Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many illegal substances were found at HMP Berwyn in each month since January 2021.

HMPPS records finds of illegal substances within its Incident Reporting System (IRS). These reports are created by the staff who recover the substances and include details of the weight of the substance found and an assessment of the type of substance found. In many cases it is evident what the substance is, however in some cases it is not possible to confirm the exact substance and so a staff assessment on the substance is required. We therefore cannot provide consistent monthly figures on the volume of specific illegal substances recovered which for the purposes of this PQ have been assumed to relate to narcotics and not tobacco and alcohol which are prohibited items within the custodial estate.

HMP Berwyn received a full diagnostic visit with suggested actions and continued support to combat the issues of substances in the prison. HMP Berwyn is also part of the Prison accelerator project and has received additional posts in Drug strategy and Health and justice partners. HMP Berwyn has an x-ray body scanner installed in February 2021 which may act as a deterrent.

In the 12-months ending March 2021, there were 20,295 finds of drugs in prisons; a decrease of 6% from the 21,575 in the 12-months to March 2020. These figures are available in the HMPPS Annual Digest.