Select committee: Public Accounts Committee
Recommendation 13
Seventy-Eighth Report - Resettlement support for prison leavers
Published 11 Nov 2023
Addressed to HM Treasury
Public Accounts Committee Improving resettlement support for prison leavers All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
When speaking about the recent decline in the quality of resettlement services, HMPPS told us that it needs “good staffing levels to deliver the best services”.28 Although the number of probation officers increased following the service’s unification in June 2021, the number of unfilled roles has also increased and pressure on the Service is acute. In December 2022 1,762 out of 6,158 probation officer roles were unfilled, a vacancy rate of 29%. In 2021–22, 8% of probation officers and 15% of prison officers left the service, the highest levels in the last six years. As a result of these staff shortages, HMPPS is not completing all the resettlement work that it recognises is essential.29
From: Public Accounts Committee, Seventy-Eighth Report - Resettlement support for prison leavers (HC 1329), 11 November 2023
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 14 February 2024 (deadline 11 January 2024).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government says it agrees with each of the Committee's recommendations on resettlement support for prison leavers, giving target dates for several of them.
- On inequalities, HMPPS is planning a programme of work to understand disparities in resettlement outcomes, and says that "By April 2025" it will deliver this analysis across prioritised thematic areas.
- On an action plan, HMPPS will "respond to the Committee by the six-month deadline" and says its plan will aim for "an adequate and consistent resettlement service" for all prison leavers by April 2025.
- On substance misuse, MoJ and the Department of Health and Social Care will develop a proposal on metrics, and the government says it will publish these metrics routinely, with a target implementation date of summer 2024.
- On evaluation, impact evaluations are "expected to be complete" by summer 2024, though findings on impact for some initiatives will only be available beyond 2024.