Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what progress has been made on the completion of the official review into privatisation of the probation service.

During 2016 and 2017 we conducted an internal review of the probation system. As a result of this work, Sam Gyimah made a written statement to parliament in July confirming our commitment to improving the delivery of probation services and outlining changes made to Community Rehabilitation Company (CRC) contracts.

In November 2017 the Ministry of Justice submitted written evidence to the Justice Committee’s inquiry into Transforming Rehabilitation. In December 2017 the National Audit Office published a report into the changes to CRC contracts in 2017. The Public Accounts Committee heard evidence relating to the conclusions of this review on 17 January 2018.

We continue to keep the performance of the probation system under review and are discussing with providers further improvements we might make to the delivery of services.