Select committee: Public Accounts Committee
Conclusion 7
65th Report - Efficiency and resilience of the Probation Service
Published 4 Feb 2026
Addressed to HM Treasury
Public Accounts Committee Efficiency and resilience of the Probation Service All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Conclusion (the committee's words)
HMPPS monitors performance against a range of targets to indicate whether the Probation Service is meeting its aims. Metrics for these targets measure activities at each stage of supervision against HMPPS’s target operating model, for example, the timeliness of appointments, and the proportion of individuals in employment at six months post release for custodial sentences.8 HMPPS’s data show that the performance of its Probation Service has worsened since unification in 2021. In 2024–25, it only met seven of its 27 (26%) performance targets, a decrease of 24 percentage points since July 2021 to March 2022 when it met eight out of the 16 targets (50%) it had at that time. HM Inspectorate of Probation’s (HMIP’s) inspections also 5 C&AG’s Report, para 3.2 6 C&AG’s Report, para 3.7 7 Committee of Public Accounts, Efficiency and resilience of the Probation Service Written Evidence 8 C&AG’s Report, para 1.9, Figures 4, 5 9 suggest a deterioration in quality. For example, in 2024, HMIP found that probation practitioners adequately assessed risk of harm in just 28% of cases, compared with 60% in 2018–19.9
From: Public Accounts Committee, 65th Report - Efficiency and resilience of the Probation Service (HC 1235), 4 February 2026
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 7 April 2026 (deadline 4 April 2026).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government states that it "agrees with the Committee's recommendation" on each of the Committee's recommendations, and sets out timelines, a revised performance framework and reporting commitments.
- On performance, the government "expects the Probation Service to demonstrate measurable and sustained improvements" over the spending review period to March 2029, with a revised performance framework centred on "a smaller number of priority metrics" to be introduced in April 2026.
- On reoffending, it says it is "very challenging to attribute changes in the reoffending measure to individual initiatives", and that evaluation of 'Reset' "will be published by July 2026".
- On workloads, the Our Future Probation Service programme was launched with the "primary objective to reduce workloads by 25% by April 2027", and HMPPS plans to share more detail with staff during March and April 2026.
- It commits to write to the Committee on Serco's performance against its key performance indicators within six months of the report (target August 2026), and on third and private sector support and electronic monitoring capacity (target October 2026).