Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask His Majesty's Government what the visit rates were for (1) male, and (2) female, public sector prisons in (a) 2019, (b) 2020, (c) 2021, (c) 2022, and (d) 2023.

Answered by Lord Bellamy

Visits are managed locally by each establishment and data is not routinely assured and reported nationally. Collating and assuring the data in the format requested would incur disproportionate cost.

His Majesty’s Prison & Probation Service continue to promote the importance of offering different types of visits including family visits. We are aware that the Covid-19 Pandemic substantially impacted the numbers of face-to-face visits and stakeholders’ concerns over visitor numbers in some prisons being slow to return to pre-pandemic levels. There are a number of possible reasons for this including the introduction during the pandemic of additional ways in which families can stay in touch including the roll out of in-cell phones and secure video calls. Establishments have been working to provide a range of services to help prisoners develop or renew positive relationships. This includes using Official Prison Visitors, contracted family support workers, partnership work with external organisations such as New Bridge and the use of peer mentors.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask His Majesty's Government what proportion of men in prison have access to legal advice on the issue of parental rights and responsibilities.

Answered by Lord Bellamy

Prisoners are entitled to civil legal aid if their legal matter is in scope, and they pass both a merits and a means test. The merits test considers the case’s likelihood of success and benefit to the client.

Legal aid is available in certain family matters, such as public family law cases which fall under the Children Act 1989. These types of cases include proceedings relating to whether a child should be taken into care or who should have parental responsibility.

In private family proceedings, legal aid is available for domestic abuse victims and where the child is at risk of abuse, subject to providing the required evidence and meeting the means and merits tests.

However, the National Security Act 2023 introduced a restriction on access to civil legal aid for convicted terrorists, which narrowed the range of circumstances in which individuals convicted of specified terrorism offences can receive civil legal aid services, though these provisions have not yet commenced.

It is not possible to estimate how many prisoners have a family law-related issue that is in scope of legal aid, and/or are eligible for legally-aided advice, as doing so would require each prisoner undertaking a means test and merits test of their case, as well as an examination of their issue to understand whether it is in scope.

Prison staff are required to assist prisoners who wish to access legal advice by providing lists of legal advisers, supplying appropriate forms, and assisting prisoners to complete them where requested due to language or literacy difficulties.

Question to the Cabinet Office:

To ask His Majesty's Government whether they have any more recent statistics on suicide other than the Office of National Statistics data for 2022, published on 19 December 2023.

Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)

The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority.

Please see the letter attached from the National Statistician and Chief Executive of the UK Statistics Authority.

The Lord Farmer

House of Lords

London

SW1A 0AA

8 May 2024

Dear Lord Farmer,

As National Statistician and Chief Executive of the UK Statistics Authority, I am responding to your Parliamentary Question of 3 May 2024, asking whether His Majesty’s Government have any more recent statistics on suicide other than the Office of National Statistics data for 2022, published on 19 December 2023. (HL4326)

In addition to our annual suicide statistics, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) also publish provisional quarterly suicide statistics for England. The latest statistics provide provisional suicide registrations for 2023. These statistics are derived from the information provided when deaths are certified and registered. Finalised 2023 suicide registrations for England and Wales will be published later in 2024. This will be forwarded to you once released.

The Office for Health Improvement and Disparities also publish near to real-time suspected suicide surveillance (nRTSSS) data for England. This data has been collected from Police Forces in England and provides an early indication of changes in suicide trends. The latest data was published on 25th April 2024 and covers November 2022 to January 2024.

Yours sincerely,

Professor Sir Ian Diamond

Found: Loved ones are identified as a key source of support for prisoners (Lord Farmer, 20175), for example

Found: Parliamentary Under -Secretary of State for Justice Lord Jackson of Peterborough Lord McNally Lord

Found: Letter dated 30/04/2024 from Lord Bellamy to Lord Farmer and others regarding issues raised in the debate