Asked by: Yasmin Qureshi (Labour - Bolton South East)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, whether his Department has plans to (a) review the effectiveness of substance free living units and (b) make an assessment of the potential merits of extending those units across all prison estates.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)
As part of the ambitious cross-Government Drug Strategy, we are rolling out a range of interventions to support prisoners off drugs and into recovery. This includes expanding the number of Incentivised Substance-Free Living Units where prisoners commit to remaining free of illicit drugs, with regular drug testing and incentives. We now have over 60 of these wings across the estate, and are aiming to reach up to 100 by March 2025. This will dramatically expand the number of prisoners who have access to these wings. Alongside this we are working to evaluate ISFLs to improve our understanding of the impact they are having and the experience of prisoners on these wings.
Asked by: Yasmin Qureshi (Labour - Bolton South East)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what recent estimate he has made of the size of the backlog of criminal court cases in Bolton.
Answered by Mike Freer - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
The number of outstanding cases at the magistrates’ courts and the Crown Court are routinely published as part of the National Statistics release Criminal Court Statistics Quarterly. The latest published data is available to December 2022 and can be found at the following link: Criminal court statistics quarterly: October to December 2022 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk). For Crown Court, figures are published specifically for Bolton. For magistrates’ courts, the Greater Manchester Local Justice Area is the closest match available.
The published data for the Crown Court are found here: Crown Court cases received, disposed and outstanding tool, and the published data for the magistrates’ court are found here: Magistrates' courts cases received, disposed and outstanding tool.
Asked by: Yasmin Qureshi (Labour - Bolton South East)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, with reference to recommendations of the report by the University of Manchester entitled Racial Bias and the Bench, published in November 2022, if he will make it his policy to publish (a) the Judicial Executive Board report into judicial bullying and racism and (b) all reports and research commissioned by his Department into the judiciary.
Answered by Mike Freer - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
Under the Constitutional Reform Act 2005, the Lord Chief Justice (LCJ), as Head of the Judiciary of England and Wales has responsibility for the maintenance of appropriate arrangements for the welfare, training and guidance of the judiciary of England and Wales. The LCJ carries out these responsibilities through the Judicial Executive Board (JEB) and the Judges’ Council. To protect the independence of the judiciary, it is a matter for the judiciary to determine which judiciary commissioned reports are published.
Asked by: Yasmin Qureshi (Labour - Bolton South East)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what estimate he has made of the size of the criminal case backlog in Bolton.
Answered by James Cartlidge - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
The Government is committed to supporting the recovery of the courts. We recognise that the impact of the pandemic in courts has been uneven across the country, with the North West being one of the areas experiencing a greater increase in caseload.
At the end of December 2021, the outstanding caseload in the Greater Manchester Local Criminal Justice Board was 3,016 and at Bolton Crown Court, it was 478. There were 58,818 outstanding cases nationally. There will always be outstanding cases as these figures include cases that are being prepared to be heard in the courts.
In order to tackle the backlog in cases, we have extended 30 Nightingale courtrooms beyond the end of March 2022. The closest Nightingale court is at Leeds Combined Court, which offers 3 additional criminal courtrooms. We have also opened two new ‘super courtrooms’ in Manchester and Loughborough, allowing up to an extra 250 cases a year to be heard across England and Wales.
We are also working with the judiciary to explore moving cases across regional boundaries to areas with spare capacity, where appropriate, and using a national, flexible pool of judges for some regions, including the North West, to draw from as required.
I also engage regularly with other key stakeholders in the North West, focusing on how we can deliver further progress in addressing the outstanding caseload and similar challenges. For example, I recently met with Andrew Pratt, the Deputy Police and Crime Commissioner for Lancashire, and chair of the Local Criminal Justice Board, and we discussed how the Government’s increased funding for Independent Sexual Violence Advisors and Independent Domestic Violence Advisors was enabling the local CJS to deliver better support for victims of domestic abuse and sexual violence.
We have once again removed the limit on sitting days in the Crown Court for this financial year to allow courts to work at full capacity, delivering swifter justice for victims and reducing the backlog of cases. To secure enough capacity to sit at the required levels in 2022/23 and beyond we are expanding our plans for judicial recruitment.
These measures are already working, and as a result we expect to get through 20% more Crown Court cases this financial year than we did pre-Covid. Following an increase in funding as part of the Ministry of Justice’s Spending Review settlement, we aim to reduce the number of outstanding cases in the Crown Court to 53,000 by March 2025.
Asked by: Yasmin Qureshi (Labour - Bolton South East)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what percentage of defendants in Bolton require legal aid in their legal proceedings.
Answered by James Cartlidge - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
The requested information is not centrally recorded. The Legal Aid Agency monitors access to public funding according to the location of the legal representative providing the service. Client location and court venue are not reliably captured for the majority of the criminal legal aid scheme and therefore accurate data based on these proxies is not available.
Asked by: Yasmin Qureshi (Labour - Bolton South East)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what plans his Department has to review imprisonment for public protection sentences.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
The Government keeps the operation of sentences of imprisonment for public protection (IPP) under constant review. This includes continuing to ensure that IPP prisoners, as well as all prisoners serving indeterminate sentences, have every opportunity to progress towards safe release. This approach is working, with high numbers of unreleased IPP prisoners achieving a release decision each year. The number of IPP prisoners who have never been released stood at 1,602 on 31 December 2021, down from over 6,000 at its peak.
This Government has brought forward an amendment relating to IPP licence terminations as part of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts (PCSC) Bill, which is currently before Parliament. IPP offenders are eligible for Parole Board consideration of whether their IPP licence should be terminated, once 10 years has elapsed since their first release. The Bill will require the Secretary of State to refer all eligible IPP offenders to the Parole Board for consideration of licence termination. This will ensure that eligible IPP offenders have every opportunity to have their licence terminated.
The Government welcomes the Justice Select Committee inquiry into the IPP sentence and will carefully consider the recommendations in the final report.
Asked by: Yasmin Qureshi (Labour - Bolton South East)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps he is taking to tackle the rise of cases being withdrawn due to court delays and case backlogs.
Answered by James Cartlidge - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
We continue to take action to tackle the impact the pandemic has had on our criminal justice system.
We have allocated over a quarter of a billion pounds on recovery in the last financial year, making court buildings safe, rolling out new technology for remote hearings, recruiting additional staff and opening Nightingale courtrooms, including retaining 32 Nightingale Court rooms until the end of March 2022.
We are now focused both on increasing capacity of the criminal courts and maximising use of that which we already have in areas where it is needed most. There is no limit on the number of days Crown Courts can sit this financial year. The department is also working closely with the judiciary to ensure we have the capacity required to maximise the number of court hearings taking place this year and to minimise disruption to cases listed for hearings.
The Spending Review will also provide an extra £477m for the criminal justice system to meet the increased demand from additional police officers and to recover performance following the pandemic.
Asked by: Yasmin Qureshi (Labour - Bolton South East)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the HM Courts and Tribunal Service Common Platform roll-out.
Answered by James Cartlidge - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
The Common Platform will help make the criminal justice system more efficient, effective, timely, transparent and resilient for everyone. It is replacing a network of existing systems in both the Crown and Magistrates’ Courts that are coming to the end of their life and will no longer be fit for purpose in a modern court system. It is central to the wider HMCTS reform programme, and vital to bringing about improvements for collecting and managing data.
Asked by: Yasmin Qureshi (Labour - Bolton South East)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what recent assessment he has made of the effect on (a) recruitment, (b) morale and (c) retention of Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service staff of the Government’s pay policy for public-sector workers.
Answered by Victoria Atkins - Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
Pay awards for this financial year across HMPPS are subject to the public sector pay pause, introduced by the Chancellor in 2020. This has assisted Government in protecting public sector jobs and investment in public services as Covid-19 continues to have an impact.
The Secretary of State announced the prison pay award on 19 October, which delivered a pay increase of £250 to those earning less than £24,000, and progression pay of up to 5% for those who are eligible. Even with the restrictions of public sector pay policy for this year, this year’s award sees over half of prison service staff receive an increase to their pay. My Department is also currently engaging with our recognised trade unions on the 2021/22 pay award for the Probation Service, which – like the prison pay award – will be backdated to April 2021.
I welcome the Chancellor’s recent budget announcement regarding public sector pay, which will see public sector pay from 2022 return to a normal pay setting process. Following this announcement, we are developing proposals for a pay and reward package for all our staff over the coming years.
Recruitment and retention and morale are driven by a range of factors, including pay, staff health and wellbeing, leadership and line management, and how safe, secure and supported officers feel at work. When making decisions over pay, it is important that the department balances investment proportionally across these issues.
Asked by: Yasmin Qureshi (Labour - Bolton South East)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many Crown court cases have been listed for mention in each of the last 18 months.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
The table below shows the number of cases which have been listed for mention in the Crown court over the last 18 months:
April 2018 - September 2019 | ||
|
|
|
Month | Cases |
|
Apr-18 | 4588 |
|
May-18 | 4423 |
|
Jun-18 | 4442 |
|
Jul-18 | 4562 |
|
Aug-18 | 4352 |
|
Sep-18 | 4318 |
|
Oct-18 | 4874 |
|
Nov-18 | 4801 |
|
Dec-18 | 3517 |
|
Jan-19 | 4601 |
|
Feb-19 | 4228 |
|
Mar-19 | 4529 |
|
Apr-19 | 4254 |
|
May-19 | 4565 |
|
Jun-19 | 4198 |
|
Jul-19 | 4710 |
|
Aug-19 | 4212 |
|
Sep-19 | 4298 |
|
Notes:
1. These data has been extracted from the Crown Court Xhibit database, and run until September-19 in line with published data.
2. Xhibit is a live system and data can change over time.
3. The hearing codes used to extract these data are those recorded by the court listing officer and reflect the hearing type as shown on the daily list.
4. If a case has two or more hearings within the same month it has only been counted once. Should the hearings be on different months they have been counted in each month.