Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - South Shropshire)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, in what way the prison and probation estates are being safeguarded against radicalisation and security threats.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
His Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) has robust measures in place to reduce the risk of radicalisation in its estate, including specialist staff training, monitoring of communications, targeted interventions and management through a specialist multi-agency process.
In June 2026, the Ministry of Justice announced an additional £35 million investment in physical security measures, to stop the smuggling of drugs, weapons and mobile telephones into prisons. It is also working with UK Research and Innovation, which has committed £6.5 million to accelerate counter-drone research and development.
HMPPS continues to work closely with police forces to protect the prison and probation service estates from terrorist and security threats.
Asked by: Neil Shastri-Hurst (Conservative - Solihull West and Shirley)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what assessment his Department has made of the potential impact of determining judicial workload in terms of sitting days rather than hours worked on the ability of fee paid judges to undertake duty work across all jurisdictions.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
Salaried judges are expected to commit a number of days to judicial business rather than a required number of working hours. Consequently, fees are based on judicial business days, including half or quarter parts thereof, where appropriate.
In 2023, the Ministry of Justice consulted the judiciary on proposals to align judicial fees in the Tribunals. The Government’s response (published on the judicial intranet) set out that hourly payments would be more administratively burdensome but would also have implications for judicial independence given it is a judicial function to manage how time is used.
Asked by: Gregory Campbell (Democratic Unionist Party - East Londonderry)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, When will the academic Peer Review of the Ipsos Mori Retribution survey begin undertaking it's work.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The academic Peer Review process is already underway. Once reports have been finalised in the new year following peer review, publication will commence.
Asked by: Baroness D'Souza (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask His Majesty's Government what percentage of prisoners in each ethnic group were subject to a disciplinary adjudication in the most recent year for which figures are available.
Answered by Lord Lemos - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
The Adjudications Policy Framework must operate in accordance with the Equality Act 2010 and seek to eliminate discrimination, harassment and victimisation.
The information on the proportion of prisoners in each ethnic group who were subject to an adjudication is not centrally held. Providing a robust and meaningful assessment of the distribution of adjudications across ethnic groups among all prisoners held during this period would require development of new analysis across multiple datasets and the information requested could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.
However, regular statistics are published on adjudication outcomes, broken down by ethnicity, in our quarterly Offender Management Statistics. These figures relate to the number of adjudication outcomes, rather than the number of individual prisoners who received an adjudication: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/offender-management-statistics-quarterly. Information on the representation of different ethnic groups within the prison population is also regularly published within this release, for context to these statistics.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what progress he has made in delivering alcohol tagging.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
Alcohol Monitoring Abstinence Requirement was introduced in courts as part of a Community Sentence in Wales in October 2020 and England in March 2021. The Alcohol Monitoring on Licence scheme was fully introduced in Wales in November 2021 and England in June 2022.
The Alcohol Monitoring on Licence: Process and Interim Impact Evaluation was published on 30 October 2025. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/alcohol-monitoring-on-licence-process-and-interim-impact-evaluation. A further impact evaluation will be published late 2027. This will consider the longer-term outcome measure ‘reoffending’, which considers behaviour change after the order has ended for some individuals.
Compliance is strong and our published statistics show that, in June 2026, 98.3% of days on alcohol monitoring were sober days: Electronic Monitoring Statistics Publication, England and Wales: June 2026 - GOV.UK
Asked by: Baroness D'Souza (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask His Majesty's Government what information they hold on whether prison adjudication procedures and penalties are used differentially for prisoners from different ethnic groups; and what assessment they have made of any disparities identified.
Answered by Lord Lemos - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
The Adjudications Policy Framework must operate in accordance with the Equality Act 2010 and seek to eliminate discrimination, harassment and victimisation.
The information on the proportion of prisoners in each ethnic group who were subject to an adjudication is not centrally held. Providing a robust and meaningful assessment of the distribution of adjudications across ethnic groups among all prisoners held during this period would require development of new analysis across multiple datasets and the information requested could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.
However, regular statistics are published on adjudication outcomes, broken down by ethnicity, in our quarterly Offender Management Statistics. These figures relate to the number of adjudication outcomes, rather than the number of individual prisoners who received an adjudication: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/offender-management-statistics-quarterly. Information on the representation of different ethnic groups within the prison population is also regularly published within this release, for context to these statistics.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, pursuant to the answer of 11 September 2026 to question 28100 on Prisons: construction, what is the total amount allocated to further investment to purchase new land to secure potential sites for future prisons between now and 2029/30.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
We remain committed to ensuring that the prison estate can meet future capacity requirements and are progressing work to identify and assess potential sites for future prison development.
Decisions on future investment in land acquisition, including the allocation of funding through to 2029/30, will be informed by the outcome of ongoing feasibility and due diligence.
Asked by: Afzal Khan (Labour - Manchester Rusholme)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of taking legislative steps to prohibit non-consensual intimate audio-recordings.
Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
There is a lack of consensus about what constitutes ‘intimate audio’ as a concept. However, depending on the circumstances, this type of abuse may already fall within a number of existing offences where audio recordings are used to harass or blackmail. Communications offences may also apply.
The Government routinely keeps the criminal law under review. We recognise the concerns about intimate audio abuse and will continue to engage with law enforcement agencies and third sector groups to better understand the nature of the problem and any challenges in addressing it.
Asked by: Afzal Khan (Labour - Manchester Rusholme)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of powers available to sentence perpetrators who abuse victims through the dissemination of non-consensual intimate audio recordings.
Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
There is a lack of consensus about what constitutes ‘intimate audio’ as a concept. However, depending on the circumstances, this type of abuse may already fall within a number of existing offences where audio recordings are used to harass or blackmail. Communications offences may also apply.
The Government routinely keeps the criminal law under review. We recognise the concerns about intimate audio abuse and will continue to engage with law enforcement agencies and third sector groups to better understand the nature of the problem and any challenges in addressing it.
Asked by: Afzal Khan (Labour - Manchester Rusholme)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps he is taking to protect victims of abuse relating to non-consensual intimate audio recordings from further abuse and dissemination of such recordings.
Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
There is a lack of consensus about what constitutes ‘intimate audio’ as a concept. However, depending on the circumstances, this type of abuse may already fall within a number of existing offences where audio recordings are used to harass or blackmail. Communications offences may also apply.
The Government routinely keeps the criminal law under review. We recognise the concerns about intimate audio abuse and will continue to engage with law enforcement agencies and third sector groups to better understand the nature of the problem and any challenges in addressing it.