2025/28825 - Self-declared religion officers and staff

REQUEST

Dear FOI team,

I’m making this request under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

Please provide the following information for each calendar year:

• 2025 year-to-date (from 1 January 2025 to the date of this request)
• 2024
• 2023
• 2022
• 2021
• 2020
• 2019

For each year listed, and for each of the following role types:

Police officer roles – ideally split into:
a) Initial entry recruits (new probationary/trainee constables, including PCDA, DHEP, and similar entry schemes)
b) Other officer recruitment (including transfers from other forces and internal promotions to higher ranks)
If this split is not readily available, please provide the combined total for all police officer recruitment.

Police staff roles (all other roles, including PCSOs, call handlers, administrative staff, analysts, etc.)

For each role type (and sub-type if available), please tell me:

The number of applicants by self-declared religion category (as collected in your equality and diversity monitoring process).

The number of applicants in each religion category who were offered a position and accepted (i.e., became employees).

The number of applicants by self-declared ethnicity category (as collected in your equality and diversity monitoring process).

The number of applicants in each ethnic category who were offered a position and accepted.

Notes for clarity:

“Successful” means an applicant who received an offer and accepted the role.

Please use the self-declared data you collect for diversity monitoring purposes at the application stage.

If small numbers in any category risk identifying an individual, please apply standard suppression (e.g., replace counts under 5 with “<5”), in line with ICO and Home Office disclosure control guidance.

If you cannot provide the exact date range for 2025 so far, please use the most recent complete period available and specify the period covered.

Format request
Under section 11 FOIA, please provide the data in a spreadsheet (CSV or Excel) with columns for:

year, role type, religion category, applicants, successful, ethnicity category, applicants, successful.

Advice and assistance (s.16)
If you do not record religion or ethnicity for applicants, or cannot break down “successful” applicants by these characteristics, please confirm whether this is held elsewhere or for a shorter period, and provide whatever aggregated form of the information you do hold.

RESPONSE