Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many people have been held on remand for longer than (a) six months, (b) one year and (c) two years by offence type.

During the pandemic, the number of people held on remand increased due to the difficult decision to suspend jury trials for a short period in 2020, and reduced capacity within the confines of social distancing.

Custody time limits (CTLs) refer to the amount of time a person charged with a criminal offence can be kept in custody before the case is dealt with at court. CTLs were extended in September 2020 from six to eight months, due to the pandemic. The extension contained a sunset clause that expired on 28 June 2021, at which point CTLs automatically reverted to six months.

Judges continue to work to prioritise cases involving CTLs to ensure they are listed at the first available opportunity, as well as prioritising cases involving vulnerable complainants and witnesses (including youth cases), domestic abuse and serious sex cases.

As of 31 December 2021, the remand population was 12,780, a reduction of 210 prisoners on the previous quarter (September 2021). The table below shows the latest data on the number of prisoners held on remand, by length of time, in England and Wales.

Data sources and quality

The figures in this table have been drawn from administrative IT systems which, as with any large-scale recording system, are subject to possible errors with data entry and processing.

Disclosure control

Values of 1 or 2 have been suppressed (*) in the above table to protect the identity of individuals. Further disclosure control may be completed where this alone is not sufficient.

Source: Prison NOMIS