Asked by: Lord Harries of Pentregarth (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to reduce the number of suicides in prison.
Answered by Lord Bellamy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
Every death in custody is a tragedy and we continue to do all we can to improve the safety of prisoners.
We know that relationships between staff and prisoners plays an important role in preventing self-inflicted deaths in prisons and that is why we have announced additional investment in our workforce. As of 30 September 2023, there were 23,058 Full Time Equivalent (FTE) Band 3-5 prison officers in post, an increase of 1,441 FTE since 30 September 2022. This means staff can provide more support for prisoners and better monitor the risk of harm. In addition to recruiting new officers, we are developing and phasing in a new safety training package for staff. It brings together information on related safety topics, including suicide and self-harm prevention, understanding risks, triggers and protective factors. This training is complemented by a revised version of the case management approach used in prisons to support people at risk of suicide or self-harm.
We will continue to fund the Samaritans (£625,000 each year until March 2025) to deliver the Listener scheme where prisoners are trained to provide emotional support to each other. We have also worked with the Samaritans to design an additional support service for prisons in the period following a self-inflicted death, with the aim of reducing the risk of further deaths.
Asked by: Lord Harries of Pentregarth (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what is their timetable for implementing the plans set out in their A Smarter Approach to Sentencing white paper (CP 292), published on 16 September 2020; and in particular, when they plan to reduce the time periods after which some sentences become spent for the purpose of criminal records checks in order to improve offender rehabilitation.
Answered by Lord Wolfson of Tredegar
The legislative reforms announced in A Smarter Approach to Sentencing White Paper will be brought forward in the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts (PCSC) Bill. This bill was introduced on 9 March and, as confirmed in the Queen’s Speech, has been carried forward to the next session.
For the first time, sentences over four years will be able to become spent, and rehabilitation periods will be reduced for community and custodial sentences of less than four years. These changes will come into effect once the PCSC Bill has received Royal Assent.
Work is also underway on the non-legislative reforms set out in the White Paper. We are on track to deliver the Pre-Sentence Report pilot on time, and the Community Sentence Treatment Requirement Programme is now operating in courts across 14 areas in England, with eight more to come online during 2021. The Call for Evidence on Neurodiversity also set out in the White Paper closed on 15 January 2021, and evidence from this is being reviewed with a full report due this Summer.
Asked by: Lord Harries of Pentregarth (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
Her Majesty's Government what is the latest figure for self-inflicted deaths in prisons in the UK; and what steps they are taking to reduce them.
Answered by Lord Keen of Elie
The Government publishes statistics on deaths in custody quarterly, and updated detailed tables annually. These figures cover only England and Wales. They can be viewed at:
In the twelve months to June 2017, there were 97 apparent self-inflicted deaths in custody.
Improving safety is a priority for this Government. We are investing £100m a year to strengthen the frontline by recruiting around 2,500 more prison officers by the end of 2018. We are rolling out improved training across the estate for staff on suicide and self-harm reduction and have put in place specialist roles - regional safer custody leads - in every region to provide advice to prisons and to spread good practice on identifying and supporting prisoners at risk. We are providing grant funding to the Samaritans to support the prisoner Listener scheme and are providing an additional funding in 2017-18 to fund a number of other projects, including a learning tool for staff and emotional resilience training for prisoners.