Union calls for safety audit of probation services

IMPACT trade union has called for a safety audit of probation services because its members are facing a growing risk of serious violence from their service users, some of whom are even wearing body armour to appointments.

Brian Horgan, of the probation officers’ branch of the union, told its civil service divisional conference in Portlaoise: “In the last number of years, we have seen a gradual shift in the type of offender we are working with, a shift to a greater number of high-risk clients. Such clients are a product of recent societal changes, for example drug use, particularly the use of cocaine, and the carrying of lethal weapons, are a more common feature within the offender population.

“Often, these same clients are at risk themselves, and it is not at all unusual to meet clients now wearing bullet-proof body armour.”