Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if he will set a numerical target for the commitment in the Female Offenders Strategy on reducing the number of women entering prison.

We remain committed to the aims in the Female Offender Strategy (2018) of seeing fewer women offending and reoffending; fewer women in custody, especially on short sentences, with more managed effectively in the community; and better conditions for women in custody that support effective rehabilitation.

As we have an independent judiciary, setting a numerical target as proposed is not appropriate and may have unintended consequences. We are working to ensure that interventions and pilot projects are, where possible, evaluated so that we can understand their impact on the numbers and make-up of the population.