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Written Question
Legal Aid Scheme: Immigration
Tuesday 5th November 2019

Asked by: Richard Burgon (Labour - Leeds East)

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many immigration law legal aid providers there were in each year since 2010, by procurement area.

Answered by Wendy Morton

(Please see Annex attached)

Written Question
Reoffenders
Monday 4th November 2019

Asked by: Richard Burgon (Labour - Leeds East)

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, pursuant to the Answer of 21 October 2019 to Question 944 on Reoffenders, how many offenders under statutory supervision have been convicted under each category of serious offence in each of the last five years.

Answered by Lucy Frazer - Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport

We have interpreted the request to mean the number of offenders convicted of a Serious Further Offence (SFO) broken down by conviction offence type. The information you ask for is routinely published and therefore available in the public domain, and I have provided the link below.

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/serious-further-offences. We will publish SFO conviction data for 2018/19 next year.

Not all charges for an SFO will result in a conviction. In any year, in about 50% of cases either the charges are dropped before trial, or the offender is acquitted following trial or the offender is convicted of a less serious offence.

Written Question
Community Orders
Monday 4th November 2019

Asked by: Richard Burgon (Labour - Leeds East)

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many hours of unpaid work have been handed down by the courts as part of community orders in each year since 2010.

Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)

This information is not readily available and would require a manual search of court records which would incur disproportionate costs.

The number of community sentences issued can be found in our outcomes by offence tool:

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/802314/outcomes-by-offence-tool-2018.xlsx

Written Question
Ministry of Justice: Staff
Monday 4th November 2019

Asked by: Richard Burgon (Labour - Leeds East)

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many full-time equivalent National Compliance and Enforcement Service staff have been employed in each year since 2010.

Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)

The number of full time equivalent staff (FTE) working in the National Compliance and Enforcement Service at the end of March for each year since 2012 is as follows:

2012 1,706

2013 1,770

2014 1,640

2015 1,516

2016 1,470

2017 1,497

2018 1,573

2019 1,425

FTE figure include both agency and permanent staff. We do not hold any figures prior to March 2012 as headcount was historically included within Court FTE figures.

Written Question
Courts: Video Conferencing
Monday 4th November 2019

Asked by: Richard Burgon (Labour - Leeds East)

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many hearings and trials across the HM Courts and Tribunal Service estate used a video link or similar technology in each of the last five years.

Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)

The information requested could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.

Written Question
Prisons: Repairs and Maintenance
Monday 4th November 2019

Asked by: Richard Burgon (Labour - Leeds East)

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what the most recent estimate is of the cost of outstanding repairs at each prison.

Answered by Lucy Frazer - Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport

This Government is investing an additional £156million in 2020/21 to improve the conditions of existing prisons across the estate – targeting the most pressing maintenance concerns including boilers, fire safety and serveries. This underpins our commitment to a system that is decent, safe and secure.

Currently the priority maintenance backlog totals approximately £900m. This is most up to date estimate we have of the costs associated with the maintenance backlog, inclusive of resource costs.

A figure for each individual establishment is not available and would represent disproportionate cost to obtain.

Written Question
Offenders: Rehabilitation
Monday 4th November 2019

Asked by: Richard Burgon (Labour - Leeds East)

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, with reference to his Department's strategy entitled, Transforming Rehabilitation, what key success indicators his Department plans to include in its programmes to reduce reoffending.

Answered by Lucy Frazer - Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport

Performance indicators will give providers the incentives to ensure quality delivery which secures rehabilitative outcomes whilst delivering the sentence of the court and protecting the public.

There will be performance indicators to assess whether accredited programmes and other interventions have been delivered to service users referred to them by offender managers. There will also be quality indicators on whether accredited programmes and other interventions are of sufficient quality to enable individuals to complete the intervention and address problems related to their offending.

Written Question
Offenders: Rehabilitation
Monday 4th November 2019

Asked by: Richard Burgon (Labour - Leeds East)

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if he will publish the criteria used by Her Majesty's Prisons and Probation Service expert panel to assess accredited rehabilitation programmes.

Answered by Lucy Frazer - Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport

The criteria used by the Correctional Services Accreditation and Advice Panel (CSAAP) to accredit programmes for Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) are being updated and prepared for publication.

There are 18 HMPPS accredited programmes, of which:

  • Two programmes have published impact studies which set out the programme’s impact on proven reoffending.
  • A further four programmes have published short-term outcomes studies which assess the programme’s effect on variables that are expected to change (such as treatment targets like problem solving) to then assess impact (reduced likelihood of reconviction).
  • In addition, seven programmes have not been in operation long enough to generate sufficient data for a reoffending impact analysis, and three have small or specialist samples that make constructing a suitable comparison group for a robust evaluation challenging at this time.
  • Impact studies to assess reoffending are currently being scoped or are underway for four HMPPS programmes. Short-term outcome studies are underway for two other programmes.

While several evaluations have been published for accredited offending behaviour programmes, are being scoped, or are underway, not all courses have had an impact evaluation. There are several reasons for this:

  • Some are relatively new and insufficient time has passed to observe outcomes – especially for programmes that target individuals likely to be on long sentences. It can take many years (sometimes upwards of eight years) to generate the data needed to evaluate proven reoffending.
  • Some programmes are delivered to a low volume of participants or are targeted at specific cohorts, which makes it difficult to construct a suitable comparison group for a robust impact evaluation to assess reoffending.
  • The Department has delivered other types of evaluations such as process studies or short-term outcome studies (for example, effects on institutional behaviour) to assess the implementation and delivery of the programmes. This is particularly valuable for new programmes, where we want to learn about how they are being received (as per Cabinet Office guidance on evaluation).
Written Question
Offenders: Rehabilitation
Monday 4th November 2019

Asked by: Richard Burgon (Labour - Leeds East)

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what proportion of HMPPS accredited programmes have had impact evaluations.

Answered by Lucy Frazer - Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport

The criteria used by the Correctional Services Accreditation and Advice Panel (CSAAP) to accredit programmes for Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) are being updated and prepared for publication.

There are 18 HMPPS accredited programmes, of which:

  • Two programmes have published impact studies which set out the programme’s impact on proven reoffending.
  • A further four programmes have published short-term outcomes studies which assess the programme’s effect on variables that are expected to change (such as treatment targets like problem solving) to then assess impact (reduced likelihood of reconviction).
  • In addition, seven programmes have not been in operation long enough to generate sufficient data for a reoffending impact analysis, and three have small or specialist samples that make constructing a suitable comparison group for a robust evaluation challenging at this time.
  • Impact studies to assess reoffending are currently being scoped or are underway for four HMPPS programmes. Short-term outcome studies are underway for two other programmes.

While several evaluations have been published for accredited offending behaviour programmes, are being scoped, or are underway, not all courses have had an impact evaluation. There are several reasons for this:

  • Some are relatively new and insufficient time has passed to observe outcomes – especially for programmes that target individuals likely to be on long sentences. It can take many years (sometimes upwards of eight years) to generate the data needed to evaluate proven reoffending.
  • Some programmes are delivered to a low volume of participants or are targeted at specific cohorts, which makes it difficult to construct a suitable comparison group for a robust impact evaluation to assess reoffending.
  • The Department has delivered other types of evaluations such as process studies or short-term outcome studies (for example, effects on institutional behaviour) to assess the implementation and delivery of the programmes. This is particularly valuable for new programmes, where we want to learn about how they are being received (as per Cabinet Office guidance on evaluation).
Written Question
Offenders: Rehabilitation
Monday 4th November 2019

Asked by: Richard Burgon (Labour - Leeds East)

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, whether his Department plans to include targeted programmes for offenders that are dependent on (a) drugs, (b) alcohol and (c) gambling as a commissioning requirement under the proposed new probation system.

Answered by Lucy Frazer - Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport

The Probation Reform Programme seeks to support the protocol agreed between the Ministry of Justice, Department of Health and Social Care, NHS England and Public Health England to promote the use of Mental Health Treatment, Alcohol Treatment and Drug Rehabilitation requirements as the intervention of choice for eligible offenders.

We also intend to procure additional rehabilitative interventions that support offenders on release from custody and under community supervision to access treatment and stay safe while awaiting treatment and/or access to specialist services which address both substance misuse and gambling.