******
I did, it really angered me! The tone was so awful, as if we’re going to read that and then realise we’ve all been looking at it all wrong. All hail the chief PO for busting those myths and essentially calling us all liars and over-reactors. And you wonder why there’s a retention problem…
I did, it really angered me! The tone was so awful, as if we’re going to read that and then realise we’ve all been looking at it all wrong. All hail the chief PO for busting those myths and essentially calling us all liars and over-reactors. And you wonder why there’s a retention problem…
******
I’ve read the Chief Probation Officer’s “myth busters” piece carefully. It sets out three main corrections and provides percentage tables to show pay growth over time. So let’s respond clearly and factually.
Myth 1: CBF is separate from the pay award
It’s correct that progression (CBF) sits within Civil Service Remit Guidance and forms part of the annual pay framework. But progression is movement within a pay band. It is not a cost-of-living increase. It does not raise the value of the band itself. It simply moves someone closer to the ceiling that already exists. Once staff reach the top of their band, progression ends. From that point on, only the headline uplift matters. So while CBF may technically sit inside the “award”, it does not function as restoration for experienced staff already at band maximum. That distinction is not a myth. It’s mechanics.
Myth 2: Only 1% between 2018 and 2021
The article states that between 2018 and 2024 average increases were 24.4% at band minimums and 10.8% at band maximums. Minimums rose faster to support recruitment. Maximums rose more slowly. That means newer entrants benefited proportionally more than long-serving staff at the top of bands. During the same period, cumulative inflation — especially post-2020 — significantly reduced real-terms value. Nominal increases without inflation context do not equal restored purchasing power.
Myth 3: Only 11% since 2010
The table shows band maximum increases since 2010. For Band 4, that’s 17.56% (22.26% including the proposed 2025 uplift). Spread across roughly 14–15 years, that averages around 1–1.5% per year. Over that same period, inflation has substantially exceeded that figure. The question staff are asking is not whether pay bands have moved at all. It’s whether pay has kept pace with inflation, expanding workload, heightened risk, professional registration requirements and responsibility creep. Those are different questions.
The 2025–26 offer remains:
• 4% uplift to pay points
• 4% uplift to allowances
• Progression where eligible
I’ve read the Chief Probation Officer’s “myth busters” piece carefully. It sets out three main corrections and provides percentage tables to show pay growth over time. So let’s respond clearly and factually.
Myth 1: CBF is separate from the pay award
It’s correct that progression (CBF) sits within Civil Service Remit Guidance and forms part of the annual pay framework. But progression is movement within a pay band. It is not a cost-of-living increase. It does not raise the value of the band itself. It simply moves someone closer to the ceiling that already exists. Once staff reach the top of their band, progression ends. From that point on, only the headline uplift matters. So while CBF may technically sit inside the “award”, it does not function as restoration for experienced staff already at band maximum. That distinction is not a myth. It’s mechanics.
Myth 2: Only 1% between 2018 and 2021
The article states that between 2018 and 2024 average increases were 24.4% at band minimums and 10.8% at band maximums. Minimums rose faster to support recruitment. Maximums rose more slowly. That means newer entrants benefited proportionally more than long-serving staff at the top of bands. During the same period, cumulative inflation — especially post-2020 — significantly reduced real-terms value. Nominal increases without inflation context do not equal restored purchasing power.
Myth 3: Only 11% since 2010
The table shows band maximum increases since 2010. For Band 4, that’s 17.56% (22.26% including the proposed 2025 uplift). Spread across roughly 14–15 years, that averages around 1–1.5% per year. Over that same period, inflation has substantially exceeded that figure. The question staff are asking is not whether pay bands have moved at all. It’s whether pay has kept pace with inflation, expanding workload, heightened risk, professional registration requirements and responsibility creep. Those are different questions.
The 2025–26 offer remains:
• 4% uplift to pay points
• 4% uplift to allowances
• Progression where eligible
No one is disputing the arithmetic. What staff are disputing is the framing. Because when real-terms pay erosion is reframed as “misunderstanding”, it feels less like myth-busting and more like minimising. You can call it clarification. But when experienced practitioners calculate what their pay buys now compared to ten or fifteen years ago, the gap is not imaginary. It’s visible. And no table changes that.
******
We are not stupid. We do not need “myth busters” to explain percentages to us. We can divide 22% by 15 years. We can compare it to inflation. We can look at our rent, mortgages, fuel bills, childcare and food costs and do the maths without supervision thanks! The issue is not misunderstanding. The issue is erosion.
Calling it a “myth” when staff point out that 1–1.5% a year over a decade and a half is nowhere near real-terms restoration feels profoundly insulting. It suggests the problem is that we haven’t grasped the figures properly, rather than the figures being inadequate. Progression is not a pay rise for experienced staff at the top of bands. It is internal movement within a ceiling that itself has barely moved. Recruitment minimums rising faster than maximums doesn’t disprove erosion. It highlights it. And presenting nominal percentage tables without inflation context is technically correct but economically hollow. We are being told, essentially: “Look at the numbers. You’re doing better than you think.”
Eh, No!
We are looking at the numbers.
And we are looking at our bank accounts.
And we are looking at workloads that have intensified year on year.
And we are looking at risk that has escalated.
And we are looking at professional expectations that have increased.
And we are looking at colleagues leaving.
The anger isn’t because we can’t do maths. It’s because we can! When a workforce under sustained strain is told their concerns are “misunderstandings,” it doesn’t feel explanatory. It feels incredibly dismissive! And that is what has landed so badly. This isn’t about confusion. It’s about value. If leadership wants trust, start by acknowledging real-terms loss without reframing it as myth. We don’t need correcting. We need recognising. There's a difference.
We are not stupid. We do not need “myth busters” to explain percentages to us. We can divide 22% by 15 years. We can compare it to inflation. We can look at our rent, mortgages, fuel bills, childcare and food costs and do the maths without supervision thanks! The issue is not misunderstanding. The issue is erosion.
Calling it a “myth” when staff point out that 1–1.5% a year over a decade and a half is nowhere near real-terms restoration feels profoundly insulting. It suggests the problem is that we haven’t grasped the figures properly, rather than the figures being inadequate. Progression is not a pay rise for experienced staff at the top of bands. It is internal movement within a ceiling that itself has barely moved. Recruitment minimums rising faster than maximums doesn’t disprove erosion. It highlights it. And presenting nominal percentage tables without inflation context is technically correct but economically hollow. We are being told, essentially: “Look at the numbers. You’re doing better than you think.”
Eh, No!
We are looking at the numbers.
And we are looking at our bank accounts.
And we are looking at workloads that have intensified year on year.
And we are looking at risk that has escalated.
And we are looking at professional expectations that have increased.
And we are looking at colleagues leaving.
The anger isn’t because we can’t do maths. It’s because we can! When a workforce under sustained strain is told their concerns are “misunderstandings,” it doesn’t feel explanatory. It feels incredibly dismissive! And that is what has landed so badly. This isn’t about confusion. It’s about value. If leadership wants trust, start by acknowledging real-terms loss without reframing it as myth. We don’t need correcting. We need recognising. There's a difference.
--oo00oo--
What does AI say?
Myth 1: "Probation officers are well-paid for their work."
Reality: Pay has fallen significantly in real terms.
While starting salaries for qualified probation officers rose to £35,130 (plus London weighting) by 2024/25, unions argue this does not compensate for over a decade of wage stagnation. Data indicates that probation staff have faced a real-terms pay decrease of roughly 22% compared to similar professions over the past decade, with some estimates suggesting a 60% real-terms cut since 2010.
Myth 2: "The 2024/25 pay rises resolved the pay crisis."
Reality: The rises barely kept up with inflation, and negotiations for 2025 were delayed.
While a 2024 deal brought a 6.4% increase for some and brought forward pay dates, it followed years of suppressed wages. As of late 2025, unions were still in dispute, with reports of "relentless" workload pressures and no immediate 2025 pay offer, leading to threats of industrial action.
Myth 3: "Probation officers are paid equivalent to police/prison officers."
Reality: Probation staff have consistently fallen behind other justice sectors.
Comparative data shows that probation staff have received lower, or joint-lowest, pay awards compared to police staff and prison officers since 2010. As of 2024, probation pay lagged behind other public sector roles (Police Staff 20%, Health 16%, Local Government 18.4% vs. Probation 9.9% increase).
Myth 4: "The high caseloads are temporary, justifying the pay rate."
Reality: Unmanageable workloads are now considered systemic.
The service is under severe pressure, often described as "buckling" or in crisis, with high turnover, severe staff shortages (estimated at 3,150), and unsustainable caseloads. Staff describe pay as "atrocious" for the high-risk, 24/7 nature of the work.
Myth 5: "The service is now properly funded after reunification."
Reality: Despite returning to public control, funding remains a key issue.
Although the 2021 unification was generally welcomed, reports from 2025 show that the service is "under-funded, under-staffed, and overworked". The reliance on early release schemes (SDS40) has exacerbated workload issues without corresponding pay increases for the increased risk.
Disclaimer: Pay data is based on 2024-2025 union negotiations and Ministry of Justice figures. The situation regarding 2025/26 pay is subject to ongoing negotiations.
In other news. Seen on Twitter by Krishnan Guru-Murthy:-
ReplyDelete"On C4 News : Extraordinary interview tonight with Simon McDonald - former Permanent Secretary at the Foreign Office - who is trying to warn No 10 about the widely reported plans to replace Chris Wormald as Cabinet Secretary with Antonia Romeo without a new appointment process. He says ditching Wormald is “extraordinary” and he wants to talk to them about the Foreign Office investigation into allegations against Antonia Romeo in 2017 which the Cabinet Office said was investigated and dismissed without a case to answer. “Due diligence has some way to go” says Lord McDonald who says there must be a full process before any appointment. He says he’s been trying to speak to No 10 but nobody is calling him back!"
https://evrimagaci.org/gpt/dame-antonia-romeo-set-to-become-first-female-cabinet-secretary-528486?srsltid=AfmBOooOpals7mbEtcI9A5ugt0XYJcGz8LmhXXoJ5wXXPTOeec8HuIlQ
DeleteSummary
Dame Antonia Romeo is set to become the first female Cabinet Secretary amid major government leadership changes following Sir Chris Wormald's resignation.
Sir Chris Wormald resigned after just over one year, marking the shortest Cabinet Secretary tenure, and will receive a £250,000 payoff plus a £2.5 million pension.
Romeo, known for her progressive diversity advocacy and cleared of past misconduct allegations, has previously been considered for the role and is viewed as a reformist leader.
"Her progressive stances have earned her both admirers and detractors. According to The Mail on Sunday, Romeo’s tenure as consul general in New York saw her host lavish events for celebrities such as Anna Wintour and Calvin Klein, moves that reportedly raised eyebrows among some colleagues. Allegations surfaced in 2017 accusing Romeo of bullying, harassment, discrimination, and misuse of expenses—including claims she allowed her husband’s firm to use the taxpayer-funded residence for work events and that she spent government money on school fees, business class flights, taxis, and even £30,000 worth of paint and furnishings for her official flat.
However, the Cabinet Office ultimately cleared her of all wrongdoing... Dave Penman, general secretary of the civil servants’ union, suggested that some of the criticism directed at Romeo carried a “whiff of misogyny.” "
La romeo was a much lauded rising star when she was at the cabinet office francis maude:
"Antonia Romeo worked closely with Francis Maude in the Cabinet Office during the early 2010s, notably as Director of Governance Reform in 2010 and in facilitating government digital strategies. Later, Romeo served as the sponsor for the 2022 independent review of Civil Service governance led by Lord Maude."
La romeo was also the responsible officer for the TR project when maude's cabinet office stumped up the £80m "Modernisation Fund" sweetener to pay off probation staff in order to make TR seem a more palatable proposition to the crc companies... money the pirateer crc's pocketed for themselves rather than hand it out to staff as part of any severance arrangement.
So, rest assured, La romeo will soon be enabled to fuck up the country from a position of ultimate power despite her appalling track record.
Another alleged bully at the top of government,should fit in well
DeleteBritain’s biggest union has called for the Probation Service to be removed from civil service control after a damning report from MPs flagged staffing concerns and questioned the service’s ability to turn around record-high reoffending rates.
ReplyDeleteUnison, which counts probation officers, other civil servants, health professionals and social workers among its 1.3 million members, said ministers should make good on a 2024 general-election manifesto pledge and review the governance of probation “without further delay”.
An MoJ spokesperson said the current Labour government inherited a Probation Service "under immense pressure which has placed too great a burden on our hardworking staff", adding that the government is fixing this with a record £700m funding increase.
Before the Transforming Rehabilitation programme was launched by the coalition government in 2014, probation trusts separate from the Ministry of Justice were responsible for providing services. The 35 trusts in England and Wales were responsible for overseeing offenders in the community and providing specialist services in courts and prisons.
Since June 2021, following the scrapping of the Transforming Rehabilitation reforms, probation services have been unified at HM Prison and Probation Service, which is part of the MoJ.
A report from parliament’s Public Accounts Committee yesterday said the number of offenders recalled to prison is at an all-time high, accounting for 15,583 inmates at the end of March last year – or 15% of the overall prison population. MPs said the figure represented a 49% increase since June 2021.
Following their inquiry, sparked by a critical National Audit Office report in October, MPs questioned whether HMPPS has a proper understanding of how many staff it needs to sufficiently improve probation performance.
https://www.dailyecho.co.uk/news/25846289.hampshires-probation-service-debilitated-new-report-says/
ReplyDeleteI have searched in the Bank of England's Inflation calculator.
ReplyDeleteBand 2 salary in 2010 was £20,566 and the BoE calculator shows at the end of 2024, taking into account the increased costs in goods and services, you would need £30,769.
This was an increase of 49.7%.
Yet the Myth Buster show B2 pay was £25,210.
That's approx £5,500 less than the rate of inflation between 2010 and 2024.
B3 - £27,102 to £32,550. BoE over 14 years shows would be £40,567
B4 £35,727 in 2010 to £42,090 in 2024. BoE shows inflation means at 2024 the equivalent 2010 amount should be £53,477.
Not myth busting, just maths.
Vote No .
Myth buster; The inspectorate continually tells us that senior managers are excellent…………the truth is usually a long way away from this…..
ReplyDeleteOh.
Deletehttps://hmiprobation.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/document/dynamic-inspection-of-public-protection-in-south-west-region/
"while it was articulated that public protection was a priority, there was no regional public protection strategy or defined priorities, actions, or accountability mechanisms... in over three-quarters of inspected cases, management oversight was insufficient, ineffective, or absent...
A largely inexperienced workforce, including middle managers, reported significant gaps in training. Worryingly, despite almost all staff believing they possessed the necessary skills, experience, and knowledge, this did not translate into effective management of risk within all cases.
Of our inspected cases, 22 were MAPPA eligible, with the majority (20) managed at Level 1. However, only eight of these cases demonstrated evidence of coordinated, multi-agency oversight, including joint working with the police."
_________________________________________________
https://hmiprobation.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/document/dynamic-inspection-of-public-protection-in-south-central-region-2026/
"In the cases inspected, just over a third were sufficient in assessing risk of harm appropriately... His Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) must lead the way in providing the resources, clarity, and infrastructure needed to embed public protection at the heart of probation delivery.
workforce instability, high churn, and lengthy vetting times left many practitioners underprepared and under-skilled for complex risk management... Workload pressures and poorly managed transfers of cases within the region and to other areas exacerbated these issues...
Learning from serious further offences (SFOs) was not systematic... fear of SFOs drove process compliance rather than reflective decision-making.
Human factors approaches had started to embed psychological safety and encourage problem-solving, while performance management processes had improved staff confidence in accountability. However, this accountability did not lead to practitioners understanding the purpose behind the tasks they were completing, or how those tasks were intended to be applied, other than to meet performance targets.
Many of those who had trained while within former community rehabilitation companies (CRCs) would have had no longstanding experience of working with higher risk caseloads.
Staffing and service delivery were critical areas for improvement."
https://hmiprobation.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/news/hmpps-respond-to-national-inspection-recommendations/
ReplyDelete“I welcome this week’s response from HM Prison and Probation Service to the recommendations made in our National Inspection of Probation, published in April 2025.
This inspection examined the effectiveness of HMPPS’ work to support, enable, and drive the delivery of probation services in England and Wales. It highlighted major shortfalls in service delivery and significant public protection concerns – resulting in an overall rating of ‘Requires improvement’.
The period since our Inspection has been one of considerable change for the Service, so we are pleased to see areas where progress has been made, in particular across probation strategy and digital working, which were key report recommendations.
However, it is clear that the Service remains under significant strain – as more recently reflected in this month’s Public Accounts Committee report – and I remain convinced of the critical need for urgent attention, at the most senior level, to ensure it has the staff, resources, and focus it needs to protect the public and reduce reoffending.
We will be continuing our work with ministers and HMPPS as further changes from the Sentencing Act are implemented, to help ensure progress is made across all our report’s recommendations.”
_______________________________________________________
https://hmiprobation.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/news/inspectorate-concerned-by-quality-of-work-to-keep-people-safe-following-inspection-of-probation-services-in-the-south-west-region/
Inspectorate “concerned’ by quality of work to keep people safe, following inspection of probation services in the South West region
_______________________________________________________
https://hmiprobation.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/news/chief-inspector-of-probation-highlights-systemic-public-protection-challenges-in-south-central-region-of-probation-service/
Chief Inspector of Probation highlights systemic public protection challenges in South Central region of Probation Service
hmpps response here:
ReplyDeletehttps://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6989e5a985bc7d6ba0fbc7f3/HMPPS_response_to_the_National_Probaton_Inspection_-_Feb_2026.pdf
I’m just reading the above and honestly the response / the spin !! ‘’Staffing
DeleteHMPPS recognise that our people are our greatest asset. We want to first acknowledge the considerable pressure probation staff have faced during significant organisational change and that pay and reward are key issues for our workforce. Following constructive negotiations, we are proposing one of the most generous public sector pay offers this year for probation staff and are committed to engaging openly with them to help ensure they understand what the award means for them. We are also fully invested in driving improvements regarding training and workload levels to ensure that staff are properly supported and equipped to deliver our important work effectively’.
"this year" no mention of 12m overdue
DeleteMore juicy excerpts from hmpps spin doctors:
Delete"The period following the inspection has seen further development across our national arrangements, and we are now able to set out our direction with greater certainty following Royal Assent of the Sentencing Bill. This legislative clarity enables us to articulate with greater confidence how our future programme of work responds to the Inspectorate’s findings, supports improvements to probation delivery, and ensures that our reform activity meets the evolving needs of probation services and the public we protect."
"We were pleased that the Chief Inspector recognised HMPPS’ achievements since the unification of the National Probation Service and Community Rehabilitation Companies in 2021 and acknowledged our strengths in relation to digital services in improving delivery to the front-line."
"Government Risk Management Profession Training and accreditation has been extended to Areas to improve skills in the identification and response to risks to probation service delivery and there is early evidence of local managers taking up the training."
"we are beginning to see the positive impact of the centralised recruitment process as a large number of qualified probation officers come through the pipeline."
"As the NAO and Public Accounts Committee have documented, probation faces an acute capacity gap equivalent to 3,900 FTE unless determined action is taken to reduce workload. That is why we have commissioned the OFPS programme, with a Ministerial mandate to close the capacity gap by April 2027"
"We will ensure robust governance and senior accountability are in place to check, challenge and quality assure activities... We will hold ourselves accountable by maintaining rigorous oversight through our established governance structures and ensuring senior leaders are responsible for monitoring and evaluating progress."
ReplyDeletehttps://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c3wlqy6695do
... on Wednesday evening Lord McDonald, the former head of the Foreign Office, told Channel 4 News that if this was the case then "in my view, the due diligence has some way still to go".
He called for a "full process" to appoint a new cabinet secretary that "starts from scratch".
This has been interpreted as a reference to an investigation Dame Antonia faced over allegations about her spending in 2017 when she was the government's consul-general in New York, and Lord McDonald was her boss.
In response to Lord McDonald's interview, a Cabinet Office spokesperson said: "There is absolutely no basis for this criticism.
"Antonia Romeo is a highly respected permanent secretary with a 25-year record of excellent public service.
"The allegations all come from a single grievance made some time ago by a former employee. All the allegations were dismissed on the basis there was no case to answer."
Except... romeo has overseen the demise of probation & the effective collapse of the prisons system in england & wales.
* from the transcript of evidence given to the Public Accounts Committee on 12 March 2014:
Margaret Hodge: But the Peterborough model, as I understand it, is voluntary.
Antonia Romeo: That is correct.
Margaret Hodge: And the model that you are designing is not voluntary.
Antonia Romeo: That is correct.
Margaret Hodge: Is there any international evidence on this payment by results stuff?
Antonia Romeo: Very little actually.
* she was the senior responsible officer for the tories' transforming rehabilitation experiment, an embarassing failure that lost the taxpayer £half-a-billion & was reversed by a later tory government
* the former Permanent Secretary of the UK Ministry of Justice (2021–2025), held executive responsibility for probation services, overseeing their unification and addressing performance challenges
(for "unification" read "attempting to repair the damage done by the tr debacle")
* She faced scrutiny from the Justice Committee regarding probation failures, staff shortages, and serious further offences.
For all of her certificates & scrolls & gongs & plaudits, romeo has cost the taxpayer a shedload of cash, fatally wounded the probation service, inflicted massive harm on the prison service, had a right laugh at the uk taxpayers' expense in New York as consul-general, has a reputation for harassing & bullying staff to get her own way and was nick-named "Strong White" (apparently her favourite farrow & ball colour).
"a 25-year record of excellent public service" = lost £hundreds-of-millions of taxpayer cash but managed to blame other people & achieve promotion before being tarred with that brush.
But *this* is the jewel in the crown (ahem) that will get her whatever she wants, when she wants it:
"The Coronation Scroll of King Charles III, often associated with Antonia Romeo (Clerk of the Crown in Chancery) who authored and presented it, is a 21-meter (70-foot) hand-stitched manuscript documenting the 2023 Coronation."
The guardian likes her.
Deletehttps://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/feb/12/antonia-romeo-and-tipped-next-cabinet-secretary
https://www.civilserviceworld.com/professions/article/cab-sec-chris-wormald-departs-civil-service
Delete"The official statement said that, for an interim period, the responsibilities of the cabinet secretary will be shared by Cat Little, the permanent secretary at the Cabinet Office; Dame Antonia Romeo, the permanent secretary at the Home Office; and James Bowler, the HM Treasury permanent secretary...
... When appointing him, Starmer said Wormald would bring “a wealth of experience to this role at a critical moment"... In July 2025, just seven months later, briefings emerged that Starmer had “buyer’s remorse” over the appointment."
The HMPPS response acknowledges “significant strain.” It acknowledges a 3,900 FTE capacity gap. It acknowledges workforce instability, churn, public protection failings and the need for urgent senior attention.
ReplyDeleteIt thanks staff for their resilience.
And then... it pivots to programme language.
OFPS.
Digital reform.
Risk architecture.
Workforce strategy.
25% workload reduction by 2027.
Quarterly oversight.
Embedding improvement.
Meanwhile, practitioners are documenting unsafe caseloads, MAPPA failures, insufficient oversight, and colleagues being placed under performance scrutiny for structural overload.
The Inspectorate says management oversight is insufficient in over three-quarters of cases.
HMPPS says progress is being made.
Staff say they are exhausted and do not feel safe raising concerns.
That isn’t a communications gap.
That’s a psychological safety crisis.
When people raise real-terms pay erosion and are told they’ve misunderstood the figures, it feels like gaslighting.
When people raise workload risk and are told the strategy is working, it feels like minimising.
When people document overload and are warned about performance measures, it feels coercive.
You can't rebuild trust while implying the workforce simply hasn’t grasped the maths.
We understand the maths, inflation, progression ceilings. We understand that 4% does not restore 15 years of erosion.
What we don’t understand is why legitimate concerns are reframed as myths. This isn’t about acronyms or governance diagrams.
It’s about whether staff feel believed and right now many don’t.
And that is far more dangerous to public protection than any blog thread.
If this appointment goes through, it won’t just feel like business as usual. It will feel like confirmation that there is no such thing as accountability at the top of this system. TR didn’t “underperform.” It destabilised a public service, cost the taxpayer hundreds of millions, fractured professional identity and took years to reverse. Reunification didn’t restore stability. We are now looking at 20%+ vacancy rates, soaring recalls, declining inspection outcomes and a Public Accounts Committee describing the service as on the brink.
ReplyDeleteThose are not abstract management challenges. Those are lived consequences for staff and risks carried daily in practice.
And yet the trajectory upward continues.
That grates.
Frontline staff are performance managed for missed targets that arise from vacancy rates, churn and caseloads running well beyond capacity, pressures they did not design and cannot control. Practitioners carry the personal weight of SFO scrutiny in a system operating with record recalls, rising demand and acknowledged staffing gaps. Middle managers are criticised in inspection findings for oversight failures rooted in structural instability, not individual malice. Yet when large-scale strategic reforms destabilise an entire service, visible career consequence appears to evaporate the higher up the ladder you go.
If anything, it seems to be rebranded as “experience.”
We all know that responsibility should flow both ways but doesn't!
So is it the “worst thing” that could happen to probation? Perhaps not in isolation. But symbolically, it reinforces the message many staff already feel in their bones which is that when things slip, the spotlight lands on the practitioner but when things collapse, the reshuffle happens somewhere above.
That isn’t resentment.
It’s observation.
And if there’s one skill probation staff possess in abundance, it’s recognising patterns.
Simply saying thank you for the above insightful and thought provoking comments and wishing all those working across Probation a kind and productive day. Take Care of each other. PS have now connected with the 11th MP and I would still invite you all to share your concerns/issues with your MP too. IanGould5
ReplyDeletein other civil service news:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.civilserviceworld.com/professions/article/senior-civil-servant-sentenced-over-child-abuse-images
"A former senior civil servant in the Cabinet Office has avoided jail after admitting possessing hundreds of indecent images of children.
Marco Salzedo was sentenced at Norwich Magistrates' Court on Friday after pleading guilty to possessing 312 images and videos of children, 139 of which were category A, including images of babies.
Salzedo was director of commercial and contract management capability at the Cabinet Office but has been dismissed from the role. He was also briefly joint interim government chief commercial officer.
He has been sentenced to a 12‑month community order, ordered to carry out 120 hours of unpaid work and has been placed on the sex offenders register for five years."
Really blimey why hasn't starmer put him in the lord's FFS.
Deletewhat we can expect from hmpps digitisation?
ReplyDeletehttps://www.civilserviceworld.com/professions/article/copilot-trial-dwp-staff-save-19-minutes-per-day
"Department for Work and Pensions staff have saved 19 minutes per day on average in a trial where they used Microsoft 365 Copilot to help with routine tasks.
An evaluation of the trial found evidence of improved task efficiency, work quality and job satisfaction, with 73% reporting better quality outputs and 65% feeling more fulfilled at work."
Huzzah!!
Nurses are to be given 3.3% pay rise in April, which answers what we'll be given, although obviously with another 12 months of pretending to give a fu*k before being offered it.
ReplyDeleteIt’s not really about what percentage nurses get. It’s about what the government believes it can get away with in each workforce.
Delete3.3% for nurses doesn’t “answer” what probation will get. It signals the benchmark the Treasury thinks it can land without triggering sustained disruption.
The difference is this- health unions have demonstrated repeatedly that they can mobilise numbers, generate media attention and create operational pressure. That changes the negotiation dynamic.
Probation hasn’t done that at scale.
So the question isn’t “what are nurses getting?” It’s “what leverage are we prepared to create?”
Because pay offers don’t emerge from kindness. They emerge from risk calculation.
And at the moment, the calculation about probation seems to be containable.
The elephant in the room is that Probation has become a young feminised deunionised workforce that demographically wields much less power than when there was proper national collective bargaining other than being a cog that might hold up other parts of the CJS. It would not surprise me that elements within the security services have worked and continue to work to undermine the Probation TUs ever since TR. The Napo GS may even have been recruited some time ago whilst working for PCS. Some of the anti union comments on this blog look like similar anti union comments that can be found on most political blogs. I wonder if there is a special unit beavering away somewhere trolling trade unions and spreading division/fanning discord.
DeleteAnon 01:02 An interesting thought, but I guess we'll never know. The God's certainly haven't been kind to probation or Napo for sure and by the law of average's you'd have thought a brilliant champion would have emerged by now. As it happens I found myself addressing a local church group on Thursday as part of my attempting to spread the word about probation and I found myself a bit emotionally overcome. It's such a tragic story and scandalous lost opportunity and bless them the audience as with the general public were blissfully unaware of it all. Ignorance is our greatest enemy I think.
DeleteNapo GS recruited. Come off it the issues are well known within Napo and we all know the passengers on the bus get off after a difficult journey. That was to watch Napo take a routwau that led is here. It could have so properly gone the right way for the passengers but the driver is not able to read the map which was pointed out to him . Instead of dumping the driver the passengers change but the drive around distraction continues .
DeleteGS recruited. There were certainly rumours circulating in PCS about suspected recruitment when he was working for them and seen as a right winger. Apparently Napo were warned about him but ignored it. He is certainly popular with the Directors in HMPPS who regard him as dependable and no threat and therefore would prefer him to carry on. Who he really works for is moot. .
DeleteReally! It might explain it then but I think of him as dense and lacks assesment. He acts in ways to cover himself. If Napo were warned that's a ledger appointment when he came in or thereabouts. It is true he over identifies with management than membership we ought to offload this guy in some way.
Delete10:51 astounding suggestions can you tell us any further details.
DeleteThey could... but then they'd have to kill everyone who read their post.
DeleteThere are far too many 'conspiracy theories'... its more likely that:
1. the reality is that lawro is not as good as he claims to be
2. that the warnings given to napo were that he was not as good as he claimed to be, and
3. that noms/hmpps know he's not as good as he claims to be so they play havoc with his fragile ego & the poor sap thinks he's being effective.
4. the napo membership are so embroiled in day-to-day issues - e.g. caseloads, bullying, surviving each day's work - that they haven't the time or energy to raise a glass to their lips, let alone matters with their rep (if they have one). They simply trust that their union (if they're a member) is 'on the case'.
Post-ledgergate napo didn't even have the credibility of Wittgenstein's duck-rabbit (Ludwig Wittgenstein popularized the "duck-rabbit" illusion in his Philosophical Investigations to illustrate "aspect perception"—the concept of seeing something "as" something), so in the absence of a rabbit the membership voted for a lame duck.
The consequences have been grim for probation staff in terms of pay, terms & conditions, health & safety, but... who gives a crap?
noms/hmpps? - nah
the british public? - nah
elected MPs? - nah
invisible chief po? - nah
the PI? - nah
napo/unison/gmb? - nah
antonia romeo? - nah
amy many_names_rees? - nah
It was not just Napo that lost credibility with the Jonathan Ledger debacle - we were completely deceived by (new) Labour - (this could be a very long post) - The Magistrates Association and the Probation Committee of the national coordinating group with whom we once negotiated pay were swept away - the Chief's Association kept reforming and was bought off with the 2001 reforms -(I found I was working for the strangely named "London Probation Area" whose Chief Officer was a failed Prison Governor ) - but I have not kept dates and as I was forced into a position where early retirement protected my dependents from 2003 - I turned away in exhaustion and then found Grayling being even worse than the NOMS/MOJ introducers with people like Blunkett who completely misunderstood the role of probation, unlike Churchill a century earlier. - I'll stop - I am still angry after all these years.
DeleteThe cracks may be starting to show.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15558451/Keir-Starmer-Antonia-Romeo-Whitehall-chief-concerns-record-probation-privatisation.html
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2026/02/12/antonia-romeo-cabinet-secretary-despite-warnings/
DeleteStarmer to force through preferred Cabinet Secretary despite warnings
PM told not to appoint Dame Antonia Romeo, who has previously faced accusations of misusing taxpayer funds and bullying
Sir Keir Starmer is facing a Civil Service revolt over the ousting of his Cabinet Secretary after just over a year in the job.
The Prime Minister will replace Sir Chris Wormald with Dame Antonia Romeo despite previous allegations of bullying and misuse of expenses made against her.
Government officials reportedly refused to sign off on Sir Keir Starmer’s decision to sack Sir Chris as Britain’s most senior civil servant because it would cost taxpayers £260,000.
Not often that I am in agreement with the Daily Mail but Romero is responsible to a large part for the road crash that was TR. If she is appointed I will resign from the Labour Party in protest. 🪧 What are they thinking of. She is competently incompetent and has 9 lives leaving a trail of destruction in her wake.
Delete"As the Mail on Sunday first reported back in 2017, Dame Antonia was behind a disastrous £4billion privatisation of the probation service"
Delete________________________________________________
https://www.civilserviceworld.com/in-depth/article/interview-antonia-romeo-moj
“To get large transformation programmes working, you’ve got to have really good assurance in place so that you know you’re not believing your own hype”
when CSW returned to the MoJ’s Petty France HQ to talk about the probation outsourcing programme with Antonia Romeo, director-general of criminal justice, it was with both a long list of questions, and a certain amount of scepticism. After all, since last year the MoJ’s mismanagement of the electronic tagging contracts run by Serco and G4S has raised yet more questions over its ability to manage private suppliers. And the probation scheme is far bigger and riskier than either the interpreters or the tagging projects.
“This work is going to be done in a completely new way,” she says.
“We’ve got to design a system that works locally, and we spend a lot of time engaging with local partners,” she says. “We’ve got competition teams whose job it is to make sure that we really understand, in running these competitions, what the local issues are. Police and crime commissioners and local authorities are very involved.”
“This is not a price competition; this is a quality competition,” she says. “It’s about getting incremental reductions in reoffending over the long term, to help us live within our means in future years.”
Romeo denies that such offenders will suddenly be presented with a new set of staff and procedures: “It doesn’t necessarily mean a completely new set of people; it will all depend on what’s best for that particular case,” she says. “They will now be the responsibility of the NPS, but in terms of who’s doing offender management and what are the interventions – that won’t necessarily completely change.”
What evidence is there that the new probation system will meet the MoJ’s aim of reducing reoffending? Romeo acknowledges that the ministry hasn’t trialled its final proposals anywhere.
she notes, there’s “a timing issue, because the government’s policy is to roll it out by 2015, so we can really start feeling the effects in reductions to reoffending.” There is clearly a political timetable behind the pace at which the MoJ is moving – but Romeo argues that the ministry’s payment-by-results pilot in Peterborough prison has “a lot of similarities” with the probation reforms, providing confidence about the new system.
“The Cabinet Office has a very clear process for awarding contracts.”
“One thing is clear: we will not be operating a payment mechanism that incentivises people to do nothing”
NOMS has a business assurance board designed, she adds, to “give me, the senior responsible officer, the assurance that this is going to work and isn’t taking on any unnecessary risk.”
Comments from a civil service message page:
Delete* If she fell down the stairs she'd land at the top.
* Well that sucks. She is absolutely terrible- petty, small minded, just no leadership qualities at all.
* Another example of someone being promoted ahead of their ability.
* I`m glad I have retired.
* Well if this happens I doubt many Home Office colleagues will go into mourning
* Ah Westminster school, PPE and Oxford nice social mobility here.
* Work in MOJ. Whilst she was there I swear for all the pictures and photo ops she was in on the intranet (there were LOADS), not a single one was north of Watford and my personal conspiracy theory is she got a second perm secretary to venture to the north!
* Doesn’t believe in big pay rises either. Everyone is working in the civil service for the honour of it according to her. Would be a terrible appointment.
https://www.channel4.com/news/sources-tell-channel-4-news-allegations-against-dame-romeo-were-not-dismissed
DeleteFollowing days of political turmoil and speculation – Sir Chris Wormald is standing down as the head of the Civil Service – after just over a year in the post.
Three top civil servants will share the job for now – including Dame Antonia Romeo who is widely tipped to take over.
However last night in an interview on Channel 4 News Lord Simon McDonald said “the due diligence needs to be thorough” in terms of vetting Dame Antonia for the post.
The Cabinet Office has said “All the allegations were dismissed on the basis there was no case to answer”, but tonight this programme can reveal that three sources with knowledge of the investigation have told us that the allegations against Antonia Romeo were not dismissed by the Foreign Office.
From 2022:
Deletehttps://www.julianlevay.com/articles/should-failing-civil-servants-be-sacked
Usually a senior civil servant who has failed on a big scale is promoted at exactly the same pace as if they had succeeded. That can't be right.
(Case in point, Antonia Romeo, Senior Responsible Officer for the single greatest disaster in justice policy in a generation, the probation privatisation programme, that had to be expensively cancelled after years of critical inspection reports, has now become..... Permanent Secretary at the MoJ. Equality of opportunity was not supposed to mean promoting failure on an equal basis with success.)
The circumstances in which I think there should be a penalty of some sort for failure - I'm talking of failure to do the job or deliver a reasonable service, not something like fraud, sexual harassment etc - are as follows. When someone does something or fails to do something which they ought to know will cause serious failure, or serious harm. When someone covers up or lies about serious failure. When someone allows a serious failure to continue over a period , without doing anything about it or reporting it . And when a senior person takes delivery of a report exposing serious failure and is charged with ensuring that there is an improvement, fails to do so.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/home-office-matthew-rycroft-yvette-cooper-civil-service-dame-b2713786.html
DeleteDame Antonia Romeo has been named as the new top civil servant at the Home Office.
She will move from her current role as permanent secretary at the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) to take on the Home Office job.
Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said: “I am delighted to announce Antonia Romeo’s appointment as permanent secretary at the Home Office.
“Antonia has huge experience delivering transformation across a range of Government departments, as well as a track record of delivery and strong systems leadership, both of which will be vital to lead the Home Office to deliver its mission on safer streets and border security.”
???*** a track record of delivery & strong systems leadership ***???
vs
"Senior Responsible Officer for the single greatest disaster in justice policy in a generation, the probation privatisation programme, that had to be expensively cancelled after years of critical inspection reports"
https://probationmatters.blogspot.com/2021/01/failure-rewarded.html
ReplyDelete“I am thrilled to be appointed Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Justice. I have spent the majority of my career in the department, working on its vital agenda of protecting the public and reducing reoffending, ensuring access to justice, and upholding the rule of law."
We've managed to catch a glimpse of the original draft:
"I am thrilled to be appointed Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Justice. I have spent the majority of my career striking down upon probation with great vengeance and furious anger, smiting the woke, pleasing my benefactors and enriching the chumocracy. Justice is mine. I am the law."
https://ukcivilservant.substack.com/p/knives-out-for-mcsweeney-wormald
ReplyDeleteOn romeo:
"[She is said to be] unapologetically ambitious ... massive self publicist ... Some civil servants describe her as someone so focused on managing upwards that subordinates are never sure if they are about to be sacrificed to please those above her. ... [When appointed New York Consul-General] Romeo used the residence on East 51st Street to host lavish events. ... While decidedly different from her “white, pale, male and stale” predecessors, Romeo’s direct style and penchant for luxury irked her new colleagues in New York. One described how the diplomat was “obsessed” with her social media presence, using her profile on Twitter and Instagram to share pictures of herself with celebrities and public figures.
A junior member of staff resigned while Romeo was in post, telling human resources that she treated underlings “like stepping stones” and was overtly concerned with “building the personal brand of Antonia”. Others counter that her social media efforts only began when she became a diplomat charged with promoting Britain in the US.
She also rubbed some senior colleagues up the wrong way. “Her approach was very much, ‘I want this, I am going to be a permanent secretary, I have got strong backers and you will do what I say if you know what’s good for you’,” claimed one.
During her tenure multiple Foreign Office staff raised concerns about Romeo, who was subsequently investigated for bullying and misusing expenses. In documents seen by The Times, colleagues outlined concerns about how she had requested more than $100,000 to redecorate the residence. When her efforts were rebuffed, she allegedly asked staff to approach British companies, such as Farrow & Ball and The Rug Company, to redecorate it free of charge. Concerns were also raised about her use of $150,000 on school fees for her children, as well as sending $200 bouquets of flowers to figures such as Victoria Beckham.
When the complaints were handed to the Foreign Office in London, Sir Tim Hitchens, the former ambassador to Japan, was asked to investigate. His concerns were passed to the Cabinet Office, which decided that there was “no case to answer”. Some senior Foreign Office officials regarded the decision as a “whitewash” organised by [then Cabinet Secretary and Romeo mentor] Heywood."
"Cabinet secretary Sir Jeremy Heywood, said Romeo had "done an excellent job in a number of roles across government" and said she would bring "a strong blend of leadership and Whitehall skills at an exciting time for the department". " (from csw, jan 2017 on her DiT appt).
DeleteThe rightwing tory cheerleaders at spectator magazine are also very pro-romeo... not an endorsement I would see as positive, but they're laying it on with a trowel:
"The favourite to replace [wormald] is Antonia Romeo – currently doing great work at the Home Office... All things considered, Romeo is ‘ballsy and brassy’ and currently part of the most successful Secretary of State/mandarin pairing in Westminster, alongside Shabana Mahmood. Could she be exactly what the civil service needs? Would she be the one to drive through some serious ‘change’?"
It also indicates how right of centre the current Home Sec is.
Saw this bizarre headline in some niche tech magazine:
Delete"The DJI Romeo robovac had security so poor, this man remotely accessed thousands of them"
In the meantime the uk is about to experience the reality of the romeo robot as she wields her newly acquired authority across government, enriching herself & her chums while wearing the cloak of woke-invisibility, i.e. pretending to be a champion of the downtrodden while trampling them into the ground as she swishes from red carpet to celebrity screening to royal appointment; starmer won't know what's hit him.
https://insidetime.org/ray-says/is-this-plan-a-or-just-a-plan-the-bromley-briefings-say-it-all/
ReplyDelete