Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether his Department has considered increasing funding for the Capital Grants scheme, in the context of levels of demand.

Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

As of 1 August, strong demand for the Government’s £150 million Capital Grant offer means that all available funds for this round have now been allocated.

We plan to make further improvements to the offer for future rounds. We expect to open a new round for farmers to secure more funding during 2026. Other Countryside Stewardship capital grants which remain open for applications now are Woodland Tree Health grants, Capital grant plans, woodland management plans, Protection and Infrastructure grants and Higher Tier capital grants.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many psychologists have been employed on (a) the secure estate, (b) the open estate and (c) young offenders’ institutions in each of the last 10 financial years.

Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)

The requested information is published in Table 15 of the HM Prison & Probation Service Workforce Statistics, which can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/hm-prison-probation-service-workforce-statistics.

Psychologists in HM Prison and Probation Service are organised into regional teams. Although each is based at an individual establishment, they work across sites, depending upon demand.

A breakdown of establishments by category can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/prisons-and-their-resettlement-providers.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many assaults on (a) children and (b) staff have occurred in Young Offenders Institutions in each of the last 10 years.

Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)

For the period 1 April 2018 to 31 March 2025, the requested information can be found in table 1.2.2 of Safety in the Children and Young People Secure Estate: Update to March 2025 - GOV.UK.

As the counting rules for assaults in young offender institutions changed during 2018-19, comparable figures are not available for earlier years.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if her Department will make an assessment of the proportion of inmates on the women’s estate who have immediate access to menstrual products in their cells.

Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)

All women in prison have access to menstrual products, which are typically stored in locations that allow women to collect items themselves as needed. They are then able to store them in their cells. In circumstances – such as overnight – where a woman is confined to her cell and does not have access to menstrual products, she can alert a member of staff, who will ensure that appropriate provision is made without delay.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if her Department will make an assessment of the potential merits of allowing inmates to apply for jobs in prison while on remand.

Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)

The Ministry of Justice acknowledges the importance of purposeful activity including employment in custody for convicted prisoners and for those on remand.

Under Section 31 of the Prison Rules 1999, un-convicted prisoners are already permitted to take up prison employment voluntarily, though they are not compelled to do so.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many neurodiversity support staff have been employed on the open and secure estate in each of the last 10 calendar years.

Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)

The concept of dedicated neurodiversity support staff was introduced in 2021, with four in post. National rollout commenced during 2022 and was phased in over two years. In 2023, there were 51 staff in post. Implementation was completed in 2024, with 123 in post. This number has since remained broadly stable.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what recent steps her Department has taken to help reduce levels of reoffending in (a) South Norfolk constituency and (b) Norfolk.

Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)

All individuals are assessed for their risk of harm and factors that pertain to re-offending as part of recommending the appropriate sentence and interventions. These deliver a combination of individual supervision and group programmes to assist people on probation developing more pro-social behaviours. Alongside this, timely enforcement is critical when conditions are breached, or risk escalates beyond a manageable level in the community. In relation to South Norfolk and Norfolk, the following specific arrangements are in place to help reduce levels of re-offending:

• Partnerships - There is a strong relationship with Norfolk PCC which has enabled co-commissioning of services, for example, HGV Driver and Forklift Truck Driver Training.

• Commissioned Rehabilitative Services - There are services directly commissioned by HMPPS providing services for women and ethnic minority people. These services also support people in probation with accommodation, personal wellbeing, finance, benefit and debt. In addition, dependency and recovery workers, co-commissioned with Norfolk County Council are in place for dealing with alcohol and drug misuse.

• Local Strategic Engagement - HMPPS convenes and chairs pre-release panels for those leaving prison. These are establishing and developing professional relationships between stakeholders by taking a multi-disciplinary approach to release planning and move-on for people at risk of homelessness. The local Probation Service is an active member of the Community Safety Partnership Group that brings together organisations from across Norfolk to tackle crime and disorder, to ensure the county remains a safe place for people to live, work and visit. The members of the NCSP represent local councils, policing and fire services, probation, youth offending, health and housing.

• Additional services - There is currently an education, training and employment pilot in Norfolk which looks to improve employment outcomes (and sustaining employment) for people on release from custody and for those on community orders. This has seen many positive results with people gaining and maintaining employment. Purfleet Trust are also co-commissioned with West Norfolk Local Authority to provide additional support to provide a bespoke programme of support for all individuals referred into the service to help people sustain accommodation. We have an advanced service using Peer Mentors under our engaging people on probation framework which results in better engagement from our people on probation who may otherwise not engage fully with services, breaking down barriers and leading to desistance. It also helps us as a service to develop and enhance our culture to meet the diverse needs of people on probation.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how much staff time, in hours, was lost to sick leave in (a) the open estate, (b) the secure estate and (c) Young Offenders Institutions in each of the last 10 years.

Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)

Sickness is measured across the Civil Service in working days lost rather than the number of hours lost.

The number of working days lost to sickness is published in the HM Prison and Probation Service workforce quarterly publication which is available here: www.gov.uk/government/collections/hm-prison-probation-service-workforce-statistics.

The number of days lost in each prison annually from 1 April 2019 to 30 June 2025 is available in Table 21 of this spreadsheet: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/689f34791fedc616bb133a86/hmpps-workforce-statistics-tables-jun-2025_final.ods.

Data from 1 April 2017 to 31 March 2019 is available in Table 21 of this spreadsheet: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/64dcd3e0c8dee4000d7f1db2/hmpps-workforce-statistics-tables-jun-2023_final.ods.

The prison categories are available in this spreadsheet: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6889f68876f68cc8414d5b6a/Chapter_10_Tables___Staff_in_post.ods.

Data for 1 April 2015 to 31 March 2017 is included in the attached spreadsheet. This also includes the average staff in post and average working days lost for context to enable comparisons over time.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, with reference to her Department's press release entitled Criminals to face football, travel, club and pub bans, published on 23 August 2025, what impact her Department estimates these measures will have on (a) rates of first offence and (b) rates of reoffence.

Answered by Alex Davies-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)

Through the Sentencing Bill we will introduce new powers available to the courts when imposing a community or suspended sentence. This will provide courts with greater flexibility than ever before to tailor punishments to offenders and ensure sentences served in the community are not a “soft option” but represent a genuine punishment by restricting offenders’ freedoms.

The four new powers which this Bill includes are:

• Banning offenders from attending public events (including sports events);

• Banning offenders from attending drinking establishments (including pubs, clubs and bars);

• Prohibiting offenders from driving, and

• Requiring an offender to stay within a geographic location (restriction zones).

We believe that these new powers, for example banning criminals from football matches and pubs, will help to deter offending and hammer home that under this Government, crime no longer pays.

The Sentencing Bill seeks to increase the robustness of community sentencing. Evidence suggests that community orders and suspended sentences are more effective than short custodial sentences at reducing reoffending in certain circumstances.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many Border Force staff have been allocated to fast parcels in each of the last 10 financial years.

Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)

As an intelligence-informed organisation, Border Force do not disclose specific details regarding the deployment of resources to individual border threats. This is to ensure the integrity of our operations, and avoid compromising the effectiveness of our security response, which is based upon real time intelligence and operational sensitivity.

Found: of 12 (75.0%) Paul Davies (Labour, Colne Valley) (added 6 Jan 2025) 17 of 18 (94.4%) Ben Goldsborough