Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, with reference to the document entitled Self-harm by adult men in prison: A rapid evidence assessment, published by HM Prison and Probation Service in September 2018, whether he plans to provide training on self-harm in male prisoners for staff working in prisons as a result of the statement in that document that poor staff knowledge and attitudes play a role in influencing self-harm.

This report helpfully draws together the findings of the key research on self-harm in prisons in the UK and beyond, and its conclusions have informed the development of our prison safety programme, including the training that we provide for staff.

In 2017 we introduced an improved course known as Introduction to Suicide and Self-Harm prevention, which is being delivered to all new prison officers, and as refresher training to existing staff with prisoner contact. So far it has reached over 17,000 staff, and over 8,000 have been trained in all six modules. We have also worked with the Samaritans to develop a suicide prevention learning tool, which uses a series of short films to build staff understanding of self-harm and suicide and give them greater confidence to engage with prisoners who may be at risk.