Asked by: Paula Barker (Labour - Liverpool Wavertree)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many people have been convicted for carrying cannabis in England and Wales in the last 12 months.
Answered by Nicholas Dakin - Vice Chamberlain (HM Household) (Whip, House of Commons)
The Ministry of Justice publishes data on convictions for possession of cannabis at criminal courts in England and Wales in the Outcomes by Offences data tool, that can be downloaded from the Criminal Justice Statistics landing page here: Criminal Justice Statistics.
Asked by: Paula Barker (Labour - Liverpool Wavertree)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what consideration is given to home Energy Performance Certificates by the first-tier tribunal in determining a market rent assessment.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
A market rent decision in the First-tier Tribunal is a judicial decision. In reaching a decision, a tribunal will take into account all relevant factors in a given case including, amongst others, those relating to the condition of a property such as energy efficiency or an Energy Performance Certificate, if that evidence is before the Tribunal.
Tribunal market rents decisions are published at Residential property tribunal decisions - GOV.UK and can be searched using free text terms such as “EPC” or “energy efficiency” within the “Rents” category of decisions.
Asked by: Paula Barker (Labour - Liverpool Wavertree)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps her Department is taking to reduce prison officer vacancies in (a) public prisons and (b) prisons run by contractors.
Answered by Nicholas Dakin - Vice Chamberlain (HM Household) (Whip, House of Commons)
We remain committed to ensuring prisons are sufficiently resourced and that we retain and build levels of experience, both of which are fundamental to delivering quality outcomes in prisons. As of December 2024, there are 23,062 Band 3-5 Prison officers in post and nationally we are at 97.2% of our Target Staffing Figure, based on hours adjusted FTE. Substantive recruitment efforts will continue at all sites where vacancies exist or are projected, with targeted interventions applied to those prisons with the most need.
In private sector prisons, Directors (who are equivalent to Governing Governors in public sector prisons) manage vacancies in line with the contract set by the Government. If there are particularly acute resourcing challenges, we sometimes send HMPPS staff on detached duty to support sites.
Asked by: Paula Barker (Labour - Liverpool Wavertree)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps her Department is taking to ensure that Prison pathfinder meetings are provided with intelligence risk assessments on the release of prisoners that could pose a threat to national security.
Answered by Nicholas Dakin - Vice Chamberlain (HM Household) (Whip, House of Commons)
The improvements being made to the Pathfinder process, to further enhance our ability to make informed decisions about offenders who pose national security risks, are set out in the Ministry of Justice’s response to the Prevention of Future Deaths Report by H M Coroner, following the inquest into deaths resulting from the terror attack in Forbury Gardens, Reading (https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/2024-0276-Response-from-Ministry-of-Justice.pdf). In addition, new guidance and templates have been produced for prison security departments to improve the quality and detail of the intelligence assessments that inform pre-release planning under the Multi-Agency Public Protection Arrangements.
Asked by: Paula Barker (Labour - Liverpool Wavertree)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps her Department is taking to help protect victims of domestic abuse and violence who are affected by the early release of some prisoners.
Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
Due to acute prison capacity pressure, the Government has had no option but to introduce a change that will allow prisoners serving an eligible standard determinate sentence (SDS) to be released after serving 40% rather than 50% of that sentence in custody.
Victims and survivors can be assured that probation will continue business as usual processes to build appropriate risk management plans to support the safe release of prisoners. We also have important safeguards in place for the early release scheme and have made sure that changes won’t apply to offences that can occur most frequently in the context of domestic abuse including stalking, coercive or controlling behaviour, and non-fatal strangulation.
Victims and survivors who are eligible for and have opted into the Victim Contact Scheme or the Victim Notification Scheme continue to get information and updates about developments on their case. We have been working closely with the victim support sector so that frontline services have the information they need to support victims and survivors that may be impacted.
All offenders released will be subject to robust licence conditions and risk management plans, monitored by the probation service. There are clear expectations in place for probation staff managing cases where there is evidence of domestic abuse. While on licence, offenders will be subject to conditions including those deemed necessary to protect the victim and wider public, such as exclusion zones, location monitoring, residence at a specified place or disclosing details of any new relationship. Offenders must comply with these conditions and attend supervision. If they fail to comply, they can be recalled to continue serving their sentence in prison.
Asked by: Paula Barker (Labour - Liverpool Wavertree)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, for what reason each prisoner who was released under the revised terms of the early release scheme and had previously breached a restraining order was released.
Answered by Nicholas Dakin - Vice Chamberlain (HM Household) (Whip, House of Commons)
Certain offences are excluded from the SDS40 change. Exclusions included the Breach of Restraining Order (BoRO) offence under Section 363 of the Sentencing Act 2020.This offence replaced an older offence in Section 5 of the Protection from Harassment Act 1997, which was repealed on the commencement of the Sentencing Act 2020 on 1 December 2020. At that point the new Sentencing Act offence should have been used.
However, our assurance work uncovered that since December 2020, offenders have been charged and sentenced under this repealed offence. This means the 1997 Act was being used incorrectly and this created an anomaly.
We took rapid action, and all 37 offenders have been returned to prison. Every victim affected and currently in the Victim Contact Scheme or Victim Notification scheme has been contacted.
All prisoners in custody with this offence recorded against them have been reviewed to ensure there are no further releases in error.
Asked by: Paula Barker (Labour - Liverpool Wavertree)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps her Department is taking to prevent women being put in danger following the release of perpetrators of domestic violence.
Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
We have important safeguards in place for the early release scheme ‘SDS40’ and have made sure that changes won’t apply to a series of offences that occur most frequently in the context of domestic abuse including stalking, coercive or controlling behaviour, and non-fatal strangulation.
Victims and survivors can be assured that probation follow business as usual processes to build appropriate risk management plans to support the safe release of prisoners. Victims and survivors who are eligible for and have opted into the Victim Contact Scheme or the Victim Notification Scheme continue to get information and updates about developments on their case.
All offenders released are subject to robust licence conditions and risk management plans, monitored by the probation service. There are clear expectations in place for probation staff managing cases where there is evidence of domestic abuse. While on licence, offenders will be subject to conditions including those deemed necessary to protect the victim and wider public, such as exclusion zones, location monitoring, residence at a specified place or disclosing details of any new relationship. Offenders must comply with these conditions and attend supervision. If they fail to comply, they can be recalled to continue serving their sentence in prison.
Asked by: Paula Barker (Labour - Liverpool Wavertree)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps her Department is taking to ensure that perpetrators in line for early release who have (a) history of and (b) prior convictions for domestic violence do not reoffend.
Answered by Nicholas Dakin - Vice Chamberlain (HM Household) (Whip, House of Commons)
The Government inherited a justice system on the brink of collapse and due to acute prison capacity pressure, the Government had no option but to introduce a change that will allow prisoners serving an eligible standard determinate sentence (SDS) to be released after serving 40% rather than 50% of that sentence in custody. Certain offences have been excluded from this change. They include serious violent offences with a sentence of four years or more, specified offences linked to domestic abuse irrespective of sentence length (including stalking, coercive or controlling behaviour, and non-fatal strangulation).
The policy is being implemented in two tranches to safely manage releases. All offenders released will be subject to robust licence conditions and risk management plans, monitored by the probation service. There are clear expectations in place for probation staff managing cases where there is evidence of domestic abuse. While on licence they will be subject to conditions including those deemed necessary to protect the public, such as exclusion zones, location monitoring, residence at a specified place or disclosing details of any new relationship. Offenders must comply with these conditions and attend supervision. If they fail to comply, they can be recalled to continue serving their sentence in prison.
Asked by: Paula Barker (Labour - Liverpool Wavertree)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, whether any prisoners convicted of violent offences are scheduled for early release.
Answered by Nicholas Dakin - Vice Chamberlain (HM Household) (Whip, House of Commons)
Certain offences have been excluded from this change. This includes serious violent offences with a sentence of four years or more; specified offences linked to domestic abuse irrespective of sentence length (including stalking, coercive or controlling behaviour and non-fatal strangulation); sex offences irrespective of sentence length; as well as offences concerning national security. The change will also not apply to sentences subject to release at the discretion of the Parole Board or to certain sexual and violent offences which currently attract automatic release from an SDS at the two-thirds point.
This change means that by law, an offender serving multiple sentences could have a mixture of some sentences that are eligible for the 40% release point and others that are not. Someone serving a sentence for an excluded offence will not see their custodial time for that sentence reduced.
Asked by: Paula Barker (Labour - Liverpool Wavertree)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what categorisations of crimes will perpetrators be eligible for release from prison under the early release schemes; and what methodology was been used to determine the categories of offenders to be released.
Answered by Nicholas Dakin - Vice Chamberlain (HM Household) (Whip, House of Commons)
Release provisions for different sentence types and length are fixed by law. This change has amended the automatic release point for standard determinate sentences.
Certain offences have been excluded from this change. This includes sex offences irrespective of sentence length; serious violent offences with a sentence of four years or more; specified offences linked to domestic abuse irrespective of sentence length (including stalking, coercive or controlling behaviour and non-fatal strangulation); as well as offences concerning national security. The change will also not apply to sentences subject to release at the discretion of the Parole Board or to certain sexual offences and violent offences which currently attract automatic release from an SDS at the two-thirds point.
This means that by law, an offender serving multiple sentences could have a mixture of some sentences that are eligible for the 40% release point and others that are not. Someone serving a sentence for an excluded offence will not see their custodial time for that sentence reduced.