Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what estimate she has made of the cost of providing suicide prevention training to (a) prison and (b) probation staff.

Suicide prevention training for prison staff has been developed by the HMPPS learning design team in conjunction with policy leads and subject matter experts. It is delivered locally, using a training for trainers approach where possible, to minimise the cost and resource impact on prisons, and delivered centrally only where this is not deemed appropriate.

Suicide prevention training for probation staff was developed externally by the Zero Suicide Alliance (a suicide awareness and prevention initiative, funded via Mersey Cares NHS Charity) in conjunction with HMPPS subject matter experts, at no additional cost to HMPPS. It is delivered online, and as part of broader training for new entrants. It is not possible to disaggregate the costs of this training as they appear in a number of budgets including those for Learning and Development and for individual probation delivery units.

We are unable to disaggregate suicide prevention costs from other learning activity. As the delivery model in prisons is local, the costs for trainers and staff attending are in prison budgets. In probation the training is completed online, the costs of staff time to complete the training are in PDU budgets.