‘Further progress required’ at Yorkshire probation service

HM Inspectorate of Probation’s latest inspection of the region’s probation service found that long-standing issues with staffing “continued to undermine capacity and confidence”.

The Ministry of Justice said it inherited a “criminal justice system in crisis” which it is addressing by increasing funding for the probation service and recruiting more probation officers.

Martin Jones, chief inspector of probation, said the inspectors were “encouraged to find signs of increasing stability” across Yorkshire and the Humber’s probation service after 90 of its cases were inspected.

However, Mr Jones said the probation service, which is the second largest after London, continued to face “longstanding issues with vacancies, sickness and attrition”.

He said these issues, “combined with high levels of practitioner and middle manager inexperience, continued to undermine capacity and confidence”.

Mr Jones urged leaders to “strengthen practitioners’ skills and confidence and ensure there is meaningful management oversight and consistent delivery of interventions”.

Inspectors found that workforce pressures remained a “significant challenge” for the Yorkshire and the Humber probation service in some probation delivery units, but said “encouragingly, there were signs of increasing stability”.

“Despite this, longstanding issues with vacancies, sickness and attrition, combined with high levels of practitioner and middle manager inexperience, continued to undermine capacity and confidence,” inspectors said in their report.

They found that staff retention levels were being affected by “long vetting delays, concerns about pay, and excessive workloads”.

Inspectors also found that “leaders felt national recruitment campaigns had not properly reflected the public protection responsibilities of the role, leaving new staff unprepared”.

“Inspectors noted constant organisational change, driven by national policies, and crisis-driven working, which meant that staff were encouraged to focus on transactional tasks rather than reflective, analytical decision-making,” they added.

Probation service faced delays in accessing information from police, inspectors find

Inspectors said access to critical risk information from the probation service’s partners – such as the police and children’s services – had improved, but practitioners “still faced delays and received incomplete information”. They said leaders “stressed that national action was required to fully resolve this”.

The report recommended that the probation service develops practitioners’ confidence and skills in the use of “professional curiosity and challenging conversations”.

They also said the probation service should ensure senior probation officers have “sufficient capacity and resources to undertake effective management oversight of casework”.

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Inspectors recommended that the government develops a national strategy to improve information service from the probation service to the police and children’s services.

They also urged the government to “reduce vetting delays and address workforce instability by implementing streamlined and more regionally responsive recruitment processes”.

A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: “The government inherited a criminal justice system in crisis, placing significant strain on the probation service.

“We are addressing this by boosting probation funding by up to £700 million extra by 2028, recruiting another 1,300 probation officers on top of the 2,300 we already committed to and delivering the biggest expansions of tagging in British history to ensure robust supervision of offenders and protect the public.”