- Conference
- 2025 Police, Probation and CAFCASS Conference
- Date
- 17 June 2025
- Decision
- Carried
Conference notes the publication of the Department for Communities and Local Government English Devolution White Paper, which sets out Government proposals to reform local government in key areas of the country and which has potentially major implications for policing and probation.
Conference further notes that the White Paper proposes over time to:
1. Create Mayoral Combined Authorities.
2. Grant these Mayoral Combined Authorities the role and function of the office of Police and Crime Commissioner.
3. Potentially change the boundaries of some police forces to make them coterminous with those of the proposed Mayoral Combined Authorities and/or propose the merger of some forces.
4. Align the boundaries of the Probation Service in England with the proposed Combined Mayoral Authorities
Conference welcomes the briefings which have been sent to branches highlighting these potentially major changes to the policing and probation landscapes and the work that UNISON is doing to protect members’ interests in relation to this local government re-organisation.
Conference calls upon the Service Group Executive to:
a. Support work at the Police Staff Council for England and Wales to create an appropriate staff protections agreement to cover all eventualities which might affect police staff arising from the English Devolution proposals;
b. Work with Regions and branches to better understand the regional implications of the devolution proposals for police staff members and probation service members
c. Campaign to promote the local devolution possibilities for probation which are inherent in the devolution proposals and which chime with UNISON’s existing conference policy which supports the removal of the Probation Service from civil service control and the recreation of local probation services on the footprint of police forces overseen by elected Mayors or Police and Crime Commissioners