and numeracy tests, situational judgment tests and physical and medical tests. These determine a candidate’s suitability for the role and do not take into account a candidate’s age or gender, which prevents any unlawful discrimination. There are four elements of the fitness test including grip, agility, bleep test and holding a shield. All of these elements need to be passed for the candidate to pass the fitness part of the assessment.

All prison officers who joined the service after April 2001 must pass an annual fitness test in order to remain a prison officer. Staff who do not meet the annual fitness test standard will be provided with advice and support by a fitness assessor on achieving and maintaining the required fitness level.

There are many factors which determine a person’s ability to pass a fitness test which could not be determined by their age alone.

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