Select committee: Public Accounts Committee
Recommendation 23
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 ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
It is not yet clear whether the 25% reduction in capacity can be achieved as planned, as HMPPS acknowledged that there remain many uncertainties within the programme, and that it does not yet have a full set of measures in place to address the 25% gap.50 It explained that, even if the programme delivers on its objective, it still needs to close a residual staffing gap of 1,950 44 C&AG’s Report, para 13 45 Qq 63–65 46 Qq 65–7 47 Qq 87; C&AG’s Report, para 2.18 48 Qq 72–75; C&AG’s Report, para 3.16 49 Qq 67–71,78–79 50 Qq 60,61,67 16 staff through measures that it is still considering.51 HMPPS also confirmed that it had considered the impact on probation workload from the upcoming Sentencing Bill (a net 500 full-time equivalent increase in probation staff required) in its modelling.52 However, its modelling does not yet account for additional staff needed for other areas of probation, or for the impact of some wider policy changes, for example, the Independent Review of Criminal Courts, which is likely to create additional demands on probation staff.53 MoJ stated that it will need to keep evaluating the programme as it is rolled out, to make sure it is introducing the right measures.54 Electronic monitoring, third sector and private sector capacity
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).