Prisons: Security

(asked on 19th June 2019) - View Source

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of X-ray body scanners in prisons in England and Wales.


Answered by
Robert Buckland Portrait
Robert Buckland
This question was answered on 27th June 2019

We are taking urgent and decisive action to stop contraband from entering our prisons. These illicit items pose a significant threat to safety and security.

HM Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) initially trialled the use of X-ray body scanners in a small number of prisons. Based on learning from these trial sites, a significant investment was made in 2018/19 to purchase 18 newly-designed body scanners for the establishments in the 10 Prisons Project and for the Long Term and High Security estate.

We believe X-ray scanning technology provides an effective method of confirming whether a prisoner is attempting to smuggle contraband via internal concealment.

The future rollout and tendering of a HMPPS specific contract for X-ray body scanning technology will commence formally later in 2019.

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