Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what estimate he has made of the number and proportion of victims who made personal statements at parole hearings in each of the last 10 years.

The victim personal statement (VPS) was introduced in 2007, and provides victims with a valuable opportunity to tell the Parole Board how the prisoner’s offence has affected them or their family and what the impact of the prisoner’s release will be on them.

Victims can submit a VPS in writing, or they can apply to the Parole Board to read it in person, with the presumption that the Parole Board will agree to this. The right to make a VPS to the Parole Board, and to apply to read it in person, was enshrined in the new Victims Code which was implemented in December 2013.

The National Offender Management Service is committed to ensuring that victims are provided with support and information to help them decide whether they wish to make a VPS to the Parole Board.

The National Offender Management Service does not record information centrally in relation to the number of victims who make a VPS, and has not made an estimate of this number. The Government has made a commitment to monitor criminal justice agencies’ compliance with the Victims’ Code and in “Our Commitment to Victims,” published on 15 September 2014, we announced that criminal justice agencies will publish information on how they have improved services for victims from April 2015.