Asked by: Fred Thomas (Labour - Plymouth Moor View)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many probation officers retired from the service in (a) 2010, (b) 2014, (c) 2019 and (d) 2023.
Answered by Nicholas Dakin - Government Whip, Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury
The Ministry of Justice publishes data on the leaving reasons of probation officers in Table 14b of the quarterly “HM Prison and Probation Service workforce statistics” publication. The latest publication and tables, which covers the year to September 2024, are available here:
www.gov.uk/government/statistics/hm-prison-probation-service-workforce-quarterly-september-2024
Data is only available since the National Probation Service was formed in June 2014, as a result of which the number who retired in 2010 is unavailable. The number of probation officers who retired in 2019 and 2023 is included in the above publication.
The number who retired in 2014 is available in the December 2015 publication available here: www.gov.uk/government/statistics/national-offender-management-service-workforce-statistics-december-2015
This only includes data for those who retired after the formation of the National Probation Service in 2014.
Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many probation officers in the probation delivery units in the areas covering Greater London left the probation service in (a) 2022 and (b) 2023.
Answered by Edward Argar - Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
The quarterly HMPPS workforce statistics publication covers staffing information, including number of leavers by group by structure/division. The latest publication covers data for up to the period 30 September 2023.
Data for the number of probation officers who left the London Probation Service by probation delivery unit, in the period 1st January 2022 to 31st December 2022 and the period 1st January 2023 to 30th September 2023 is provided in table 1 and table 2 below.
Table 1: Probation officers who left the London Probation Service by probation delivery unit, in the period 1st January 2022 - 31st December 2022
(headcount)
PDU | Headcount |
LDU Cluster Ealing, Harrow and Hillingdon | 1 |
PDU Barking, Dagenham and Havering | 2 |
PDU Brent | 4 |
PDU Camden and Islington | 2 |
PDU Croydon | 3 |
PDU Ealing and Hillingdon | 6 |
PDU Enfield and Haringey | 5 |
PDU Greenwich and Bexley | 4 |
PDU Hackney and City | 3 |
PDU Hammersmith, Fulham, Kensington, Chelsea, Westminster | 4 |
PDU Harrow and Barnet | 2 |
PDU Kingston, Richmond and Hounslow | 6 |
PDU Lambeth | 2 |
PDU Lewisham and Bromley | 4 |
PDU Newham | 3 |
PDU Redbridge and Waltham Forest | 6 |
PDU Southwark | 5 |
PDU Tower Hamlets | 5 |
PDU Wandsworth, Merton and Sutton | 3 |
PS London Accrued Programmes and Structured Interventions | 1 |
PS London Corporate Services | 0 |
PS London Headquarters | 0 |
PS London Public Protection Custody | 8 |
Total | 79 |
Table 2: Probation officers who left the London Probation Service by probation delivery unit, in the period 1st January 2023 - 30th September 2023 (p)
(headcount)
PDU | Headcount |
LDU Cluster Ealing, Harrow and Hillingdon | 0 |
PDU Barking, Dagenham and Havering | 1 |
PDU Brent | 6 |
PDU Camden and Islington | 4 |
PDU Croydon | 4 |
PDU Ealing and Hillingdon | 6 |
PDU Enfield and Haringey | 2 |
PDU Greenwich and Bexley | 0 |
PDU Hackney and City | 0 |
PDU Hammersmith, Fulham, Kensington, Chelsea, Westminster | 6 |
PDU Harrow and Barnet | 2 |
PDU Kingston, Richmond and Hounslow | 3 |
PDU Lambeth | 3 |
PDU Lewisham and Bromley | 3 |
PDU Newham | 4 |
PDU Redbridge and Waltham Forest | 3 |
PDU Southwark | 2 |
PDU Tower Hamlets | 0 |
PDU Wandsworth, Merton and Sutton | 0 |
PS London Accrued Programmes and Structured Interventions | 0 |
PS London Corporate Services | 1 |
PS London Headquarters | 1 |
PS London Public Protection Custody | 2 |
Total | 53 |
The leaving rate for probation officers in the London Probation Service was 12.4% in the 12 months to 30 September 2023 – a fall from the year prior.
Both recruitment and retention remain a priority across the Probation Service. We have accelerated recruitment of trainee Probation Officers (PQiPs) to increase staffing levels, particularly in Probation Delivery Units (PDUs) with the most significant staffing challenges. There were 2,185 staff, equivalent to 2,164 FTE, as at 30 September 2023 undertaking the PQiP training, which we anticipate will start to directly impact on the reduction of caseloads as they qualify.
Notes to table 1 and table 2:
(p) Figures relating to current financial year are provisional and may be subject to change in future.
Asked by: Sharon Hodgson (Labour - Washington and Gateshead South)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of contracting (a) rehabilitation, (b) therapy and (c) other similar services for frontline staff.
Answered by Damian Hinds
In full recognition of the challenging aspects of front-line prison and probations services-based work, His Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) provides a wide range of formal contracted rehabilitation, therapy, physical and mental health support for its staff.
The principal merits of external contracted services are firstly, that the robust Crown Service Commercial tender process requires a strict evaluation criterion and moderation exercise where all the evaluation forms and notes become public record. This means that the successful bidder has been selected fairly, on the merits of their service provision and without conflict of interest. As the largest individual customer of services through this framework, the Ministry of Justice takes a key role in defining the services that must be provided and the standards that contractors must meet before gaining access to the framework. Secondly, due to the wide geographically dispersed nature of our HMPPS working population across the UK with some overseas staff, it is imperative that the contractors are capable of delivering a range of services to 62,801 full time equivalent staff in post (HM Prison and Probation Service workforce quarterly: June 2023 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)). Thirdly, contractors are subject to a series of performance measures set by both the Crown Commercial Service and the department which are reported at set intervals and managed accordingly in order to ensure staff have rapid access to services. This allows regular evaluation of service quality and effectiveness but also ensures that the correct governance structures remain in place, such as GDPR for handling employee personal data and ensuring their data protection rights. Fourthly, the contracted model of employee health services benefits from impartiality, in that independent external clinical advice is given to the employee confidentially and if appropriate with consent, to the referring line manager.
The contracted services for staff health and wellbeing include occupational health (OH), employee assistance programmes (EAP) and reflective sessions. These contracts include a variety of services which include but are not limited to therapeutic or rehabilitative interventions and are aggregated based on specialisms to ensure the MoJ has access to the most relevant services. Working with subject matter experts employed by the third-party providers, the department has the benefit of being able to explore and implement innovative and value-adding employee health and wellbeing services for front-line staff. This model is also vital to ensuring that the breadth of services can be delivered consistently across the prison and probation estate. The merits of contracted services can be evidenced upon illustration of the wide range of services that are hereby listed:
Occupational Health
Prison officer pre-employment health assessments at national Fitness Centres
Performance and Attendance management referrals for advice on fitness for work and reasonable adjustments due to ill health, disability and/or following an accident/injury at work
Post-Covid Syndrome Referral Service
Fast track Trauma referrals
EMDR and CBT (Eye Movement Desensitisation Reprocessing and Cognitive Behavioural Therapy)
Immunisations and vaccination history checks.
Health Surveillance
Physiotherapy
Workstation and workplace ergonomics
Dyslexia and other neurodiverse conditions assessments 13
Occupational Therapy
Ill-health retirement and advice on eligibility for ill-health early retirement
Body Fluid Exposure & Sharps Injury Support
Online Physio Support
Online Health Condition Management
Employee Assistance Programmes
Employee self-referral to 24/7 confidential telephone helpline staffed by qualified counsellors
Face to face or online counselling Services, including therapeutic interventions
Bullying and harassment support
Management support services
Support and advice on personal matters e.g. health, relationships, family, financial, emotional, legal, anxiety, alcohol, drugs and other issues.
Support for work matters - work demands, working relationships, work/life balance, stress and other related issues
Reflective Sessions
Trauma and Critical Incident Support
Health and wellbeing promotion, such as wellbeing and mental health related workshops and training programmes
Mediation
Asked by: Andy Slaughter (Labour - Hammersmith and Chiswick)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, pursuant to the Answer of 7 June 2023 to Question 187087 on Prison Accommodation, for what reason it is not practicable to collect data on time out of cell for each prison in England and Wales.
Answered by Damian Hinds
Prison governors set a regime for each day specifying when prisoners will ordinarily be unlocked. There will be occasions, however, when certain prisoners will remain in their cell during these times. Reasons for this will include illness, being over retirement age, the management of operational incidents, and other operational reasons such as staff needing to be deployed to other duties.
There will also be occasions where prisoners will be out of cell at times when they are scheduled to be locked in, for example to attend medical appointments at hospital, a late arrival from court, or a transfer between prisons.
To accurately record the amount of time prisoners spend out of cell, His Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) would therefore be required to record information for each individual prisoner, taking into account their unique movements on a daily basis.
Asked by: Liz Saville Roberts (Plaid Cymru - Dwyfor Meirionnydd)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what recent estimate he has made of the number of probation staff who are expected to retire over the next 12 months.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
Due to changes in retirement rules in recent years we are unable to collect data on how many staff are due to retire within the next 12 months as there is no longer a statutory retirement age for Probation Officers.
Asked by: Liz Saville Roberts (Plaid Cymru - Dwyfor Meirionnydd)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps he is taking to improve the levels of (a) recruitment, (b) morale and (c) retention of probation staff.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
In April 2021 we published the first national Recruitment and Retention Strategy for the Probation Service which identified several key areas of focus.
The Probation Service is committed to increasing recruitment to fill Probation Officer vacancies, particularly in areas with significant local employment market challenges.
In 2020/21, we recruited a record 1,007 trainee probation officers. We are further increasing our recruitment to unprecedented levels, with a target 1,500 trainee Probation Officers being recruited this financial year (2021/2022).
We have identified six common drivers of attrition across those regions where it is more challenging to recruit and retain probation officers. These drivers include:
o Pay and benefits
o Newly Qualified Officer (NQO) attrition
o High caseloads
o Lack of career progression
o Wellbeing
o Bullying, Harassment and Discrimination
Work is underway to address these six drivers of attrition, and we are developing solutions to help regions retain staff which will strengthen our ability to help manage staff wellbeing and resilience.
We introduced three new pathways to help us retain experienced staff approaching retirement. This allows them to continue their current roles on more flexible terms or utilise their experience to guide new starters by undertaking new roles as Practice Tutor Assessors or Learning Coaches, which reduces the pull on existing experienced Probation Officers to help with this workload.
Asked by: Liz Saville Roberts (Plaid Cymru - Dwyfor Meirionnydd)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what recent assessment he has made of trends in the level of (a) recruitment, (b) morale and (c) retention of probation staff.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
In April 2021 we published the first national Recruitment and Retention Strategy for the Probation Service which identified several key areas of focus.
The Probation Service is committed to increasing recruitment to fill Probation Officer vacancies, particularly in areas with significant local employment market challenges.
In 2020/21, we recruited a record 1,007 trainee probation officers. We are further increasing our recruitment to unprecedented levels, with a target 1,500 trainee Probation Officers being recruited this financial year (2021/2022).
As of 30 September 2021, the overall leaving rates for the Probation Service is 7.7%, which is an increase of 1.1%points from 6.6% at 30 June 2021. This figure is lower than the overall HMPPS leaving rate as of 30 September 2021, which is 10.1%.
The Probation Services Officer (PSO) leaver rate for 12 months to March 2021 (7.0%) was the lowest it had been in the past 5 years. The percentage as of 30 September 2021 stands at 8.4% which is an increase of 1.1% points as at 30 June 2021.
The Probation Officer (PO) leaving rates are 6.9% as of 30 September 2021 which is an increase of 1.1% points from 5.8% at the 30 June 2021.
The Senior Probation Officer (SPO) leaver rate for 12 months to March 2021 (3.3%) was the lowest it has been in the past 5 years; however, the decline needs to be treated with caution as this is likely to be an artificial decline due to the pandemic. It has since risen to 4.3% as at 30 September, which is an increase of 0.9% points from 3.4% at 30 June 2021.
As outlined in the Recruitment and Retention Strategy, our focus is addressing recruitment and retention challenges within the Probation Service, particularly for those Probation Delivery Units (PDUs) with the highest average Probation Officer vacancy rates over a 12-month period.
We have identified six common drivers of attrition across those regions where it is more challenging to recruit and retain probation officers. These drivers include:
Work is underway to address these six drivers of attrition and we are developing solutions to help regions retain staff which will strengthen our ability to help manage staff wellbeing and resilience.
We have introduced three new pathways to help retain experienced staff approaching retirement. This allows them to continue their current roles on more flexible terms or utilise their experience to help guide new starters by taking on new roles as Practice Tutor Assessors or Learning Coaches and reduce the pull on existing experienced Probation Officers to help with this workload.
Asked by: Liz Saville Roberts (Plaid Cymru - Dwyfor Meirionnydd)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many and what proportion of prison officers in (a) Band 2, (b) Band 3, (c) Band 4, and (d) Band 5 have retired in each of the last 12 months, by prison.
Answered by Victoria Atkins - Shadow Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
The latest set of HMPPS Workforce Bulletin statistics for the quarter to 30 June 2021: Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service workforce quarterly: June 2021 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
This publication provides headline statistics at an organisational, Group and Division level, we are not able to break this down further to establishment level by month. This information is broken down into various categories but can be found under retirement and medical retirement.
The next set of data for the period to 30 September 2021 is due to be published in the Workforce Statistics Report on 18 November 2021.
These statistics only cover information in relation to the public sector.
Asked by: Lord Beecham (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask Her Majesty's Government how many prison officers have left HM Prison Service in each of the last three years for reasons other than reaching retirement age.
Answered by Lord Keen of Elie - Shadow Minister (Justice)
The number of band 3-5 prison officers who have left HM Prison Service by reason for leaving in each of the last three years is presented in table 1 below. This information can also be found in table 11b in the latest set of HMPPS workforce statistics at the following link:
Table 1: Band 3-5 prison officer leavers (headcount), by reason for leaving, 12 months ending 31 March 2016 to 12 months ending 31 March 2018
|
|
| Headcount |
Reason for leaving | 12 months ending 31 Mar 2016 | 12 months ending 31 Mar 2017 | 12 months ending 31 Mar 2018 |
Resignation | 596 | 859 | 1,244 |
Medical retirement | 150 | 142 | 109 |
Death | 14 | 15 | 23 |
Voluntary Exit1 | ~ | ~ | ~ |
Voluntary Redundancy | ~ | ~ | ~ |
Compulsory Redundancy | ~ | ~ | ~ |
Dismissal Other | 4 | 44 | 80 |
Dismissal - Conduct | 64 | 57 | 61 |
Dismissal - Poor performance | 8 | 6 | 6 |
Dismissal - Unsatisfactory attendance/Medical Inefficiency2 | 324 | 330 | 151 |
Transfer to other Government dept. | 38 | 58 | 72 |
Public sector transfer3 | ~ | 3 | ~ |
Other4 | 59 | 39 | 43 |
Total (excl. retirements) | 1,258 | 1,553 | 1,791 |
Retirements | 286 | 281 | 297 |
All band 3-5 officer leavers | 1,544 | 1,834 | 2,088 |
1 This can be offered where the organisation wishes to reduce staff numbers by offering an early exit scheme or an early exit package to an individual. There is no compulsion on individuals to accept the offer.
2 Since January 2017, information regarding dismissals as a result of medical inefficiencies have been recorded as unsatisfactory attendances. Therefore, these categories have been combined.
3 Public sector transfers include healthcare staff transferring to NHS employment. These staff continue to work within establishments but under a different employer.
4 The 'Other' category largely consists of fixed-term appointments coming to the end of their contract. Reductions in this category reflect the fall in recruitment since 2009, including fixed-term staff.
~ denotes suppressed values of 2 or fewer or other values which would allow values of 2 or fewer to be derived by subtraction. Low numbers are suppressed to prevent disclosure in accordance with the Data Protection Act, 1998.
Asked by: Liz Saville Roberts (Plaid Cymru - Dwyfor Meirionnydd)
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.
Answered by Rory Stewart
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