"The irony is almost insulting. On the very day HM Inspectorate publishes a paper saying the service needs to create “psychological safety” and take staff wellbeing seriously, Probation Day apparently involves a national call where staff can’t even use the chat or Q&A.
We’re thanked for our commitment. We’re praised for our resilience. We’re told our wellbeing matters. We’re told the frontline is being listened to. Then somebody switches off the microphone. Perhaps that is the most accurate metaphor for modern probation anyone could have devised."
We’re thanked for our commitment. We’re praised for our resilience. We’re told our wellbeing matters. We’re told the frontline is being listened to. Then somebody switches off the microphone. Perhaps that is the most accurate metaphor for modern probation anyone could have devised."
****
But hey it's probation day today so let's pretend everything is rosyNational call BS = ✔️
Kim late to join the call ✔️
Turn off chat and Q&A for staff ✔️
****
Is it apt that Probation day falls on the same day as National Survivors day?
--oo00oo--
1. Introduction
Despite the explosion of trauma-informed approaches within frontline services that work with society’s most excluded and vulnerable individuals, researchers have been slower to recognise the related harms that may befall staff or practitioners (in this case probation workers). There is a growing understanding of a list of secondary or ‘vicarious’ traumas but often with little to no recognition from wider organisations and a limited evidence base regarding the full effects of these occupational risks and the true extent of their prevalence in our working lives (Powell, Walton and Scott, 2024). Many professionals within these roles, e.g. nurses, police officers or even researchers in challenging spaces, experience cumulative and multiple distressing events over time. Although not included in any job description, they are routinely implied within the roles and sense of professional identity, where exposure to secondary trauma is simply ‘part and parcel’ of the job, a form of occupational duty. Furthermore, staff in such frontline fields often report a series of barriers to help-seeking, for example a high degree of stigma when coming forward, with roles routinely being tied to notions and expectations of endurance and stoic toughness (Cogan, 2026).
--//--
2.3 The state of play in probation
As is widely known, the Probation Service has, and continues to be, under considerable strain. There has been the destabilising Transforming Rehabilitation era (2014-2021) followed by the difficult unification of probation services during the Covid-19 pandemic, sitting alongside a history of underinvestment. At the staffing level, the challenge is just as acute. The service has experienced consistent shortfalls in staffing numbers (Orakci, 2025) and significantly higher levels of absence than the national average, with ‘mental health’ being the most commonly reported reason (ONS, 2026). Not enough is known about the exact state of the mental health of probation practitioners, other than using the simplistic labels of ‘stress’ and ‘depression’, which tell us little about the complex mental lives or the struggles that they face. Practitioners often feel disillusionment and frustration at not being able to make the kind of difference to their clients’ lives that they intended when joining the service, recorded in experiences of practitioner burnout, and the psychological costs of emotionally ‘taking the work home’ (HM Inspectorate of Probation, 2025).
3. Conclusion
2.3 The state of play in probation
As is widely known, the Probation Service has, and continues to be, under considerable strain. There has been the destabilising Transforming Rehabilitation era (2014-2021) followed by the difficult unification of probation services during the Covid-19 pandemic, sitting alongside a history of underinvestment. At the staffing level, the challenge is just as acute. The service has experienced consistent shortfalls in staffing numbers (Orakci, 2025) and significantly higher levels of absence than the national average, with ‘mental health’ being the most commonly reported reason (ONS, 2026). Not enough is known about the exact state of the mental health of probation practitioners, other than using the simplistic labels of ‘stress’ and ‘depression’, which tell us little about the complex mental lives or the struggles that they face. Practitioners often feel disillusionment and frustration at not being able to make the kind of difference to their clients’ lives that they intended when joining the service, recorded in experiences of practitioner burnout, and the psychological costs of emotionally ‘taking the work home’ (HM Inspectorate of Probation, 2025).
It would be difficult to overstate the considerable challenges faced by probation practitioners in their everyday working lives. They must manage high-pressured, emotionally and intellectually demanding cases, and balance the goals of rehabilitation and public safety. Not only does probation have one of the highest rates of staff attrition in the public sector, but often cited reasons for staff leaving the profession are highly relevant to any discussion on CF. Although probation does not assess for the presence or prevalence of CF, there is strong evidence to suggest that the features and duties of probation staff place them at higher risk of developing CF than in many other professions. The Probation Service also experiences far higher levels of public criticism and scrutiny than in many other professions (see Martin, 2025). Whilst this is perhaps unsurprising, given the risks to public safety, this can lead to negative and stigmatised appraisals of probation practitioners’ work, adding an additional risk factor in developing CF.
--//--
3. Conclusion
This paper has introduced the concept and risk of CF for probation practitioners. While it is only one of many potential vicarious harms experienced by probation staff, an increased focus on the complex reasons for practitioners leaving the profession would no doubt reveal dimensions of the phenomenon, while providing an opportunity to reduce the burden on those undertaking this most essential role in our society. Otherwise, CF is likely to continue contributing to practitioners moving away from the service.
Any future discussion must start with the recognition that human needs are inherently infinite, whereas practitioners’ time, resources and their level of emotional resiliency are not. The fundamental and relational challenge of probation work is regular exposure to human suffering and traumas from people on probation, alongside a combination of complex decision-making, routine system instabilities, and high degrees of responsibility. Taking CF seriously validates these challenging lived experiences of probation staff. It acknowledges the everyday struggles, including the emotional labour involved in the work, and the inherent moral and social justice element to compassion itself.
The quality of care provided by frontline staff in any helping profession should be a primary concern of any employer or organisation. Investing in a model of psychological safety for probation staff, prioritising staff wellbeing, would be beneficial both to the practitioners themselves and in terms of wider public safety by increasing staff effectiveness and the likelihood of their long-term retention in the service. In the same way that a firefighter would wear protective equipment before entering a property engulfed in flames, we too must provide probation practitioners with appropriate psychologically-informed safeguards and supports, working towards a system and culture that promotes psychological resilience and safety.
Whistleblowers say probation system headed for ‘disaster’ because of early release
ReplyDeleteThe controversial policy of releasing thousands of prisoners early to free up prison places has already sparked criticism from both senior police officers and victims of crime.
Probation officers are also coming forward to warn that they don’t have the capacity to deal with such a big increase in caseload and that the plans are a “disaster waiting to happen”.
We hear from whistleblowers in the service and from families for whom the worst has already happened.
In a statement, the Ministry of Justice told us that protecting the public was their top priority.
It said that the government has invested £700 million in probation, including recruiting nearly 1,400 new probation officers and tagging a record number of offenders.
https://www.channel4.com/news/whistleblowers-say-probation-system-headed-for-disaster-because-of-early-release
Pull a string and they mention the £700m...
ReplyDelete"the government has invested £700 million in probation, including recruiting nearly 1,400 new probation officers and tagging a record number of offenders" ....while simultaneously reducing contact time with people on probation, ceasing all contact at all in the final third, watering down what is actually done by introducing a list of "sparks conversations" and pushing through a policy of "early termination" simply because we need to reduce the probation caseload....meanwhile the work our staff do is creating huge meaningless assessments which need to adhere to so called quality standards, adhere to performance targets, collect and measure a whole load of data....because we feel this should take precedence over training our officers to deliver meaningful evidence based practice.
DeletePublished: 20 August 2026
ReplyDeleteHM Inspectorate of Probation has undertaken a review of public protection measures [see notes to editor] across the London region of the Probation Service.
'Martin Jones, Chief Inspector of Probation, said: “Leaders demonstrated a strong commitment to improving the quality of practice which was supported by well-developed systems for performance management and learning. Despite these positive steps, the quality of practice observed during this inspection remained inconsistent, and inspectors did not find enough evidence that these strategic improvements had translated into consistent outcomes in frontline delivery'
Londons frontline staffs turn, why oh why are we plebs letting down all our glorious Leaders time and time again!!
There has indeed been substantial investment in Probation in recent years but it pales in significance in relation to the Prison system that is one of the largest in Europe in proportion to its population. If you take into consideration real world wage cuts ( a pay freeze that seemingly never ended) this leaves probation officers requiring at least a 40% increase in earnings to meet market value. Under investment by successive governments and experimentation withe what was a working but impoverished system have all been factors. We now have a probation service that is progressive in some respects but held back by being chained to the civil service. A poison chalice for any government whilst it should be a service to be proud of. Mind you everything is a bit run down and shabby these days.
ReplyDeleteAnon 12:03 "We now have a probation service that is progressive in some respects". Not sure about that at all!
DeleteYou really couldn’t have scripted the timing of this.
ReplyDeleteHM Inspectorate publishes a paper acknowledging that practitioners’ time, resources and emotional resilience are finite, that probation operates amid “routine system instabilities”, and that staff carry extraordinarily high levels of responsibility.
Within days, probation staff are appearing as whistleblowers warning that the service does not have the capacity to safely absorb what is coming.
And what is the MoJ response?
£700m. Recruitment. Tagging.
Again.
At what point does repeating the amount of money supposedly invested stop being an answer to the question being asked?
Practitioners aren’t saying no money has been spent. They’re saying the operational capacity required to do the work safely isn’t there. Those are completely different things.
Tell us how many experienced, qualified practitioners will actually be available to manage the additional cases. Tell us what their workloads will be. Tell us how much additional practitioner time all this tagging, monitoring, breach consideration and recall activity will consume. Tell us how the new OFPS supervision model has been tested against the additional demand created by sentencing reform. Tell us what happens when those assumptions prove wrong.
And while you’re at it, tell us where the £700m actually went.
Because simply pulling the cord on the £700m talking doll every time somebody raises a public-protection concern isn’t reassurance.
The most disturbing part is that staff are now having to become whistleblowers to get this heard outside the organisation.
Think about what that says about all the supposed internal mechanisms for “listening to the frontline”.
Staff have raised concerns internally. The unions have raised concerns. The PAC has raised concerns. HM Inspectorate has raised concerns. The Chief Inspector has publicly warned about capacity. Now practitioners are going anonymously to Channel 4 and using words like “disaster waiting to happen.”
How many warnings constitute sufficient warning?
Because if serious harm follows these changes, I don’t ever want to hear that nobody could have foreseen it.
It’s being foreseen, documented and shouted from the rooftops right now.
I am absolutely sick to death of hearing about the £700 million.
ReplyDeleteEvery single time practitioners raise a legitimate concern about workload, staffing, experience, public protection or what is coming down the line, somebody at the MoJ presses the same bloody button:
£700 million. 1,400 recruits. More tagging.
We know. We’ve heard it. Repeatedly.
What we are telling you is that IT ISN’T FIXING THE PROBLEM.
I don’t manage £700 million. I manage people. Real people, with complicated lives, changing circumstances and risks that don’t conveniently fit into a tier, an actuarial score or a bloody dashboard.
A trainee isn’t an experienced PO because you’ve counted them in a recruitment figure. A GPS tag isn’t supervision. AI isn’t professional judgement. An exclusion-zone alert isn’t risk management. And reducing contact with people doesn’t magically create a safer probation service simply because somebody in HMPPS has labelled the missing hours “released capacity”.
Meanwhile those of us actually carrying the cases are expected to absorb OFPS, new tiering, sentencing reform, early releases, more electronic monitoring, more information, more potential breaches and recalls, and whatever else arrives next — while being told the answer is to spend less professional time with some of the people we’re responsible for.
And when we tell you we’re worried?
Thank you for your resilience.
When we tell you we’re exhausted?
Here’s a wellbeing webinar.
When we tell you workloads are unsafe?
We’re taking away your ability to see the WMT.
When we tell you we’re frightened something will be missed?
£700 million.
And now practitioners apparently have to speak anonymously to Channel 4 because shouting inside the organisation isn’t working.
That should shame HMPPS.
These aren’t disgruntled staff moaning because they’re busy. These are professionals warning before the event that they do not believe they have sufficient capacity to safely deliver what Government is promising the public.
So record it. Date it. Remember it.
We told you.
If this goes wrong and somebody is seriously harmed, don’t you dare come back afterwards with an SFO review, work backwards through an individual practitioner’s records and ask what they should have done differently.
Ask what you did when the workforce warned you.
Ask why you kept piling work into probation while reducing meaningful supervision.
Ask why recruitment headlines mattered more than retaining experience.
Ask why you removed workload visibility.
Ask why every warning was answered with investment figures and corporate platitudes rather than evidence that the service could safely cope.
And please, spare us the inevitable “lessons will be learned.”
The lesson is being handed to you right now.
You’re just not bloody listening.
Well said! And what also irritates me is that the so called "released capacity" isn't actually doing anything in the here and now...reducing supervision appointments, early termination and ceasing all contact at the final third won't actually kick in for many many months...so at the very time thousands are being released these people still need to be seen while at the same time as you point out we're also expected to digest a new model of working, working out what the hell SPARKS is and get used to all on licence being on tag. While I inherently disagree that reducing contact was the best solution to reducing capacity l, even if I did none of this capacity is released for a very long time while probation work and caseload initially increase.
DeleteFinancial investment in probation alone will not fix the problems.
ReplyDeleteActually, "The Irony Of It" is that the £700m that is being banded about in every other sentence from the Government, is roughly only about the amount that was stripped out of the service through austerity and TR. £700m could really be seen only as a refund?
The real investment that probation needs is in all the things that went as a consequence of that financial stripping.
Identity, experience, independence, autonomy, training etc etc.
Good investment is not always about looking for a financial fix.
https://yorkshirebylines.co.uk/news/safe-for-all-how-austerity-wrecked-the-probation-service/
'Getafix
Safe for all? How austerity wrecked the probation service
DeleteAusterity broke it: the probation service in England and Wales is now rated “inadequate” after years of cuts, chaos and failed privatisation
Who would be a probation officer? Long hours, complex work and some of the most challenging clients imaginable. In spite of all that, over 20,000 full-time probation service staff work in the probation service day in, day out. And yet, with the probation service’s watchdog’s recent annual report having rated the probation service as inadequate, there is a mounting sense that it may be at crisis point.
The probation service stands at a precarious moment. With the government reducing sentences in an attempt to ease an overwhelmed prison system, more and more criminals are being managed in the community. However, the government’s chief inspector of probation services says that the public are at real risk of crime unless the probation service is overhauled and properly funded. Why is the probation service underperforming at the exact moment the system needs to be robust and properly funded?
The roots of the service’s inadequate performance go back further than 12 months to disastrous decisions made over 15 years ago which have wrecked the system designed to keep the public, staff and offenders safe for all.
Faced with a growing populist backlash and chronic underfunding, it’s worth asking what has broken the probation service. The answer is austerity.
Probation service: a deteriorating system for managing offenders
In 2010, the Conservative-led coalition government came to power and inherited a healthy, award-winning service for managing offenders leaving prison. The National Offender Management Service was managed by 35 publicly owned probation trusts. While never perfect, as no public body ever is, the overall system was a healthy one. Fast forward 15 years and the latest research into the overall health of the system makes for grim reading.
In March 2025, HM Inspectorate published its annual report, covering inspections undertaken between February 2024 and February 2025, and on 29 April, it published the results of its 2025 inspection into the general sufficiency of national probation services. The results, the inspectorate discovered, were wanting. Martin Jones, Chief Inspector of Probation, said: “Major shortfalls were found in service delivery and work to keep people safe remains a significant cause for concern”. The report highlighted that the probation service was not meeting the needs of offenders released from prison or the wider community. Staff were underfunded and overworked, and junior staff were not supported.
This is a sadly all too familiar story for those who have worked for or had contact with the probation service.
DeleteAusterity: all in this together, or a convenient lie?
How did this happen? How did the umbrella service for managing offenders either going to prison, in prison, or having left prison, go from an award-winning service in 2014 to a failing service staffed by burnt-out staff with overflowing caseloads? The answer, in a word, is austerity.
When the Tory-Lib Dem coalition was formed in 2010, it immediately began cutting the public sector. Britain’s finances, they claimed, were on the brink of ruin and cutting the public sector was the only remedy that would stave off complete collapse. In fact, it was a lie. A convenient lie which acted as the ideological cover for stripping back the state. In 2010, David Cameron gave a speech in which he outlined his vision for Britain, saying he wanted a “fairer, greener, safer Britain”. Ultimately, austerity delivered none of these things. Instead 14 years of Tory government left Britain an impoverished, broken down, sicker country.
The cost of austerity for the probation service
Nowhere is the failure of austerity more acutely on display than in the current failures of the probation service. In 2014, minister Chris Grayling pushed through the part-privatisation of the probation service, in which the trusts previously responsible for managing offenders in the community were scrapped.
The state was left to manage only the high-risk offenders. The rest were to be managed by private entities called Community Rehabilitation Companies (CRCs). The result was a disaster. The number of offenders breaking the terms of their licenses went up, and central government had to bail out the failing CRCs. The total cost? Five hundred million pounds. The privatisation process was later reversed. So, the taxpayer ended up paying £500mn for a failed privatisation scheme which made offending worse.
Austerity’s legacy: the catastrophic undermining of the probation service
The disastrous Grayling reforms are very instructive. This year, 15 years on from the first ‘austerity’ budget under the Tory-Lib Dem coalition, it’s become clear that a pattern has emerged as follows:
Take a public service which may have its problems but is working well at the point of delivery. Then invent a crisis, use that crisis to starve it of public funds, then let results plummet and public confidence deteriorate. Then introduce privatisation, and when the outcome is failure, blame it on ‘woke’ policies and frittering away public money on ergonomic chairs and rainbow lanyards. It’s a recipe not for a successful society but a smoking ruin of a country.
The probation service provides a vital service. Probation service staff at all levels have immense responsibility to judge risk, provide a high-quality service and treat offenders with dignity and respect. We’ve learned from the inspectorate’s report that such a challenging job cannot be delivered when staff are overburdened, underfunded and landed with impossible expectations including unrealistic caseloads.
There are pathways to return the service towards a high-quality service. In May this year Unison recommended that the whole system be decentralised and given proper oversight again by elected mayors. But unless the catastrophic error of austerity is reversed, and the service is given proper investment, to support junior staff, reduce caseloads and provide proper oversight of offenders, it’s hard to see outcomes improving.
I obviously agree austerity was a key issue here. But I can't help the feeling the probation service itself mismanaged the whole situation too, compounding the issues further. During this period of time it double downed on OASYS perfection as the key to unlocking success, while simultaneously putting the limited resources it had into external CRS services. What this meant was that staff time became increasingly focused on minor imperfections in their written assessments and plans, while des-skilling the workforce: the message was do nothing to implement the plans, but refer out to services like CRS keyworkers or drug workers to "do the actual job". This completely fragmented the service and probation officers lost a sense of what they were actually there to do...HMIPs constant emphasis on practitioners not being "sufficiently professionally curious" misses the point entirely that it's the system itself that has created the problems upon which something like professional curiosity relies. The system itself has forced practitioners into a sense of passive monitoring. And this is only going to get worse with supervision packages and sparks...I'm not disagreeing staff leave the service due to vicarious trauma and emotional burnout....however I do think staff leave as they haven't been provided the skills and training to deal with the emotional baggage which comes with the job, as the service's response is: don't worry your poor little head with these trivialities, just refer the person to a substandard CRS Wellbeing service and spend your life referring to community mental health services we all know the person won't recieve....don't think you have the skills to deal with the emotional trauma underlying drug and alcohol abuse, just refer them to a drug keyworker who is as equally untrained as you are to even attempt to scratch the service about what's really going on. And what is HMIPs response? The practitioners aren't professionally curious enough to get to the root causes of the issues that the service you work for doesn't equip you to know about!
Delete"I can't help the feeling the probation service itself mismanaged the whole situation too"
DeleteI can't disagree with that in principle because there was a lot of self-harm going on, but... it wasn't 'the probation service'; it was that strata of so-called 'leaders' who were so desperate to blend into the political landscape, to align themselves with 'the centre', to ingratiate themselves with their Whitehall 'masters'. Those who climbed the greasy pole (often those incapable of, or reluctant to do, the frontline work) collectively & willingly abused the concept & ethos of 'the probation service'.
I see 'the probation service' as those who the Yorkshire Post article refers to as undertaking "Long hours, complex work and some of the most challenging clients imaginable."
Sadly, as referred to in another recent post, the probation inspectorate still regards the so-called leaders as something to make a fuss over while shitting on the frontline staff:
"Leaders demonstrated a strong commitment to improving the quality of practice, supported by well-developed systems for performance management and learning... inspectors did not find sufficient evidence that improvements at a strategic level had translated into consistent outcomes in frontline delivery."
https://hmiprobation.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/document/dynamic-inspection-of-public-protection-in-london-2026/
This seems to be indicative of the whole probation shitshow - the so-called & much feted 'leaders' can talk-the-talk, present detailed analyses, speak of systemic change & "lessons learned", but they fail to actually do anything with it beyond dazzling the inspectors with their shiny shit.
Good leaders, useful leaders, ACTUAL leaders *get stuff done*... they communicate with their staff complement, they impress, they inspire.
For far too long the probation service has been enslaved by the worst kind of egocentric, power-hungry managerialism; a trait which led to the pseudo-leaders being in thrall to Whitehall, and the rise & rise of noms/hmpps. (With barely a handful of exceptions) bullies, useless fuckers & worse now inhabit the management structure of the probation service, from local office up to hmpps hq. Nothing will change while they sit on those chairs.
There must be something in the water in the north-east, or maybe someone slipped the inspectors a mickey finn?
Deletehttps://hmiprobation.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/document/dynamic-inspection-of-public-protection-in-the-north-east-region/
We were encouraged to note some substantial improvements in the North East region, relative to our findings at the last inspection in 2025. Furthermore, this was the only region in this series of public protection inspections where at least half of all cases we examined were evaluated to have sufficiently met all four of our key questions relating to the management of risk... Leaders and staff in the North East should be proud of the work they are doing; much of it they are doing well."
But, however discombobulated they were by the spiked drinks, they soon came to their senses & normal service was resumed:
"Where we saw shortfalls in casework it was often because practitioners were not adhering to these standards; ensuring this baseline operation remains the challenge for leaders in the future."
When in doubt, shit on the practitioners.
"at least half of all cases we examined were evaluated to have sufficiently met all four of our key questions"
Deletewell fuck me backwards on a donkey - I'm sure that will please/appease burn'em & co!
And the other half???
"On 1 April 2017, HM Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) replaced the National Offender Management Service (NOMS). The quarterly HMPPS (and previously NOMS) workforce statistics bulletins are designed to monitor changes to staffing figures and the structure of the organisation’s staff population over time. They are produced on a quarterly basis to most appropriately reflect the dynamic nature of the data included within many of the tables, and covers all civil service employees of HMPPS and formerly NOMS. From April 2025 an annual release showing the number of Trainee Probation Officers onboarded into HMPPS for the previous financial year has also been produced."
ReplyDelete5% increase in SPOs
2% decrease in POs
13% increase on PSOs
1,602 FTE band 5 senior probation officers, showing an increase of 76 (5.0%) over the previous year
5,465 FTE band 4 probation officers in post - This is a slight decrease of 54 FTE (1.0%) since 30 June and of 109 FTE (2.0%) compared to 31 March 2026.
Leaving rate of 5.3% amongst band 4 probation officers
5,924 FTE band 3 probation services officers in post - This is an increase of 711 FTE (13.6%) since 30 June 2025 and of 139 FTE (2.4%) since 31 March 2026.
Leaving rate of 9.8% amongst band 3 probation services officers
What the fuck does this mean? - "The shortfall in probation officers has increased relative to the March release mainly due to an increase in probation officer target staffing."
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/hm-prison-probation-service-workforce-quarterly-june-2026/hm-prison-and-probation-service-workforce-quarterly-june-2026
some of hmpps hq staffing ~full-time equivalent (see "Time series of HMPPS staff in post receiving pay on staff in post date" for full list... salaries are guesstimates as pay scales in CS seem to be variable & have different headings in different departments)
ReplyDeleteBand 3 / Administrative Officer: 130 @ starting £23k pa
Band 4 / Executive Officer: 284 @ £27k - £33k pa.
Bands 5-8 / Managers: 927 @ £27k - £54k pa.
Bands 9-11 / Senior Managers: 344 @ £53k - £83k pa
Bands A to D: 18 @ £81k entry minimum - £220k pa
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/hm-prison-probation-service-workforce-quarterly-june-2026
And there, buried underneath all the recruitment headlines, are the figures that actually matter.
ReplyDeleteQualified Band 4 POs: DOWN 2%.
Band 3 PSOs: UP 13.6%.
Yet apparently we’re supposed to hear “1,400 new probation officers recruited” and conclude that the staffing crisis is being fixed.
It isn’t.
You can recruit thousands of trainees, increase PSO numbers and issue endless press releases about recruitment targets, but none of that changes the number of qualified, experienced practitioners actually available today to carry the work and the risk.
And this little gem deserves translating:
“The shortfall in probation officers has increased relative to the March release mainly due to an increase in probation officer target staffing.”
In plain English: we’ve finally admitted we need more POs than we previously said we did, so the hole is even bigger than we were admitting.
Meanwhile the Government is shifting thousands more people into community supervision, massively expanding electronic monitoring and telling probation to absorb the consequences of sentencing reform.
And their answer?
“We’ve recruited 1,400.”
No. You’ve recruited people towards becoming probation officers while the number of actual Band 4 POs has fallen.
There is a difference. Stop pretending there isn’t.
Getafix is also absolutely right about the £700m. Investment isn’t just money. What probation has lost over successive “reforms” is experience, professional identity, autonomy, confidence, continuity and institutional knowledge.
You cannot buy 25 years of practitioner experience with a recruitment campaign. You certainly can’t replace it with a tag, an algorithm or AI.
Perhaps instead of endlessly telling us how much money you’re putting into probation, somebody could finally explain what sort of Probation Service we’re actually getting for it.
Because from where I’m sitting, we’re getting fewer qualified POs just as Government expects probation to do more.
That’s not investment. That’s deprofessionalisation with a press release attached.
Then factor in the leaving rates:
DeleteBand 4 @ 5%
That's 275 POs gone.
Band 3 @ 10%
So, recruit 1,400 at band 3 (which is where trainees start), but lose 592.
Staff loss: (592+275) = 867
Claims about recruitment:
1. "In the past year, 1,622 probation services officers were appointed, some of whom will be training to become qualified probation officers."
2. "The Probation Service onboarded 1,389 new Trainee Probation Officers (PQiP) across the 2025/26 financial year"
Yeah, but more than half that number have left..
net staffing (depending on which figure is used):
= (1622 - 867) = +755... or...
= (1389-867) = +522
Neither of those figures gives 1,300 net increase.
Whilst the lies fall from their mouths, it would be preferable that the scales fell from their eyes.
Ah, but we can rest easy in the knowledge that there are ever increasing numbers of management to browbeat & bully those staff who can't, won't or don't leave.
DeleteThe managed decline of the service is clear for all those who want to see it, all to make things so bad that we have to go back to the drawing board, get rid of the pesky probation word and replace it with HM Correctional Services……..think it won’t happen?
ReplyDeleteTotally deskilled punitive pqip service
ReplyDeletehttps://www.theguardian.com/society/2026/aug/22/sex-offenders-libido-control-drugs-prisons-england-wales
ReplyDeleteWon't be long before they'll introduce a tag monitoring offenders sexual arousal, alongside alcohol use and whereabouts! No doubt we will have to consider a recall for any unauthorised erections...
DeleteDrugs that help control the libidos of people who have committed sexual offences could be rolled out for thousands of male prisoners in England and Wales from December 2028, an expert has said.
DeleteProf Belinda Winder, who has evaluated the use of sex drive-suppressing medication in prisons, said about one in four sex offenders – equating to 3,750 current prisoners – would be considered for the treatment.
Government sources have told the Guardian that Andy Burnham’s administration is keen to expand the voluntary use of sex drive-suppressing drugs amid a scramble to ease the prison overcrowding crisis.
However, ministers are re-evaluating whether to press ahead with Shabana Mahmood’s pledge to explore mandatory chemical castration of serious sex offenders, such as paedophiles and rapists.
About 15,000 prisoners in England and Wales are serving a sentence for a sexual offence, and more than 850 men a month are arrested on suspicion of online child sexual abuse offences.
A pilot programme, the medication to manage problematic sexual arousal treatment pathway (MMPSA), will be expanded from 10 to 20 prisons in November. The next phase will extend from south-west England into two additional NHS regions, the north-west and north-east.
It is meant to target sex offenders who experience intrusive, persistent and intense sexual thoughts, persistent arousal, and unhealthy sexual urges and sexual behaviours. Prisoners on the trial can be offered drugs including selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), such as sertraline, which helps to limit invasive sexual thoughts, and anti-androgens, which reduce the production of testosterone and limit libido. In some cases, it reduces testosterone to pre-pubescent levels.
Winder said officials could be ready to launch the drugs in prisons and probation services across England and Wales within 28 months if the pilot continued to progress.
“They [the Ministry of Justice] could be ready in December 2028 to roll the programme out if the interim findings look useful,” she said.
Those on the scheme would have to receive clinical support if they were to commit to taking the drugs and not reoffend, Winder said. “I am optimistic that a properly resourced, voluntary national MMPSA pathway could ultimately be developed … A good national service needs appropriately trained clinicians, clear referral routes, appropriate psychological support alongside medication,” she said.
Last year Mahmood, the then justice secretary, told MPs she was exploring a national rollout of voluntary chemical castration for sex offenders and whether it could be made mandatory.
Two experts have told the Guardian that the plan will not work. Winder, a co-chief investigator of a Prozac clinical trial with sex offenders, said she had significant concerns.
“A mandatory approach would require screening a very large prison population to identify the much smaller group for whom treatment might actually be appropriate,” she said. “It would have substantial clinical and resource implications.”
There were also concerns that if it was mandatory, there could be a breakdown of trust with offenders and it could be open to abuse, she said.
Delete“Trying to impose and monitor daily medication among people who do not necessarily want to take it could be extremely inefficient. It could also introduce a range of consequences that we simply do not yet understand, including effects on trust, disclosure, engagement and the therapeutic relationship.”
She rejected characterising the drugs as a form of “chemical castration”. “People say that because some people like the idea of castrating people who commit sexual offences,” she said. “But these drugs are not permanent, unlike castration, and must be taken consistently to work.”
Burnham announced earlier this month that prisoners convicted of rape, grooming and serious child sexual offences would be excluded from the early release scheme that is due to begin in October. Other sex offenders serving sentences of less than four years will still be eligible to leave prison early.
There are comparatively low reoffending rates among sexual offenders compared with other cohorts. According to government data, 11.7% of sex offenders reoffended in 2023, compared with 53.9% of those with an index offence for theft.
Prison campaigners have urged caution before going ahead with a national programme. Critics have previously pointed out that long-term testosterone suppression can cause osteoporosis and cardiovascular disease. There is limited data because randomised controlled trials remain scarce.
Andrew Neilson, the director of campaigns at the Howard League for Penal Reform, said: “The history of prison-based treatment programmes in this area has proven troubled, which is both a reason for exploring alternatives but also a reason to exercise caution before expanding new approaches more widely. It’s also important that nobody is forced into these chemical interventions and that participation is truly voluntary.”
Mark Fairhurst, the national chair of the prison officers’ union the POA, said: “Anything that potentially protects the public is welcome but I would be cautious about the rollout until we are in receipt of evidence that proves success.”
A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: “This government is determined to tackle the root causes of sex offending, which is why we’re working at pace to extend the existing pilot to a further two regions.”