Andrew Griffiths: MoJ: Written Answers (29)

Written Question

Prisons: Drugs

Thursday 15th January 2015

Asked by: Andrew Griffiths (Conservative - Burton)

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, pursuant to the Answer of 8 January 2015 to Question 219263, what substances are covered by the heading Other in the table placed in the Library.

Answered by Andrew Selous - Second Church Estates Commissioner

The National Offender Management Service (NOMS) records all incidents on the Incident Reporting System (IRS). The incident reporting system provides the option for the drug found to be recorded as any of Amphetamines, Barbiturates, Cannabis, Cannabis Plant, Cocaine, Crack, Heroin, LSD or Tranquilisers. If the drug found is not suspected to be one of these, then the drug found will be declared as Other. This will include New Psychoactive Substances, steroids and drugs of unknown type.

If substances in the Other category become easier to define NOMS will review the options for recording them more specifically

Written Question

Prisons: Drugs

Thursday 8th January 2015

Asked by: Andrew Griffiths (Conservative - Burton)

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many drug seizures for each illegal substance there were in each prison in each of the last four years.

Answered by Andrew Selous - Second Church Estates Commissioner

A table showing the number of drug finds in each prison in England and Wales in the period requested has been placed in the House Library

Please be aware that all figures have been drawn from live administrative data systems which may be amended at any time. Although care is taken when processing and analysing the returns, the detail collected is subject to the inaccuracies inherent in any large-scale recording system. The data are not subject to audit.

Written Question

Prisons: Drugs

Wednesday 7th January 2015

Asked by: Andrew Griffiths (Conservative - Burton)

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many (a) visitors, (b) staff and (c) prisoners were caught attempting to smuggle illegal drugs into each prison in England in each of the last four years; and what steps have been taken in respect of those so caught.

Answered by Andrew Selous - Second Church Estates Commissioner

Table 1 below shows the number of visitors who were arrested by the police after being caught attempting to convey drugs into custody. NOMS does not hold any information on any criminal justice outcomes for those individuals. NOMS’ policy is to refer all visitors to prisons found in possession of drugs to the police. In addition, closed visits, where the prisoner and visitor are prevented from physical contact, are used as a measure to deal with visitors and prisoners who smuggle or are suspected of conveying drugs through visits.

Table 2 below provides the number of staff who have been dismissed, excluded and convicted as result of being caught attempting to convey drugs into custody. Please note that some of the outcomes may be as a result of multiple allegations, for example conveying drugs and mobile phones. The data has not been provided by individual prison, as to do so could lead to identification of individuals.

No information is held on the number of prisoners caught attempting to convey illegal drugs into prison. Table 3 below shows the number of prisoners caught in possession of drugs whilst in prison. Any prisoner found attempting to convey drugs can be referred to the police for prosecution and also charged under the prison rules, which could result in restrictions to the facilities that they can access in prison and added days to their sentence.

Table 1. Number of incidents where visitors were arrested by the police on suspicion of conveying drugs into prisons¹ in England, April 2011-March 2014

	2010/11	2011/12	2012/13	2013/14
Total²	268	229	248	296
Acklington	6	1
Altcourse	1		2	2
Aylesbury	2	2	1	1
Bedford	1	1	0	1
Belmarsh	1	1	0	1
Birmingham	1		0	7
Brinsford			2	6
Bristol	2	3	2	1
Brixton	15	14	6	2
Bronzefield	4	1	1	1
Buckley Hall	6	5	3	6
Bullingdon	6	1	0	5
Canterbury		1
Castington	1	4
Channings Wood			2	3
Chelmsford	2	3	1	1
Coldingley	1		1	2
Cookham Wood			0	1
Dartmoor	1
Deerbolt	4	2	3	0
Doncaster	7	1	11	15
Dorchester	1		1	1
Dovegate	1	7	5	12
Dover	2	1	3	0
Durham		10	4	4
Eastwood Park			0	1
Edmunds Hill	2
Erlestoke	2		2	1
Everthorpe	7	1	3	7
Exeter	2	1	2	2
Featherstone	2	2	4	2
Feltham	3	6	3	2
Ford			0	1
Forest Bank	2	5	7	3
Foston Hall			0	1
Frankland	4	2	4	2
Full Sutton			1	0
Garth	6	8	7	2
Gartree	1		2	0
Glen Parva	1	3	3	3
Gloucester	3
Guys Marsh	2	1	5	2
Haslar	1
Haverigg	2		1	7
Hewell	10	9	6	9
High Down		1	0	2
Highpoint	3	1	8	6
Hindley	4	2	1	4
Holloway	1		0	1
Holme House	2	2	3	4
Hull			1	5
Isis		3	0	2
Isle of Wight	2	1	5	1
Kennet	2	1
Kirkham	1
Lancaster Farms	2	2	1	1
Leeds	1		3	2
Leicester	2	1	5	0
Lewes	2	2	0	3
Lincoln	3	2	3	3
Lindholme	12	12	7	9
Littlehey	2	1	1	1
Liverpool	4	7	4	3
Long Lartin			0	2
Low Newton	1	2	1	3
Lowdham Grange			5	11
Maidstone	1		0	1
Manchester	2	2	1	0
Moorland	2	4	3	3
Morton Hall		1
Mount	17	14	6	5
New Hall			1	0
Northumberland			6	12
Norwich			1	2
Nottingham	2	2	0	4
Oakwood			1	10
Onley	2	2	5	2
Pentonville	13	17	9	6
Peterborough	2		5	0
Portland			1	0
Preston	5	6	2	0
Ranby	6	3	5	3
Reading	1
Risley	7	6	5	2
Rochester	2	1	3	2
Rye Hill	5	1	2	2
Sheppey: Elmley	4	1	5	4
Sheppey: Swaleside	7	8	2	3
Standford Hill	1
Stafford		4	2	0
Stocken	2	1	1	2
Stoke Heath		1	1	0
Styal			1	0
Thameside			12	33
Thorn Cross	1
The Verne	4	1
Wandsworth	1	2	2	0
Wayland	3	2	1	1
Wealstun	1	1	5	8
Wellingborough	1	2
Werrington			1	0
Wetherby	1	1	2	1
Whitemoor	2		0	4
Winchester	1		2	0
Wolds	3	1	0	2
Wormwood Scrubs	7	2	5	3
Wymott	3	7	4	1

1. No visitors were apprehended at establishments not listed above
2. Refers to the number of incidents and not the number of visitors arrested.

Table 2. Number staff convicted, dismissed and excluded in relation to conveying drugs into prisons¹ in England, April 2011-March 2014

	2010/11	2011/12	2012/13	2013/14
Total	11	16	9	25
Convicted	11	11	5	13
Dismissed	0	1	2	1
Excluded	0	4	2	11
1. No visitors were apprehended at establishments not listed above
2. These figures include directly and non directly employed staff. The data is in regard to the number of staff removed from service, not the number of dismissals, exclusions and convictions, as this could result in counting one member of staff more than once.

Table 3. Number of incidents where drugs were found in a prisoner's possession¹ in prisons² in England, April 2011-March 2014

	2010/11	2011/12	2012/13	2013/14
Total	1,163	1,211	1,545	1,694
Acklington	18	6
Altcourse	59	26	64	41
Ashfield	1		1	1
Aylesbury	6	2	2	7
Bedford	12	5	6	3
Belmarsh	6	8	1	1
Birmingham	1	2	38	73
Blantyre House			1
Brinsford		5	5	18
Bristol	19	10	6	9
Brixton	6	2	10	5
Bronzefield	10	1	11	35
Buckley Hall	14	35	55	43
Bullingdon	27	23	22	24
Bure	1			1
Canterbury		2
Castington	12	25
Channings Wood	13	9	13	7
Chelmsford	8	18	26	31
Coldingley			1	4
Dartmoor	1	1		1
Deerbolt	2	6	6	10
Doncaster	22	11	59	100
Dorchester	9	12	10	2
Dovegate	33	15	45	58
Dover	8	6	4
Downview	1
Drake Hall	1		1
Durham	4	95	76	15
Eastwood Park				21
Edmunds Hill	1
Erlestoke	5	23	13	7
Everthorpe	9	1	14	14
Exeter	31	45	46	29
Featherstone	9	18	20	38
Feltham		3	10	6
Ford	22	25	14	34
Forest Bank	96	52	113	154
Foston Hall	1	2	3	1
Frankland	1	2	2
Full Sutton	2	4
Garth	8	7	18	9
Gartree		1	1	1
Glen Parva	3	5	6	1
Gloucester	4	1	3
Guys Marsh	9	15	12	11
Haslar	1
Hatfield	1			8
Haverigg	11	13	9	7
Hewell	16	27	31	21
High Down	3	7	1	4
Highpoint	9	11	21	22
Hindley	7	1	3	4
Hollesley Bay		1
Holloway	2	2	3
Holme House	34	45	39	29
Hull	2	2	3	3
Huntercombe		1	4	2
Isis			7	7
Isle of Wight		2	8	1
Kennet	4	9	6	4
Kirkham	9	6	4	3
Kirklevington		6	6	7
Lancaster Farms	3	3	1	3
Leeds	8	15	35	29
Leicester	41	24	19	25
Lewes	10	5	8	8
Leyhill	12	7	11	8
Lincoln	15	12	8	11
Lindholme	2	6	7	4
Littlehey				2
Liverpool	8	2	5	1
Long Lartin		1		1
Low Newton	27	28	15	15
Lowdham Grange	10	13	35	12
Maidstone		1		2
Manchester	44	42	30	57
Moorland	5	4	2	2
Morton Hall	1	2	3	4
Mount	15	17	22	7
New Hall	2		2
North Sea Camp	9	9	19	7
Northallerton	2	3	8	4
Northumberland			39	36
Norwich		1	4	2
Nottingham	12	43	40	17
Oakwood			7	47
Onley	27	25	20	24
Pentonville	30	26	24	31
Peterborough	7	5	20	41
Portland	1	1	2	1
Preston	51	30	53	47
Ranby	2		2	2
Reading	1
Risley	18	10	4	3
Rochester	2	1	3	31
Rye Hill	15	7	24	30
Sheppey: Elmley	38	28	19	10
Sheppey: Standford Hill	24	15	14	11
Sheppey: Swaleside	4	2	2	2
Shepton Mallet		1
Spring Hill	1
Stafford	10	18	7	4
Stocken	5	5	2	11
Stoke Heath	4	2	5
Styal	2	1	10	5
Sudbury	30	88	61	88
Swinfen Hall		2	2
Thameside			22	61
Thorn Cross	2	2
Verne	5	1	3
Wandsworth		4	1	5
Warren Hill	1		2
Wayland	3	1	4
Wealstun	1		8	7
Wellingborough	5	2	1
Wetherby	10	11		3
Whatton				2
Whitemoor	1	1		1
Winchester	1		1	1
Wolds	28	11	21	18
Woodhill			1	1
Wormwood Scrubs	10	6	2	13
Wymott	4	5	2

1. Includes drugs found in the prisoner's cell
2. No prisoners were found with drugs at establishments not listed above.

Written Question

Prisons: Visits

Monday 5th January 2015

Asked by: Andrew Griffiths (Conservative - Burton)

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many prison visitors have been arrested in each of the last four years; and how many of those arrested have been (a) prosecuted and (b) convicted of an offence.

Answered by Andrew Selous - Second Church Estates Commissioner

Records of visitors arrested and of subsequent prosecutions and/or convictions are not held centrally. To provide this information would involve requesting and examining any information held locally at all prison establishments which could only be achieved at disproportionate cost.

Written Question

Counter-terrorism

Monday 1st December 2014

Asked by: Andrew Griffiths (Conservative - Burton)

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what the budget is of the National Offender Management Service deradicalisation programme.

Answered by Andrew Selous - Second Church Estates Commissioner

The National Offender Management Service (NOMS), as part of its extremism programme, has a variety of theological, motivational and behavioural programmes and interventions at its disposal to challenge those with extremist or radicalised views and to support those vulnerable to extremist messaging or radicalisation. The effectiveness of this work is regularly and independently assessed.

To enable it to carry out its extremism programme NOMS receives funding from the Office for Security and Counter Terrorism (OSCT) in the Home Office. We do not release the breakdown of funding per sector, as this could potentially reveal where the threat to the national security of the UK is greatest. This may impact negatively on the delivery of Prevent, and on the range of activities deployed to prevent terrorism. This could serve to weaken and prejudice the national security of the UK.

In addition, NOMS staff, as part of their daily role, contribute to the Organisation’s extremism work. The extent of this work is not quantifiable in terms of resources allocated.

Written Question

Counter-terrorism

Monday 1st December 2014

Asked by: Andrew Griffiths (Conservative - Burton)

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the National Offender Management Service deradicalisation programme.

Answered by Andrew Selous - Second Church Estates Commissioner

In addition, NOMS staff, as part of their daily role, contribute to the Organisation’s extremism work. The extent of this work is not quantifiable in terms of resources allocated.

Written Question

Counter-terrorism

Monday 1st December 2014

Asked by: Andrew Griffiths (Conservative - Burton)

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many offenders have been engaged with the National Offender Management Service deradicalisation programme in each of the last five years.

Answered by Andrew Selous - Second Church Estates Commissioner

In addition, NOMS staff, as part of their daily role, contribute to the Organisation’s extremism work. The extent of this work is not quantifiable in terms of resources allocated.

Written Question

Prisons: Drugs

Friday 24th October 2014

Asked by: Andrew Griffiths (Conservative - Burton)

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many (a) drug caches including heroin and (b) needles used for drug-taking were found in each prison during the last year for which figures are available; and how many prisoners tested positive for heroin use in each such prison in that year.

Answered by Andrew Selous - Second Church Estates Commissioner

I am sorry that the response to this question was delayed by a failure in the data collection system.

The National Offender Management Service (NOMS) takes the issue of all contraband in prisons extremely seriously and deploys a comprehensive range of robust searching and security measures to detect items of contraband both at the point of entry to the prison and concealed within the prison. These include targeted searching, random and targeted mandatory drug tests, the use of x-ray machines and CCTV surveillance cameras, Body Orifice Security Scanners to detect contraband secreted internally, and the imposition of closed (non-contact) visits. Prisoners found with prohibited items face swift and robust punishment. This can include having days added to their custody, being transferred to a different prison and losing privileges.

The table below gives the number of seizures of heroin and needles (including improvised needles) seized in prisons in England and Wales in 2013. The third column shows the number of prisoners that tested positive for opiates, including heroin in each of those prisons. To disaggregate the data to show those samples positive for heroin from those positive for other opiates would require a detailed investigation of every prison’s locally held records, which would entail significant disproportionate cost.

Finds of heroin, needles and Opiates by establishment¹ 01.01. 2013 to 31.12.2013

Establishment	Heroin	Needles	Positive Opiates Tests
Altcourse	9	1	35
Bedford	2	0	17
Birmingham	8	0	54
Bronzefield	2	1	48
Buckley Hall	0	10	13
Bullingdon	7	1	31
Cardiff	4	0	17
Channings Wood	0	3	5
Chelmsford	4	0	17
Doncaster	1	3	21
Dorchester	4	1	10
Dovegate	1	0	15
Eastwood Park	2	1	16
Elmley	0	1	16
Erlestoke	1	0	8
Everthorpe	4	0	18
Exeter	6	0	10
Featherstone	5	0	13
Ford	0	13	7
Forest Bank	9	0	123
Foston Hall	1	0	11
Frankland	1	0	20
Garth	6	0	18
Guys Marsh	3	0	16
Hatfield	0	16	20
Haverigg	4	1	9
Hewell	1	6	18
High Down	0	1	10
Highpoint	9	1	13
Holme House	1	0	11
Hull	2	0	11
Isle Of Wight	2	0	13
Kirkham	2	93	6
Kirklevington Grange	1	1	5
Leeds	3	1	16
Leicester	3	0	7
Lewes	4	0	14
Lincoln	1	0	6
Littlehey	1	0	6
Liverpool	1	0	60
Low Newton	2	0	3
Lowdham Grange	2	1	24
Manchester	4	1	21
New Hall	1	0	8
North Sea Camp	0	3	4
Northumberland	0	1	18
Nottingham	6	0	48
Oakwood	4	0	37
Onley	1	0	4
Parc	0	2	56
Pentonville	1	1	45
Peterborough	11	3	18
Portland	1	1	2
Preston	8	0	23
Ranby	1	0	7
Risley	1	0	27
Rochester	1	2	14
Rye Hill	6	3	13
Stafford	5	1	11
Standford Hill	3	3	7
Stoke Heath	1	0	21
Styal	2	0	25
Sudbury	0	13	13
Swansea	5	1	8
Thameside	3	1	15
The Mount	6	0	19
The Verne	1	0	2
The Wolds	1	0	4
Wandsworth	2	0	8
Wayland	1	0	22
Wealstun	1	0	3
Wormwood Scrubs	7	0	14
Total	203	192	1328

Heroin finds have reduced by 82% when compared to 2007, positive opiate tests by 82% also, and the total number of incidents of drug finds has fallen by 19% since 2007. And, under this Government, the Random Mandatory Drug Testing rate has reached the lowest level since records began.

No drugs or equipment were found, or opiate tests failed, in 2013 at prison establishments that are not listed above.

It is important to note that many drugs are similar in appearance and in many cases drugs seized are not categorically identified by scientific analysis. Many will have been identified by appearance only.

All figures in this answer have been drawn from live administrative data systems which may be amended at any time. Although care is taken when processing and analysing the returns, the detail collected is subject to the inaccuracies inherent in any large scale recording system. The data are not subject to audit.

Written Question

Prisons: Drugs

Monday 1st September 2014

Asked by: Andrew Griffiths (Conservative - Burton)

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, which prisons have held amnesties for needles used for drug-taking in the last year.

Answered by Andrew Selous - Second Church Estates Commissioner

The National Offender Management Service (NOMS) does not record centrally whether prisons have held amnesties for needles for drug taking and could not do so without incurring disproportionate cost by conducting a survey of every prison establishment.

We have a zero tolerance approach to drugs and other illicit items in prisons. Anyone caught trying to smuggle these into prisons will be dealt with severely and may be referred to the police for prosecution.

We are working hard to keep contraband out of prison, and NOMS deploys a comprehensive range of security measures to reduce the availability of drugs in prisons, including working closely with police forces and carrying out random mandatory drug tests. The Agency works closely in partnership with the NHS in England and Wales who commission a range of treatment services in prison to support those with a substance misuse problem out of addiction and into sustained recovery.