Prisons: Contracts

(asked on 26th June 2019) - View Source

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, pursuant to the Answer of 11 June 2019 to Question 259342 on Prisons: Contracts, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of HMP Altcourse’s innovative approach to violence reduction on levels of (a) prison-on-prisoner assaults, (b) prisoner-on-staff assaults, (c) serious prison-on-prisoner assaults and (d) serious prisoner-on-staff assaults between 2010 and 2018.


Answered by
Paul Maynard Portrait
Paul Maynard
Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
This question was answered on 5th July 2019

Altcourse is currently meeting the majority of its contract targets and overall performance against the contract is very good. In their report Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Prisons acknowledged that the Prison had strong leadership, and a highly positive staff culture and delivering good outcomes in many key areas.

G4S has introduced a range of measures in response to levels of violence within the prison, including behaviour management strategies to deal with violent and complex individuals in their Brook unit. Performance of the contract at Altcourse continues to be robustly managed. Please see attached table.

The safety of Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service staff working in prisons is a priority. Across the prison estate we have invested an additional £70m in a raft of measures designed to improve safety, security and decency – including body-scanners, enhanced searches and new investigative teams.

Reticulating Splines