Speech AI
Reducing admin by automatically transcribing frontline interactions
Frontline staff often spend a significant amount of time transcribing conversations, meetings, or supervision sessions. This is time that could be better spent engaging with people and managing risk.
We are piloting AI transcription and summarisation tools in probation services across Kent, Surrey, Sussex, and Wales. These tools automatically convert spoken interactions into structured notes, reducing administrative load and improving the quality and consistency of records.
Validated in real-world settings, this approach is freeing up time for deeper engagement, improving job satisfaction, and enabling staff to focus on their core responsibilities.
We are also assessing how similar tools could support other services across the justice system, including courts, tribunals, and victim services, where transcription burdens remain high and delays can impact access to justice.
Early Results
50%
Reduction in note-taking time
4.5/5
Staff rating for usability and effectiveness
Following early progress, Justice Transcribe is being expanded across probation, with over one thousand officers now being equipped to use the tool, as announced by the Deputy Prime Minister, David Lammy. Read the press release.
Other speech AI applications we are exploring
- Voice-to-voice capabilities to support personalised learning, coaching and mentorship — addressing purposeful activity in prisons.
- Translation use cases, including:
- AI-assisted interpretation for non-legal prison conversations.
- Translation of external publications (for example, the AI Action Plan for Justice), including a Welsh translation produced with an AI engine and quality-assured by the HMCTS Language Services Team.
- Courts and tribunals: Validated AI transcription and translation tools have significant potential to minimise delays, improve access to justice and reduce reliance on costly external suppliers. Automated speech recognition (ASR) can speed up transcript production and lower costs where typing is still done by hand. It can also create transcripts where none currently exist, supporting the judiciary in formulating and writing decisions and increasing the accessibility and timeliness of court transcripts.
- …and more
Case Study: Supporting probation officers with notetaking
Probation officers often struggle to record complex interactions in a consistent and timely way, particularly under high workloads. The AI transcription pilot is already delivering tangible improvements.
"Yesterday I had 10 appointments in a single day. For the first time, I finished all my notes before leaving. I walked out at 8pm with everything logged. That's never happened before. It meant I could start the next day on other tasks instead of spending the whole morning catching up."
By cutting admin time and improving clarity, the tool is helping officers stay on top of their caseload, focus on risk and rehabilitation, and reduce stress.