Asked by: Damien Egan (Labour - Bristol North East)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps his Department is taking to help ensure that the cost of legal representation and court proceedings does not prevent individuals from accessing justice; and whether he has made an assessment of the adequacy of legal aid eligibility thresholds in meeting that objective.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The Government is committed to the provision of legal aid, recognising the vital role that it plays in underpinning genuine access to justice.
We are considering our approach to eligibility across legal aid, including carefully assessing the impact of the recommendations made by the Independent Review of the Criminal Courts
This Government inherited a legal system in crisis, and we are taking steps to invest in legal aid.
We are providing additional funding of up to £34 million a year for criminal legal aid advocates alongside our commitment to match fund a number of criminal barrister pupillages. This is in addition to the investment of £92 million in the solicitor fee schemes.
Alongside this, we have also announced an uplift to immigration and housing legal aid fees. This amounts to a significant investment of £20 million a year once fully implemented – the first major increase since 1996.
Furthermore, we are delivering the largest expansion of civil legal aid in a decade, enabling bereaved families to access non-means tested legal aid at all inquests where a public authority is an interested person.
Beyond legal aid, this Government is also providing over £6 million of grant funding in 2025-2026 to support access to legal support services for people with social welfare problems. We have also announced nearly £20 million of multi-year funding to extend existing grant programmes to September 2026 and providing a new grant from October 2026 to March 2029.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what recent assessment his Department has made of the adequacy of the legal aid means test thresholds; and whether he plans to update them.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The Government is committed to the provision of legal aid, recognising the vital role that it plays in underpinning genuine access to justice.
We are considering our approach to eligibility across legal aid, including carefully assessing the impact of the recommendations made by the Independent Review of the Criminal Courts
This Government inherited a legal system in crisis, and we are taking steps to invest in legal aid.
We are providing additional funding of up to £34 million a year for criminal legal aid advocates alongside our commitment to match fund a number of criminal barrister pupillages. This is in addition to the investment of £92 million in the solicitor fee schemes.
Alongside this, we have also announced an uplift to immigration and housing legal aid fees. This amounts to a significant investment of £20 million a year once fully implemented – the first major increase since 1996.
Furthermore, we are delivering the largest expansion of civil legal aid in a decade, enabling bereaved families to access non-means tested legal aid at all inquests where a public authority is an interested person.
Beyond legal aid, this Government is also providing over £6 million of grant funding in 2025-2026 to support access to legal support services for people with social welfare problems. We have also announced nearly £20 million of multi-year funding to extend existing grant programmes to September 2026 and providing a new grant from October 2026 to March 2029.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of compensating firms for unpaid labour resulting from the Legal Aid Agency data breach.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
We appreciate the constructive way in which legal aid providers have worked with us following the serious criminal attack on the Legal Aid Agency’s (LAA) digital systems. They have continued to do vital work in challenging circumstances.
Since systems were restored in December 2025, the LAA has processed civil casework, both applications and bills, for the work undertaken by providers during the system outage. Where individual providers believe they have incurred additional billable costs, these can be claimed through the normal billing processes set out in the Costs Assessment Guidance.
We appreciate that some providers have raised concerns regarding additional administrative burdens related to contingency operations. We have worked with stakeholders to simplify processes wherever possible. This has included testing new service functionality with providers before launch and refining services based on the feedback received. For example, we extended the Average Payment Scheme for civil certificated work and temporarily suspended activities such as audits to ease administrative pressures. We have also continued to update guidance and FAQs in direct response to stakeholder input to provide clearer, more streamlined support for providers. Our priority now is working through the backlog of cases which is currently progressing well. All providers will be paid for the legal services provided under their legal aid contracts. We have no plans to set up a compensation scheme.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, whether revenue raised under his Department's proposed Interest on Lawyer's Client Accounts scheme will be earmarked to support access to justice.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The Government is committed to the biggest expansion of legal aid in a generation as part of the Hillsborough Law and are investing millions on reforming the courts system through unlimited sitting days and better maintaining courts to deliver a world-class justice system.
Funding from an Interest on Lawyers’ Client Accounts (ILCA) scheme will play a crucial role in achieving these priorities from 2028/9 onwards.
The Government has published a consultation on ILCA that closed on 9 March 2026, including how income from such a scheme might be invested. We will carefully consider all responses and provide an official response.
Asked by: John Milne (Liberal Democrat - Horsham)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, when he plans to reply to the correspondence from the hon. Member for Horsham of 6 January 2026.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
We apologise for the delay in responding to this letter. As it requires input from multiple government departments, it has not been possible to respond within the usual timeframe. A response is being prepared and will be provided as soon as it is available.
Asked by: Mike Wood (Conservative - Kingswinford and South Staffordshire)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, on Ann Limb, what is the status of the issuing the Letters Patent under the Great Seal for Ann Limb’s peerage.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
On 5 February 2026, Dame Ann Limb, DBE was created a Life Peer by Letters Patent sealed under the Great Seal. This was formally announced via a notice placed in the London and Edinburgh Gazettes: https://www.thegazette.co.uk/notice/5049850.
Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - Basildon and Billericay)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if he will amend the Criminal Justice Act 1988 (Reviews of Sentencing) Order 2006 to include offences under the Animal Welfare Act 2006 within the scope of the Unduly Lenient Sentence scheme.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
The Unduly Lenient Sentence (ULS) scheme is an exceptional power. Any expansion of the scheme must be carefully considered.
The Law Commission is currently undertaking a review of the law governing criminal appeals. As part of its public consultation, which ran from February to June 2025, the Commission sought views on a range of potential reforms to the ULS scheme, including whether additional offences, such as animal cruelty offences, should be brought within scope. The consultation closed in June 2025, and the Law Commission is expected to publish its final report in 2026.
The Government will carefully consider the Law Commission’s recommendations on possible reforms to the ULS scheme, including any proposals relating to offences under the Animal Welfare Act 2006, once the final report is published.
Asked by: Cat Smith (Labour - Lancaster and Wyre)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, whether the review of pornography law will include differences between online and offline regulation in relation to children’s access to sexually explicit material.
Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
On 9 December 2025, during the House of Lords Committee Stage debate on the Crime and Policing Bill, the Government announced that it would accept, in part, recommendation 24 of Baroness Bertin’s Independent Review on Pornography:
‘The current criminal justice response is ineffective in tackling illegal pornography online. Government should conduct its own legislative review of this regime to ensure that legislation and Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) guidance is fit-for-purpose in tackling illegal pornography in the online world.’
The Ministry of Justice will be reviewing the criminal law relating to pornography, which will give an opportunity to look holistically and consider whether it is fit for purpose in an ever-developing online world. This will involve reviewing the effectiveness of existing legislation which criminalises the possession and publication of illegal pornographic material both online and offline. We have accepted in part because the Government cannot accept the recommendation to review CPS guidance. As the CPS is independent, whether to conduct a review of guidance would be a matter for them to decide.
As the review is focused on the criminal law set out above, it will not appraise the adequacy of age-verification, age-assurance methods or regulation.
Asked by: Grahame Morris (Labour - Easington)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if he will make an estimate of the cumulative number of years of experience held by prison officers in each year since 2010.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
The cumulative length of service, in years, held by public sector band 3-5 prison officers is given in the following table. Figures are given as at 31 December each year.
Table 1 – Cumulative length of service1 of public sector band 3-5 prison officers2 in England and Wales, as at 31 December each year from 2010 to 20253
Date | Number of prison officers in post | Cumulative length of service of these prison officers (Years) |
(Full Time Equivalent) | ||
31/12/2010 | 24,501 | 329,353 |
31/12/2011 | 23,054 | 326,563 |
31/12/2012 | 21,841 | 326,660 |
31/12/2013 | 18,731 | 287,921 |
31/12/2014 | 17,796 | 278,258 |
31/12/2015 | 18,226 | 271,984 |
31/12/2016 | 17,879 | 261,501 |
31/12/2017 | 19,892 | 253,286 |
31/12/2018 | 22,673 | 247,620 |
31/12/2019 | 22,100 | 245,855 |
31/12/2020 | 21,485 | 242,229 |
31/12/2021 | 22,057 | 239,723 |
31/12/2022 | 21,546 | 226,367 |
31/12/2023 | 23,174 | 219,792 |
31/12/2024 | 23,041 | 215,660 |
31/12/2025 | 22,067 | 213,125 |
Notes:
1. The length of service in HMPPS is calculated from most recent hire date. Where staff have transferred in from another Government Department or have transferred in through HMPPS taking over a function, length of service is calculated from entry to HMPPS
2. Band 3-5 Officers includes Band 3-4 / Prison Officers (incl. specialists), Band 4 / Supervising Officers, and Band 5 / Custodial Managers
3. The dates reflect the Full Time Equivalent and cumulative years of service at that particular point of the year.
Asked by: Tom Morrison (Liberal Democrat - Cheadle)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps he is taking to support Women's centres in Greater Manchester.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
I welcome the positive work happening in Greater Manchester to support women involved in the criminal justice system, and the work of women’s community sector organisations that provide crucial infrastructure for the criminal justice system.
His Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) currently funds specialist support for women on probation through Commissioned Rehabilitative Services (CRS) delivered by third sector organisations, including providers of women’s centres. HMPPS is committed to ensuring CRS contracts deliver holistic, gender-specific support that meets women’s needs, informed by service users, stakeholders and providers.
The Ministry of Justice is providing a further £7.2 million in 2025-2026 to support the women’s community sector. This funding is aimed at building sustainability, expanding interventions and increasing capacity, including residential provision where needed. Funding for future years is subject to internal allocations.