Unison general secretary Dave Prentis said: “The ILO Forced Labour Convention is very clear that community payback orders must be supervised by the public sector, and the Government’s privatisation proposals will breach this.
“In fact, the UK Government first breached the Convention over 12 months ago when they put Serco in charge of community payback in London.
“The Government is rushing through its probation privatisation plans with undue haste, and this breach of international labour regulations will be just one of the catastrophic results.”