Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, pursuant to the Answer of 21 February 2022 to Question 121748 on Offenders: Personality Disorders, when the evaluation was completed; and what the average timescale is for clearance and publication procedures for such documents in his Department.

The OPD national evaluation report was completed in Autumn 2020 having been subject to standard MoJ analytical review processes. These processes include internal quality assurance and sending a draft of the report to two external independent reviewers for comment. Once the report is finalised and signed off by MoJ Head of Profession for social research, communication plans are put up to ministers for approval to publish on www.gov.uk. Since this time, which has included changes to ministers at the MOJ, the evaluation report has been working through standard clearance processes for publication.

The timeline for finalising a research report varies as it is dependent on a number of factors, including length, complexity and drafting styles of reports along with the time and resource required to review, quality assure, revise drafts and finalise the report. It is also important to note that since the start of the pandemic, MoJ staff, including Offender Personality Disorder Pathway staff, have been redeployed to support the operational response to COVID-19 impacts in custody and in probation.