Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)
We now come to the Select Committee statement. The Chair of the Justice Committee, the hon. Member for Hammersmith and Chiswick (Andy Slaughter), will speak for up to 10 minutes, during which time no interventions may be taken. At the conclusion of his statement, I will call Members to ask questions on the subject of the statement. These should be brief questions, not speeches. I emphasise that the questions should be directed to the Committee Chair and not to the relevant Government Minister.
Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith and Chiswick) (Lab)
I thank the Backbench Business Committee for allocating time for me to make a statement on behalf of the Justice Committee on the Government’s response to the Committee’s sixth report in this Parliament, “Tackling the drugs crisis in our prisons”. The report was published on 31 October 2025, and the Government response was received on 29 December 2025 and published on 9 January 2026.
Our inquiry was launched because the Committee was concerned by the growing level of drug use in prisons in England and Wales, and the profound damage that is doing to both the criminal justice system and individual prisoners. Our findings were bleak. The trade in and use of illicit drugs has reached endemic levels, creating a culture of acceptance where just shy of 40% of prisoners said they find it easy to acquire illicit substances.
We found a system struggling to keep pace with changing drug use, where established substances are being replaced by highly potent synthetic opioids and cannabinoids, often sourced by organised criminal gangs. The crisis is not merely institutional; it is a human tragedy. Between December 2022 and December 2024, the Prisons and Probation Ombudsman investigated 833 deaths, of which 136 were classified as drug-related.
Although the Government have acknowledged the seriousness of the issue, we are disappointed by their response to our report, which accepts only eight of our 29 recommendations, while partially accepting 19 and rejecting two. We feel that the Government’s response fails to match the urgency or degree of the drugs crisis in our prisons. We asked for mandatory drug testing to return at least to pre-pandemic levels, and for waste water testing to be rolled out faster. Those are essential steps just to identify the source, scale and nature of the drug problem. We called for more drug-free wings and for full body scanners to be provided in all prisons. Those are essential steps to controlling drug ingress. However, these recommendations were not agreed.
The chief inspector of prisons, Charlie Taylor, has described a “menu of drugs” entering our prisons through a variety of methods. Traditional routes, such as social visits and post, continue to be significant channels for smuggling in drugs, as do throw-overs—packages thrown over prison walls. We heard of drugs being concealed in babies’ nappies or new psychoactive substances being sprayed on to fake legal correspondence and children’s drawings.
A major failure of security is disrepair in the prison estate, which allows access through broken windows and collapsed netting. We recommended that prison governors be able to procure critical security repairs within 72 hours. The Government have rejected that in favour of existing facilities management contracts. When we visited HMP Brixton, we heard that it took one year to repair netting that had collapsed due to snowfall.
Although most prison staff are dedicated professionals, a small minority are manipulated by organised criminal gangs into smuggling drugs into prison. We recommend that all frontline staff undergo a mandatory face-to-face interview, led by governors, to improve screening. The Government have only partially accepted that. We believe that bypassing governor scrutiny in the hiring process facilitates criminal activity.
During our inquiry, we took evidence from the Prisons Minister and His Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service officials. We were provided with what we believe to be a clear and ambitious vision for vetting reform. We heard that HMPPS was moving towards a lifelong vetting model, ensuring that security assessments are not just a one-off event at entry, but a continuous process throughout an employee’s career. We were told that the organisational position was to align the standards of HMPPS vetting with other tier 1 agencies, such as the police. Our Committee recommended that the Government commit to this lifelong vetting model as the minimum operational standard. In their response, the Government stated that they
“do not accept the need for a lifelong vetting model as the minimum operational standard”.
Instead of the continuous lifelong assessment described to the Committee in the ministerial session, the Government have opted to re-vet staff only once every three to five years.
We are alarmed by the paradigm shift caused by drones, which now deliver bespoke packages of drugs and other contraband, such as phones, directly to cell windows. There was a 770% increase in drone sightings between 2019 and 2023. An official at the Ministry of Justice told us that they had seen drones that could lift a moderate-sized person. One of the most concerning findings of our report is the dominant role that organised criminal gangs now play in the prison drugs trade. We have moved away from what was described as a cottage industry of small-scale smuggling towards a sophisticated, gang-led structure. These gangs monopolise the lucrative prison market, where drugs can sell for up to 100 times their street value, fuelling debt, intimidation and violence.
Debt incurred by drug users is often collected from family members who, if they cannot pay inflated bills, are coerced into cuckooing or criminal activity. Prisoners in debt are also used as guinea pigs to test the potency of new, untested drugs. We called for systems capable of tracking the electronic financial transactions that underpin organised crime operations within prison walls. As long as these criminal networks can communicate reliably through illicit smartphones to co-ordinate debt and supply, the crisis will only deepen.
We acknowledge the £40 million investment in security infrastructure. However, the Government’s commitment to the Committee’s specific recommendations for disruption remains limited. While partially accepting our calls for better security, the Government have yet to commit to the rapid, estate-wide development of a SkyFence system, which is working well in Guernsey.
We also addressed the drivers of demand. Our report found that 49% of prisoners enter the system with an identified drug need, yet the environment they find themselves in—routinely locked in cells for up to 22 hours a day—drives them further towards drugs as a form of escapism. Without access to work, education or therapeutic programmes, prisoners are left in a state of idleness, where drugs become a primary coping mechanism to get through their sentence. The Government have accepted our recommendation to expand access to purposeful activities, but that will be contradicted by rumoured cuts in prison education.
The physical and operational toll of drug use is catastrophic and is characterised by a surge in medical emergencies, known as code blues. These incidents divert essential healthcare resources and force regime restrictions, further reducing access to the purposeful activities that might steer prisoners away from drugs. This environment has left frontline staff desensitised to the daily suffering and at risk of illness themselves due to secondary exposure to drugs. We called for substance misuse treatment to be commissioned separately from general healthcare contracts—a move supported by evidence from Dame Carol Black. The Government’s plan to transition responsibility to NHS integrated care boards falls short of that.
The period immediately following release is a time of vulnerability, but the Government have rejected our recommendation to introduce a universal roll-out of take-home naloxone kits for those leaving custody, citing concerns over value for money. Given that 61% of post-release deaths are drug related, we believe that saving lives must be the priority.
The Government response lacks the comprehensive plan needed to gain control over this crisis. Without reform and investment, we are unlikely to tackle sophisticated supply networks, deficiencies in treatment, the lack of purposeful activity, the poor condition of the prison estate and serious capacity pressures. Prisons will remain unstable, unsafe and incapable of gaining control over the drugs crisis. We know that the Prison Service and the ministerial team are committed to taking tangible and practical steps to control the prevalence of drugs in prison. Failure to do so undermines the Government’s whole programme of prison reform and their sincere intent to tackle the crisis in our prisons, which they inherited.
This is a problem for the current Government to solve. I hope they will look again at some of the recommendations that we have made, and increase the intensity with which we drive down the drug culture in prisons. It is the first step towards ensuring that prisons are not only a place of safety, but a place of rehabilitation and reform.
Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst (Solihull West and Shirley) (Con)
Does the hon. Gentleman share my deep disappointment and concern about the position that the Ministry of Justice finds itself in? The research and development phase for counter-drone activity has not been strengthened, and we have frequent episodes of drones bypassing prison security.
Andy Slaughter
I think it is particularly demoralising for prison staff and governors to see drones coming and going almost casually. The point I often make is that if this was happening around civil airports or military facilities, it would be stopped immediately. The problem, which is not unique to this Government and is in some way dictated by public mood, is that prisons take a lower priority, but we have heard that drones can now bring in bespoke packages and lift considerable weight—perhaps even the weight of a person. This has become an immediate crisis, so I thank the hon. Gentleman for his question.
Warinder Juss (Wolverhampton West) (Lab)
I remember walking around Featherstone and Oakwood prisons, near my constituency of Wolverhampton West, and seeing how well the incentivised substance-free living units appeared to be working. The Government’s own data suggests that prisoners on such units are 30% less likely to be involved in violence or self-harm. Does my hon. Friend agree that the Government’s decision to consolidate these living units, instead of expanding them, is a missed opportunity to improve safety and rehabilitation?
Andy Slaughter
Like the hon. Member for Solihull West and Shirley (Dr Shastri-Hurst), my hon. Friend is a very active member of the Committee, and I thank him for making that point. A lot of people would say, “Why do you have drug-free wings? Shouldn’t prisons be drug free per se?” However, that ignores the reality of the situation. Providing more drug-free wings, as he suggests, gives an opportunity to prisoners who wish to come off drugs, but who find it difficult to do so if they are surrounded by a drug culture. That is one of the recommendations that I ask the Government to look at again.
Bobby Dean (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)
I thank the Committee for its investigation into this important topic. The Chair spoke a bit about the shocking developments in the supply of drugs into prisons, but can he expand on the demand for drugs, and on the availability of rehabilitation services and other forms of support for addicts in prisons?
Andy Slaughter
Where prisoners are caught taking drugs through testing—we have said that we want testing increased—they need to be punished, but they also need to be offered treatment. We called for a dual approach in relation to that, and the Committee is undertaking a major inquiry into rehabilitation at the moment. We wanted to do the drugs inquiry as a preliminary to that, because without controlling the worst effects of drugs, rehabilitation is extremely difficult in prisons.
Jayne Kirkham (Truro and Falmouth) (Lab/Co-op)
Coincidentally, I visited HMP Wandsworth yesterday and was impressed by the progress that it has made in staff retention over the last year or so. The prison has a new unit with support for prisoners with autism spectrum disorder, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and addiction issues, and it seems to be working very well. My hon. Friend mentioned the lack of staff, which means that prison officers cannot get a grip of what is happening on the wings, because there are not enough of them. On the central recruitment of staff and vetting, I understand that prison officers are not interviewed face to face by the governor or the prisons where they will work. My hon. Friend also made a point about continued vetting. Does he agree that having face-to-face interviews in the prisons where officers are going to work is very important?
Andy Slaughter
I am glad that my hon. Friend has seen some progress being made at HMP Wandsworth, and today we have the publication of the independent investigation there. Staff are working incredibly hard, and prison officers do a dangerous and difficult job—we cannot say that enough. After the disastrous actions of the previous Government, who reduced the number of prison officers to below safety levels, there has been a big recruitment campaign. The problem is that new officers do not have the experience, and we have lost a lot of experienced prison officers. It is a difficult and dangerous job to do, and we need not only to support those officers, but to provide them with the correct training.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I thank the Chair and his Committee for all their hard work. Back home in Northern Ireland, 41% of prisoners surveyed said it was easy to acquire illicit drugs and, worryingly, 28% reported developing a drug problem while in prison. I think those figures are replicated in the report that the hon. Gentleman has presented. Drugs are a UK-wide problem. Has the Committee had an opportunity to make the report available to the Justice Minister in Northern Ireland, and to exchange ideas on how to combat growing drug use in prisons?
Andy Slaughter
As always, the hon. Gentleman gets to the heart of the matter. That statistic he quoted for the number of people who develop a drug habit in prison—they go in there clean, and come out with an addiction problem—says all we need to know about the endemic nature of the problem that I described. We will of course share the report, and I hope it will be useful in Northern Ireland.
Lewis Atkinson (Sunderland Central) (Lab)
I thank my hon. Friend and his Committee for their work on this really important matter. I would like to ask about the recommendations regarding substance misuse treatment commissioning. Does he agree with me and Collective Voice, the umbrella organisation for drug treatment providers, that drug treatment services are entirely different from general health services and need to be commissioned separately? There is no Minister from the Department of Health and Social Care present today, but will he join me in calling on the Department to think again about transferring commissioning responsibilities to ICBs, particularly given the changes going on? Does this not reiterate the need for a joined-up drugs strategy across Government, with the Home Office, Health Department and Ministry of Justice working together on this issue as a priority?
Andy Slaughter
This is my hon. Friend’s area of expertise. I mentioned the recommendations of Dame Carol Black, who is widely recognised as one of the best experts in this area; successive Governments have turned to her. She is very clear about the need to improve treatment. I have seen the correspondence from Collective Voice, which bears the authority of many organisations that engage with this issue across the country. This is a distinct problem that needs a bespoke remedy, and I hope the Government will hear that.
Chris Bloore (Redditch) (Lab)
I pay tribute to the Chair and his Committee for their report, and I am grateful to the staff at HMP Hewell on the edge of my constituency for all the work they are doing to support prisoners. I would be interested to know what metrics he will use to measure progress on meeting his report’s recommendations by the end of this Parliament. What should we be asking him in 12 or 24 months’ time to see if the Government have truly met the recommendations in this report?
Andy Slaughter
First, I am pleased that my hon. Friends are making links with their prisons. I hope all Members who have a prison will visit it regularly; I had the Scrubs in my patch for 20 years. I am also pleased that my hon. Friend wants to set targets for the Committee, rather than leave that for the Committee to deal with. We will monitor this and follow it up on a regular basis because, as I have said, without control of the drugs problem in prisons, so many other things become impossible to do. If he wants to set some benchmarks, I will ensure that we try to keep to them.
Linsey Farnsworth (Amber Valley) (Lab)
I thank my hon. Friend for speaking so powerfully about our Committee’s report. He knows that I am a huge supporter of policies that seek to maximise opportunities to rehabilitate offenders and prisoners, so I welcome the Government’s positive response to recommendation 6 on purposeful activity. We know that purposeful activity or access to it is a huge benefit in rehabilitating offenders and stopping them taking drugs while in prison through boredom. The recommendation requested that the Government provide an update to the Committee by April 2026 on the progress that has been made on purposeful activity. Could he outline what he would hope to see in that update to allow the Committee to properly scrutinise progress?
Andy Slaughter
Again, I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who is also a very assiduous member of the Committee, and I want to finish on a positive note. In this report, we inevitably concentrated on the problems and issues on which we do not feel the Government are acting. However, I am fully appreciative that the ministerial team—and particularly the noble Lord Timpson—are keen to resolve the issues of not just prison overcrowding and conditions, but of criminal activity involving drugs in prison. The objective is to get prison numbers down not by early releases, but by rehabilitation and cutting reoffending, and I see this as a series of stepping stones along that route. Much of the work we do as a Committee is linked together to that end, and I know my hon. Friend will be part of that process.