Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many criminal prosecutions in England and Wales collapsed due to (a) lost (b) missing and (c) damaged evidence for each year from 2015 to date.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The Ministry of Justice publishes data on criminal court prosecutions that can be downloaded from the Criminal Justice Statistics landing page here: Criminal justice statistics quarterly - GOV.UK.
The Ministry of Justice cannot provide data on cases that are not progressed due to lost, missing or damaged of evidence. This information would only be held in the individual court records and examination of these records would be of disproportionate cost.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, pursuant to the Answer of 18 November 2025 to Question 90780 on Prisoners' Release: Housing, whether he has made an assessment of the potential impact of the (a) saturation and (b) clustering of housing facilities for people supervised by the Probation Service on communities.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
Statutory responsibility for housing and homelessness provision in both England and Wales lies with local authorities. To supplement this, His Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) offers a three-tier structure of temporary accommodation, known as the Community Accommodation Service (CAS), for a small proportion of prison leavers and persons on bail. Many offenders leaving custody will have their own accommodation to return to.
CAS properties are sourced according to a demand analysis undertaken by HMPPS, with as wide a geographical spread as possible. They are normally in areas close to local amenities, to assist with effective rehabilitation and sentence management planning. Services have been expanded across the country in recent years to meet demand for places. This serves both to help prison leavers at risk of homelessness and to protect the public.
Other individuals under probation supervision who are in need of assistance on release from custody may be accommodated by the local authority or in accordance with private arrangements. When deciding whether to approve a proposed address, the probation practitioner will make a risk assessment and will also have regard to the offender’s sentence planning objectives
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, pursuant to the answer of 20 October 2025 to question 78371, whether he plans to increase court numbers in Greater Manchester to deal with the backlog of cases; and if he will prioritise co-location with a new police station and other services in Oldham.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The Government inherited a justice system in crisis, with a record and rising open caseload of nearly 80,000 criminal cases waiting to be heard in the Crown Court and too many victims waiting years for justice.
Upon entering office, the Deputy Prime Minister took immediate action to allocate an additional Crown Court sitting days this financial year, taking the total allocation to a record 112,500 sitting days, over 5,000 more days than those funded last year by the previous Government. We have also secured record investment of up to £450 million per year for the courts system over the Spending Review period, alongside investing almost £150 million to modernise the court estate, including improvements at Manchester Crown Court. While plans to expand criminal hearing capacity in Greater Manchester remain under review, it is important to recognise that court capacity is determined by more than the number of available courtrooms. Increasing physical space alone will not create additional hearings unless there are also sufficient judges, magistrates, legal advisors, advocates and wider system partners available to support them.
To deliver that, we are accelerating our programme to recruit more new and diverse magistrates over the coming years. We continue to recruit high levels of legal advisers to ensure courts remain resilient. We are also continuing to invest in the recruitment of c.1,000 judges and tribunal members annually across all jurisdictions.
However, demand is currently so high, it is indisputable that fundamental reform is needed. That is why, on 2 December, the Government announced a bold and ambitious criminal court reform package to ensure cases are dealt with proportionately and deliver swifter justice for victims.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what assessment he has made of the trends in local authority funeral and cremation fees and charges since 2015.
Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
Local authority cemeteries and crematoria are managed by individual councils, who are responsible for setting their own budgets and making decisions on local services in line with community priorities. In line with this principle, local authority burial and cremation authorities have the power to set their charges at levels they consider to be appropriate. This allows flexibility to reflect local needs.
The Government provides some support to people who are unable to meet the costs of a funeral. The Funeral Expenses Payments scheme provides a significant contribution towards the cost of a simple, respectful funeral arranged by recipients of certain income based benefits or tax credits. The scheme pays necessary burial and cremation costs in full, as defined by legislation, plus up to £1000 for other expenses such as the cost of a coffin, church and funeral director fees, Scotland has a similar scheme, the Funeral Support Payment scheme.
Support for funeral costs for all young people under 18 is provided by the Children’s Funeral Fund for England, with similar schemes in Scotland and Wales.
Interest-free Social Fund Budgeting Loans and Universal Credit Budgeting Advances can also be used for funeral expenses. Further financial support is available through Bereavement Support Payments which help working age people whose spouse or civil partner dies.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, whether he plans to strengthen or update legal rights of the deceased.
Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
The Government is currently reviewing the law in two respects which will strengthen and update the rights of deceased persons (and assist their families and beneficiaries).
The first is in relation to responding to the Law Commission’s comprehensive report Modernising Wills Law, published earlier this year. The Government is giving careful consideration to the report and will be announcing next steps in the near future.
Secondly, the Law Commission is currently undertaking a wide-ranging project on the law of burials, cremations and new funerary methods. The final strand of this project, Rights and Obligations relating to Funerary Methods, Funerals and Remains, will commence in early 2026 and is expected to consider whether funeral wishes should be binding, who should have the right to make decisions about the funeral, and how to resolve disputes. The Government will respond to the Law Commission’s recommendations once they are available.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, pursuant to the Answer of 5 November 2025 to Question 86689, what information his Department holds on the number of court cases that (a) did not progress and (b) were delayed due to the non-attendance of professional witnesses in 1). England and 2). Greater Manchester in the last 12 months.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
An ineffective trial is a trial that does not go ahead on the scheduled trial date, and so a further listing is required. This can be due to action or inaction by one or more of the prosecution, the defence or the court. If a trial is deemed ineffective due to the witness being absent, this would indicate that the trial has been delayed.
The Ministry of Justice publishes ineffective trials statistics by reason including trials that are rescheduled due to “prosecution witness absent – professional/expert” here: Criminal court statistics quarterly: April to June 2025 - GOV.UK. These statistics can be filtered by Local Criminal Justice Board to isolate figures for Greater Manchester. We do not have access to data on ineffective trials due to the absence of a defence professional witness.
The Ministry of Justice cannot provide data on cases that “did not progress” due to the non-attendance of professional witnesses. This information would only be held in the individual court records for cases that are discontinued, and examination of these records would be of disproportionate cost.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many (a) male and (b) female prison staff were found to have had (i) inappropriate personal and (ii) criminal relationships with prisoners in each year since 2015.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
The overwhelming majority of prison staff are hardworking and honest; we are determined to root out any who are not.
Information in relation to numbers of investigations and conduct and discipline cases can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/hm-prison-probation-service-staff-equalities-report-2023-2024/hm-prison-and-probation-service-annual-staff-equalities-report-2023-to-2024#investigations-and-conduct--discipline-cases.
As investigations and conduct and discipline cases may involve multiple charges, and multiple outcomes in relation the different parts of the case, it would not be possible to obtain the information requested in relation to outcomes without incurring disproportionate cost.
His Majesty’s Prison & Probation Service (HMPPS) has been working on raising professional standards, with the aim of giving staff greater confidence to report evidence of wrongdoing, and this may have had an impact on case numbers.
HMPPS’s Counter-Corruption Unit detects, disrupts and deters activities of those suspected of wrongdoing. It provides support to prisons and the Probation Service, with specialist staff working with the police to support investigations.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many prisoners were released to accommodation in each local authority area in each year since 2015.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
This information could only be obtained at disproportionate cost. While data on prisoners released into accommodation is held centrally, that is not broken down by Local Authority.
Performance statistics on housing and accommodation outcomes for people supervised by the Probation Service are published annually. These are broken down by probation region and can be accessed via the following link: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/offender-accommodation-outcome-statistics.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many prisoners released on license into supported accommodation went on to reoffend in each local authority area in each year from 2015 to date.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
This information could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.
Performance statistics on housing and accommodation outcomes for people supervised by the Probation Service are published annually and can be accessed via the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/offender-accommodation-outcome-statistics
Proven reoffending statistics are published quarterly and include data broken down by the accommodation status on release under tab C3 in the ‘Proven reoffending tables’ document. The series can be accessed by the link below: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/proven-reoffending-statistics
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many prisoners on license were released to supported accommodation in each local authority area in each year from 2015 to date.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
This information could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.
Performance statistics on housing and accommodation outcomes for people supervised by the Probation Service are published annually and can be accessed via the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/offender-accommodation-outcome-statistics
Proven reoffending statistics are published quarterly and include data broken down by the accommodation status on release under tab C3 in the ‘Proven reoffending tables’ document. The series can be accessed by the link below: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/proven-reoffending-statistics