Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask His Majesty's Government, in regard to the women’s local data resources published by the Prison Reform Trust, what steps they are taking to address the regional disparities in the use of imprisonment for women.

Sentencing decisions in individual cases are a matter for the courts.

This Government has set a clear goal to reduce the number of women going to prison, with more managed in the community. The Sentencing Act represents a generational shift in reforming sentencing, offender management, and community supervision. The presumption for courts to suspend short custodial sentences, along with the increased use of suspended sentences, and increased flexibility to defer a sentence for longer, is expected to reduce the number of women going to prison.