‘Sustained focus essential’ to improve quality of public protection work, finds inspection of Wales region of the Probation Service

Martin Jones, Chief Inspector of Probation, said: “We found a region with clear ambition, strong leadership and a coherent vision for improvement. We last inspected the Wales region of the Probation Service in 2025, and positively, in the short period since then, leaders have acted with pace to introduce a wide-ranging programme of change designed to strengthen the quality of work needed to keep people safe.”

Context

• This report focused specifically on public protection work being delivered across the Wales region of the Probation Service.
• Fifty-five cases were inspected where the Inspectorate examined assessment, planning, implementation and delivery, and reviewing, all through the lens of public protection work. At the time of the inspection announcement, the region supervised 10,686 people in the community or in custody.
• The Wales region of the Probation Service covers six Probation Delivery Units (PDUs), Cwm Taf Morgannwg, Dyfed Powys, Swansea Neath Port Talbot, Cardiff and the Vale, Gwent, and North Wales.

Findings

• Planning was a clear strength in practice, reflecting the sustained and targeted activity which had started before the previous inspection in 2025. Revised offender assessment system briefings had supported practitioners to produce more focused and strategic risk management plans.
• While most cases demonstrated an appropriate overall risk classification, there were persistent weaknesses in analytical depth. Domestic abuse histories were not always explored fully, and practitioners did not consistently link behaviour to the impact on children or recognise patterns across cases.
• Since our previous inspection, regional leaders had focused on strengthening public protection. This included information gathering workshops and the ‘Start Right, End Right’ approach [see notes to editor], which were beginning to strengthen the quality and availability of information.
• Inspectors found a strong culture of reflection and feedback which was reinforced by the region’s use of a human factors [see notes to editor] approach, including daily reflective discussions on decision-making, consideration of cognitive bias, and learning from Serious Further Offence (SFO) reviews to strengthen psychological safety and defensible decision-making in public protection work.
• Staffing levels across the region were stable overall, however workloads continued to be adversely affected by vacancies.

Mr Jones added: “Overall, while the region was moving in the right direction, the quality of public protection work was not yet consistently good enough. Sufficient time and emphasis were now needed to embed changes, strengthen analytical practice, and improve information sharing. A sustained focus on these areas would be essential if the region was to realise its ambition of delivering consistently high-quality work to keep people safe.”

This report makes six recommendations. Four are for the region, including to embed and evaluate existing improvement activity to achieve consistent practice. Two are for HM Prison and Probation Service, including to develop a national strategic approach to information sharing with the police and children’s services, to support regions in achieving consistency and compliance with legislation to obtain and use information to protect the public.

Notes to editor

1. Probation Delivery Units (PDUs) replaced Community Rehabilitation Companies (CRCs) and the National Probation Service (NPS), which merged into a unified Probation Service in June 2021.
2. HM Inspectorate’s Dynamic Inspection of Public Protection is a new programme which started in October 2025. The Inspectorate has paused its core adult programme to undertake six months of dynamic inspection activity, focussed solely on the Service’s delivery of public protection. It will inspect all twelve regions, then deliver follow-up activity with strategic leaders and managers to identify what can be done to support and guide regional leaders into improving work, increasing knowledge and confidence and providing a solid foundation for further improvement. 
3. In response to Probation Reset, the Wales Probation Service had embarked on a journey to ensure that people on probation received the right interventions earlier. ‘Start Right, End Right’ was created and launched in September 2024. To ensure that they were getting things right first time, the initiative saw the creation of guidance manuals for court, custody, community, and unpaid work teams, and the creation of ‘final third’ teams across PDUs where Probation Reset and Impact cases were managed.
4. The Human Factors model has an emphasis on creating a supportive learning culture within the service to improve both engagement and individual autonomy. In Wales, this has resulted in a new operational structure based on daily morning check-in meetings and a daily open hour when senior probation officers are available. You can read more about the human factors model in our Effective Practice guide – Developing operational structures and the Senior Probation Officer role. 
5. The Wales region is one of 12 probation regions. There are 11 probation regions in England.
6. The report is available on our website on 10 August 2026.
7. HM Inspectorate of Probation is the independent inspector of youth justice and probation services across England and Wales. We report on the effectiveness of probation and youth justice service work with adults and children. We highlight good and poor practice and use our data and information to encourage high-quality services. We are independent of government and speak independently.
8. The Inspectorate typically uses a four-point scale: ‘Outstanding’, ‘Good’, ‘Requires improvement’ and ‘Inadequate’ for inspections, however, has opted out of one-word ratings for this inspection programme.
9. For media enquiries, please contact Louise Cordell, Head of Communications: media@hmiprobation.gov.uk (E-mail address)