Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps his Department has taken to train prison staff on the additional needs of prisoners with disabilities, including for neurodiverse prisoners.

On 30 June 2022, the Government published our Action Plan in response to the Evidence Review on Neurodiversity in the Criminal Justice System, setting set out a number of steps we are taking to increase support for neurodivergent people encountering the criminal justice system (CJS), including those on remand.

The action plan includes a number of steps specifically focused on training staff:

• we are on track to have a dedicated Neurodiversity Support Manager in every prison across England and Wales by March 2024. A key part of their role is to deliver awareness sessions to upskill staff, and to improve prisoners’ access to education, skills and work;

• by the end of 2022, we will have developed and launched a National Neurodiversity Training Toolkit available for all prison and probation staff; and

• HM Prison and Probation Service has commissioned the organisation Skills for Justice to develop an ‘Adult Health, Care and Wellbeing Core Capabilities Framework’ for frontline staff, to set out what skills, knowledge and behaviour are required to support offenders with health requirements, including neurodivergent need.