§ LORD WELLS-PESTELLMy Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
§ [The Question was as follows:
§ To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will make a statement regarding the negotiations on probation officers' salaries.]
§ THE MINISTER OF STATE, HOME OFFICE (LORD WINDLESHAM)My Lords, my right honourable friend the Home Secretary met the Employers' Side of the Joint Negotiating Committee yesterday, and negotiations will be resumed at a further meeting of the Committee to-morrow.
§ LORD WELLS-PESTELLMy Lords, while thanking the noble Lord, the Minister, for that reply, may I ask him whether his right honourable friend the Home Secretary realises the deep resentment which is being felt in the Probation Service throughout this country at the length of the negotiations, which have been taking place now for the last seven months?
§ LORD WINDLESHAMMy Lords, it is true that these negotiations have been protracted. On May 14 the employers' side made an offer, with the agreement of the Government. Subsequently the conference of the National Association of Probation Officers passed a vote of no confidence in their representatives and called on them to resign. There was then a period of some weeks before new representatives were appointed. But, as I say, negotiations have now been resumed and they are in progress at the moment.
§ LORD WELLS-PESTELLMy Lords, would the noble Lord inform his right honourable friend the Home Secretary that while these negotiations have been going on, namely for seven months. 25 full-time officers in the Inner London Probation Service have resigned, and 10 more are about to leave the Service within 403 the next few weeks; that this will mean a loss of 11.5 per cent. of the total establishment of the Inner London Probation Service, and, what is even much more serious, it will represent 16 per cent. of the total male strength of the Inner London Probation Service?
§ LORD WINDLESHAMMy Lords, my right honourable friend is aware of those statistics. I do not think we can quite accept the implications that the noble Lord, Lord Wells-Pestell, has drawn from them. A number of people have, for example, transferred from Inner London to other probation and aftercare areas of the country; and I think his figure also includes about 10 people who have not left the Service but have actually applied for other posts. I do not think one would necessarily assume that they will leave; some of them have applied for probation work outside the Inner London area.
§ LORD BESWICKMy Lords, would not the noble Lord agree that the majority of these people are leaving the Probation Service to take up other appointments in the social services outside because of the quite unjustifiable discrepancy in the scales of pay? Is it not also the case that the figures given by my noble friend Lord Wells-Pestell for the Inner London area can be repeated in the Provinces?
§ LORD WINDLESHAMMy Lords, we are not sure of that. The national figures do not, on the information available, seem quite so serious as the Inner London ones. In the last six months only six people from Inner London have gone to take up social work with local authorities; that is, six out of the 10.
§ LORD WELLS-PESTELLMy Lords, I regret that I cannot accept the noble Lord's figures. I could give other figures. The number is greater than six.
THE LORD PRIVY SEAL (EARL JELLICOE)My Lords, I think the noble Lord is verging on a supplementary speech rather than a supplementary question.
§ LORD WELLS-PESTELLMy Lords, I was about to say that I recognise that this is neither the time nor the place to continue this.
§ LORD WINDLESHAMMy Lords, I do not think we wish to prolong the discussion. This is a matter about which my right honourable friend is genuinely concerned. He has had a number of meetings; but it is difficult to add very much to what I have said while the negotiations are currently in progress.