Numbers of police recruits who quit before completing probation ‘troubling’

18 March 2022

West Midlands Police Federation is calling for a greater focus on retention after 5.4 per cent of the Force’s new recruits quit before completing their probation.

Data from the National Police Chiefs’ Council, obtained by Police Oracle, revealed the average attrition rate across the 43 forces in England and Wales is 9.1 per cent – or 2,567 leavers from 28,173 new recruits.

The recruits have been recorded from November 2019 and the leavers from April 2020 and show that 91 of the 1,680 West Midlands new starters quit.

Sam Hughes, deputy chair of West Midlands Police Federation, comments: “It is troubling to see so many promising new officers leaving the service before completing their probation, nine per cent on average nationally and five per cent here in the West Midlands.

“The Federation has said all along that it is not enough just to get people through the door, it’s just as important to create the conditions where recruits feel the need to stay and see a future for themselves within policing. This comes down to fair pay and conditions, ensuring police officers are paid fairly for the stresses and the hazards they face while protecting the public.”

The starting salary for many officers in their first year of a Police Constable Degree Apprenticeship (PCDA) is £19,164 which is barely above the national living wage. But West Midlands Police has never paid this figure with it's new PCDA recruits starting on £22,065 and graduates starting on £23,115 on the Degree-Holder Entry Programme (DHEP).

According to the Police Federation of England and Wales’ pay and morale survey in 2021, more than one in 10 police officers say they are never, or almost never, able to cover their monthly essentials, while almost half who intended to leave cited pay as the major reason.

Sam added: “The service will struggle to reach it’s intended target of 20,000 more police if it is losing recruits or having to backfill officers who have decided the enough is enough and are walking away from policing. The Government and police leaders need to take this retention issue very seriously.”

At the top end of the figures was Northamptonshire, with a 19.3 per cent attrition during probation, followed by North Yorkshire on 16.8 per cent and Cambridgeshire at 16.1 per cent. The Met Police has lost 528 officers before completing probation – which is 7.9 per cent of its total recruits.