Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, with reference to his speech of 10 July 2018 to the Centre for Social Justice, if he will break down the £6,000,000 investment into counter-narcotics by (a) training expenditure, (b) detection equipment and (c) security improvements.

The funding cannot easily be divided into these three categories. The £6m investment into enhancing prison security will predominantly be spent on developing and implementing new technologies to improve the detection of drugs and other contraband. This includes body scanners and mobile phone blocking equipment which significantly assist Prison Officers’ work to reduce drugs and other illicit items coming into prisons. The investment in detection equipment will support general security improvements across the prison estate, and it will be backed by the training that prison staff need to be able to use that technology.