- Conference
- 2022 Police & Justice Service Group Conference
- Date
- 14 June 2022
- Decision
- Carried
Conference may be aware that The Probation Service has experienced an ongoing difficulty with the recruitment and retention of Probation Officers. The latest figures available from the Ministry of Justice indicate that over a third of staff have been in post for less than three years and recruitment and training of Probation Officers since March of 2020 indicates a national shortfall of qualified probation officers of approximately 2,500 staff. Of these staff, the latest Ministry of Justice statistics indicate that between 5 and 8.5 percent left their posts in the previous year.
Although HMPPS is clearly making an effort to train staff to fill these posts, it is also clear that the retention of Probation Officers remains a significant problem. Should this situation continue, the impact of almost 10 percent of officers leaving the Service will have a continuing negative impact on those that remain within the Service in terms of workloads and stress. This is without considering the impact on those staff who do not feel able to remain in post.
UNISON calls upon the Service Group Executive to work with HMPPS and the Probation Service to enhance support for newly qualified Probation Officers and improve staff retention by:
1)Offering NQOs and PQIP staff the opportunity to visit new places of work to acclimatise, in advance of taking up permanent posts away from the location of training;
2)Offering NQOs placements in work areas where observations have only previously been available in order to undertake work in these area (e.g. Courts) in order to become more familiar with tasks and processes;
3)Offering the opportunity to shadow experienced officers before undertaking new practices, especially during the parole process and work with people convicted of sexual offences;
4)Offering the continued provision of a mentor for NQOs for the first six months following qualification, regardless of the location of any permanent post and offering a mentor ratio to PQIP staff of no more than two trainees to one experienced officer;
5)Promoting the NQO allocation policy with middle managers to ensure that workloads are manageable and that the workload for PQIP’s remains manageable;
6)Offering the opportunity for NQOs and PQIPS staff to be represented at SFO review interviews, should this become necessary.