Prison Officer Recruitment Targets

Josh MacAlister, the Labour MP for Whitehaven and Workington, asked the Government what steps it plans to take to meet prison officer recruitment targets. The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice, Sir Nicholas Dakin, responded by acknowledging the importance of prison officer recruitment targets and praising the work of prison officers, who have gone "above and beyond" in recent weeks and months. He stated that nationally, the Government is currently above staffing targets, but challenges remain in certain sites with a high number of vacancies, and bespoke interventions are being developed for those sites. In a follow-up, MacAlister thanked the Minister for the response and praised the Government team for their handling of the "complete chaos" left by 14 years of a Conservative Government. He noted that in his previous work, he had visited young offenders institutions that had been left in "total chaos" by the last Government. He highlighted the Government's botched recruitment process for the graduate recruitment training programme for prison officers, which is currently delivered by Unlocked Graduates, a programme that the Government's chief inspector of prisons has said is at risk of ending, which could add to the recruitment problems. MacAlister asked the Government to restart the procurement process and meet with him to discuss the future of the programme. Sir Nicholas Dakin responded by stating that he is happy to meet with MacAlister to discuss the matter. He explained that the Her Majesty's Prison and Probation Service had worked to reprocure the next iteration of the graduate scheme, with contracts for an open procurement exercise. Although Unlocked Graduates was identified as the winning bidder and was offered the contract, it did not confirm its intent to sign the contract. The Department is now working hard to come up with plans to put a graduate scheme in place for future years.