Asked by: Douglas Carswell (Independent - Clacton)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what consideration was given to including punishment as a purpose of prisons in clause 1(2) of the Prisons and Courts Bill.
Answered by Sam Gyimah
The Prisons and Courts Bill is clear that prisons are there to deliver the sentences of the court – depriving people of their liberty to punish them for their crimes. This reflects and underlines the existing principles set out in the Criminal Justice Act 2003, which states that one of the purposes of sentencing is the punishment of offenders.
Asked by: Douglas Carswell (Independent - Clacton)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what discussions she has had with the President of the Family Division on the issuance of new guidance on the anonymisation of judgments.
Answered by Phillip Lee
I have discussed this matter with the President of the Family Division, and the next steps are under consideration.
Asked by: Douglas Carswell (Independent - Clacton)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what discussions her Department has had with the Judicial Office on permitting district judges to sit as presiding judges at the Muslim Arbitration Tribunal.
Answered by Oliver Heald
The involvement of judges in outside organisations is covered by the Guide to Judicial Conduct, which is published by the independent judiciary. The guide is publicly available on gov.uk. The Department does not discuss the application of this guidance to individual cases.
Asked by: Douglas Carswell (Independent - Clacton)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, on how many occasions a lie detector test has been used for serious sex offenders as part of their licence conditions, upon completion of their custodial sentence, since August 2014.
Answered by Andrew Selous - Second Church Estates Commissioner
Since August 2014 there have been 820 polygraph examinations conducted on sex offenders on licence in the community.Asked by: Douglas Carswell (Independent - Clacton)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what planning his Department has undertaken for the possibility of the UK voting to leave the EU.
Answered by Andrew Selous - Second Church Estates Commissioner
On 19 February, the Prime Minister set out the Government’s position on Europe.
Asked by: Douglas Carswell (Independent - Clacton)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what measures the Government plans to take to address the concerns expressed by the Independent Monitoring Board in its report, HMP Winchester, Annual Report June 2014 to May 2015, published on 2 November 2015.
Answered by Andrew Selous - Second Church Estates Commissioner
The HMP Winchester IMB Annual Report acknowledges the professionalism and commitment of the Governor and his staff at HMP Winchester, who manage a challenging and diverse population. We are currently recruiting prison officers to fill vacancies at Winchester, and new officers are due to start work in the new year. Should a serious incident occur at Winchester or any other prison, the situation would be constantly risk assessed as it develops to ensure the best and most appropriate response. National resources are available to provide assistance at any time, if additional resources are needed.
A wide ranging programme of work has been initiated to counteract New Psychoactive Substances (NPS) in prisons. The National Offender Management Service (NOMS) continues to work hard to source more work for prisoners across the entire prison estate. This includes working with local and national businesses as well as other Government Departments.
I wrote to Winchester’s Independent Monitoring Board Chair on 3rd November, providing a full response to the concerns raised.
Asked by: Douglas Carswell (Independent - Clacton)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what measures the Government plans to take to address the concerns expressed by the Chief Inspector of Prisons in his Annual Report for 2014-15, published on 15 July 2015; and what those measures will be on each of the four assessed outcomes referred to in the introduction to that report.
Answered by Andrew Selous - Second Church Estates Commissioner
The Ministry of Justice welcomed the scrutiny brought by the Chief Inspector of Prisons in his annual report published in July 2015. Steps have been taken at each of the prisons inspected during 2014-15 to address the specific recommendations made, and detailed action plans put in place. We are also seeking to address the Chief Inspector’s comments on each of the four outcomes of safety, respect, purposeful activity and resettlement, and we are tackling the risks of increased violence highlighted by the Chief Inspector.
The National Offender Management Service is committed to running safe prisons. We are holding a more violent prison population; the number of people sentenced to prison for violent offences has increased by 30% in the last 10 years. In addition the illicit use of New Psychoactive Substances (NPS) has been a significant factor in fuelling violence in prisons. This Government has introduced two new offences through the Serious Crime Act 2015 for being in possession of a knife or other offensive weapon within a prison without authorisation, and throwing of items, including NPS over a prison wall without authorisation. This offence will help to control these substances in prison. We are also introducing an offence of possession of NPS in the prison estate.
NOMS also operates a violence reduction project to gain a better understanding of the causes of the current levels of violence in prisons and to ensure that there is strengthened handling of it, in terms of both prevention and response. A joint national protocol between the National Offender Management Service (NOMS), the CPS, and ACPO was published in February 2015 with the purpose of ensuring a nationally consistent approach to the referral and prosecution of crimes in prison.
The Chief Inspector of Prisons found that “respect” (how a prisoner is treated) held up best amongst their four areas of inspection. We are continuing to take forward the strengths he highlighted which included: good staff/prisoner relationships, increased use of prisoner peer mentors and good practice in health care.
We noted the Chief Inspector’s concerns about “purposeful activity”. We want prisons to be places of hard work, rigorous education and high ambition, with incentives for prisoners to learn and for prison staff to prioritise education and work. The hours worked by prisoners in industrial occupations has already risen from 10.6 million hours in 2010/2011 to 14.2 million hours in the 2013-2014.
Finally in relation to resettlement (preparing prisoners for their release into the community) we have put in place an unprecedented nationwide ‘through the prison gate’ resettlement service, meaning most offenders are given continuous support by one provider from custody into the community. Community Rehabilitation Companies (CRCs) launched their ‘Through the Gate’ service on 1 May 2015. This service provides offenders with support to find accommodation and jobs, finance and debt advice, and support for sex workers and victims of domestic violence.
Asked by: Douglas Carswell (Independent - Clacton)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what his policy is on the location of imprisonment of transgender prisoners.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
Prison Service Instruction 07/2011 sets out NOMS policy on the care and management of prisoners who live or propose to live in a gender other than the one assigned at birth. Prisoners are normally placed according to their legally recognised gender. However, the guidelines allow room for discretion and senior prison staff will review the circumstances of every case in consultation with medical and other experts in order to protect the physical and emotional wellbeing of the person concerned along with the safety and wellbeing of other prisoners.
A review of the current policy on transgender and transsexual prisoners began earlier this year and revised policy guidance will be issued to reflect NOMS' responsibilities to transgender offenders in the community as well as in custody. The intention is to implement the guidance early in the New Year.
Asked by: Douglas Carswell (Independent - Clacton)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what plans his Department has to publish the Memorandum of Understanding with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, signed in September 2014.
Answered by Andrew Selous - Second Church Estates Commissioner
The Information Commissioner’s Office has upheld the decision not to publish this Memorandum of Understanding. That correspondence can be found here: https://ico.org.uk/media/action-weve-taken/decision-notices/2015/1432375/fs_50579089.pdf.
Asked by: Douglas Carswell (Independent - Clacton)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what the reasons were for which each emergency protection order was granted to a local authority in England and Wales in (a) 2010, (b) 2011, (c) 2012, (d) 2013, (e) 2014 and (f) January to March 2015.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
This information is not held centrally and could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.