Asked by: Ellie Reeves (Labour - Lewisham West and Penge)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what funding his Department has allocated for vocational education in prisons in financial year 2023-24.
Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
Funding is not allocated specifically to vocational education. Prison governors will spend their allocated education budget flexibly during the year to fund provision to meet particular local needs (including vocational education) via the Dynamic Purchasing System and Prison Education Framework.
HMPPS continues to ensure prisoners improve skills such as literacy and numeracy, acquire relevant vocational qualifications, and access employment and training opportunities on release.
Asked by: Ellie Reeves (Labour - Lewisham West and Penge)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, when he expects the recommendations of Assessing risk of harm to children and parents in private law children cases report, published in June 2020, to be implemented.
Answered by Mike Freer - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
We have made good progress on many of the measures that the Government committed to taking forward following the publication of the Harm Panel report.
In June 2023, my department published a delivery update that set out the action we have taken so far, as well as the action we intend to take.
Work on important measures, such as the Integrated Domestic Abuse Court pilots and the Domestic Abuse Commissioner’s new monitoring mechanism, is ongoing. We will provide further updates on this work as appropriate.
Asked by: Ellie Reeves (Labour - Lewisham West and Penge)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, pursuant to the Answer of 20 December 2022 to Question 109769 on Family Proceedings: Safety, what recent estimate he has made of when the final review into the presumption of parental involvement and its risk of harm exception will be published.
Answered by Mike Freer - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
This is an important and complex issue, and we want to ensure that any recommendations resulting from the review of the presumption of parental responsibility are based on a solid understanding of the ways this presumption is applied, and how this affects children.
The evidence gathering stage of the review has been completed. The review, including all research reports, will be published later this year.
Asked by: Ellie Reeves (Labour - Lewisham West and Penge)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what was the cost to the public purse of recruitment processes for Prison Officers in each of the last 10 years.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)
The delivery model for prison officer recruitment in the Ministry of Justice (MoJ), HM Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) and formerly, the National Offender Management Service (NOMS), has changed several times since 2013 to align with business need. This has spanned local, regional, and centralised management of campaigns, as well as the current blended approach of central and local management, with recruitment costs delegated across roles in individual prisons, regional delivery areas, centralised teams, and contracted suppliers.
Therefore, we do not hold complete figures in each year since 2013 as this information is held in a number of different areas and could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.
The estimated cost to recruit and train a new Band 3 Prison Officer is around £13,000 as published in the Prison Service Pay Review Body 2021 report. Further information can be found on page 55 at: Prison Service Pay Review Body - Twentieth Report on England and Wales 2021 (publishing.service.gov.uk)(opens in a new tab).
Please be aware that the figures contained in the document are subject to regular change due to a number of variables and assumptions used to calculate the figures.
Asked by: Ellie Reeves (Labour - Lewisham West and Penge)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many trials for (a) rape and (b) sexual assault have been delayed in each year since 2010.
Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
We have interpreted your request as being for ineffective trials, which is where the trial does not commence on the due date and requires rescheduling. This could be due to a variety of reasons, such as the absence of a defendant or a witness or adjournment requests from either the prosecution or defence.
Data on trial effectiveness is available in the trial effectiveness at the criminal courts tool and is published as part of the Criminal Court Statistics Quarterly release and can be filtered by offence group for adult rape and sexual offences. This can be accessed here: Criminal court statistics quarterly: October to December 2022 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk). However, information on ineffective trials broken down by offence are not available prior to 2014.
The number of ineffective trial volumes significantly increased in 2022; this was primarily due to the Criminal Bar Association action between April and September 2022.
It remains our priority to help deliver swifter access to justice for victims and reduce the Crown Court backlog. We are taking a range of measures to increase capacity in the criminal justice system, including removing the limit of sitting days in the Crown Court for the second financial year in a row.
Asked by: Ellie Reeves (Labour - Lewisham West and Penge)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many Domestic Violence Protection (a) Orders and (b) Notices were issued by each Magistrates Court in England and Wales in the last 21 months for which data is available.
Answered by Sarah Dines
DVPO (domestic violence protection order) and DVPN (domestic violence protection notice) data are not recorded by magistrates’ courts.
His Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICRFS) collect DVPN/O data and this has been published annually by the ONS here Domestic abuse in England and Wales - Appendix tables - Office for National Statistics (ons.gov.uk) for 2016-2018 and Domestic abuse and the criminal justice system - Office for National Statistics (ons.gov.uk) for annual data since 2019.
Prior to 2017 data was published directly by HMICFRS here PEEL assessments data - His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (justiceinspectorates.gov.uk) with 2015 being the first year the data was published. In 2015 only data on DVPOs issued are available. Not all police forces could provide data to HMICFRS in each data year and so the figures in the below table may underestimate the number of DVPOs and DVPNs granted. Data published by HMICFRS was published in 12-month periods from July-June. The Office for National Statistics (ONS) publication tracks DVPO/Ns issued in a 12-month period from April-March. A breakdown of these figures can be seen in the below table.
Table 1: Number of Domestic Violence Protection Orders and Notices issued
| Year | DVPOs issued | DVPNs issued |
HMICFRS published - 12 months leading to June 30th | 2015 | 3,813 | - |
2016 | 3,706 | 4,358 | |
ONS published - 12 months leading to March 31st | 2017 | 3,698 | 4,017 |
2018 | 4,878 | 4,219 | |
2019 | 5,859 | 4,349 | |
2020 | 6,267 | 4,468 | |
2021 | 7,995 | 10,046 | |
2022 | 10,167 | 11,336 |
Asked by: Ellie Reeves (Labour - Lewisham West and Penge)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Attorney General, how many and what proportion of defendants who were (a) arrested and (b) charged with the murder of a (i) male and (ii) female victim were eventually convicted of manslaughter in the latest period for which data is available.
Answered by Michael Tomlinson - Minister of State (Minister for Illegal Migration)
The Home Office holds the data on the number of arrests for specific offences.
The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) is responsible for data on charges, including data for murder and manslaughter. No information is held regarding the number of murder charges which resulted in manslaughter convictions.
Asked by: Ellie Reeves (Labour - Lewisham West and Penge)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Office, how many Domestic Violence Protection (a) Orders and (b) Notices were issued in each year since 2014.
Answered by Sarah Dines
His Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICRFS) collect DVPN/O data and this has been published annually by the ONS here Domestic abuse in England and Wales - Appendix tables - Office for National Statistics (ons.gov.uk) for 2016-2018 and Domestic abuse and the criminal justice system - Office for National Statistics (ons.gov.uk) for annual data since 2019.
Prior to 2017 data was published directly by HMICFRS here PEEL assessments data - His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (justiceinspectorates.gov.uk) with 2015 being the first year the data was published. In 2015 only data on Domestic Violence Protection Orders (DVPOs) are available. Not all police forces could provide data to HMICFRS in each data year and so the figures in the below table may underestimate the number of DVPOs and Domestic Violence Protection Notices (DVPNs) granted. Data published by HMICFRS was published in 12-month periods from July-June. The Office for National Statistics (ONS) publication tracks DVPO/Ns issued in a 12-month period from April-March. A breakdown of these figures can be seen in the below table.
Table 1: Number of Domestic Violence Protection Orders and Notices issued
| Year | DVPOs issued | DVPNs issued |
HMICFRS published - 12 months leading to June 30th | 2015 | 3,813 | - |
2016 | 3,706 | 4,358 | |
ONS published - 12 months leading to March 31st | 2017 | 3,698 | 4,017 |
2018 | 4,878 | 4,219 | |
2019 | 5,859 | 4,349 | |
2020 | 6,267 | 4,468 | |
2021 | 7,995 | 10,046 | |
2022 | 10,167 | 11,336 |
Asked by: Ellie Reeves (Labour - Lewisham West and Penge)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, for what reason the operational guidance on Pregnancy, MBUs and maternal separation in women’s prisons published on 17 May 2023 was unpublished on 19 May 2023.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)
On 20 September 2021, the Ministry of Justice published a new Policy Framework on Pregnancy, Mother and Baby Units and Maternal Separation from Children up to the Age to Two in Women’s Prisons. This filled a gap in policy provision as identified by the Policy Review and an important part of the organisational response to the learning from the Baby A investigation. The new policy was introduced with Operational Guidance for prison staff.
The Operational Guidance was published on Gov.uk on the 17 May 2023. This was removed on the 19 May 2023 after identification of an error. We will re-publish the guidance as soon as the issue is resolved.
Asked by: Ellie Reeves (Labour - Lewisham West and Penge)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what estimate he has made of the average time for a criminal case to be heard in court without a Section 28 video recording.
Answered by Mike Freer - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
HM Courts and Tribunal Service (HMCTS) does not hold information on the average time for a criminal case to be heard in court without via Section 28 video recording.
Data provide by the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) shows for all cases disposed in the Crown Court that were received between 2020-01-01 and 2022-12-31 and the defendant plead ‘not guilty’, the median time between receipt and the main hearing was 280 days for cases without any Section 28. For the same cases, the median time between the receipt and the completion of the case was 372 days where there was no use of Section 28.
The figures supplied have been produced via experimental data matching based partly on live operational systems. Whilst every effort is made to ensure that figures provided are accurate and complete, they have not been verified to the same standards as National Statistics and may not exactly match the equivalent data in the Criminal Court Statistics publication.