Oral Answers to Questions

Catherine Atkinson Excerpts

Tuesday 10th November 2026 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Chair of the Justice Committee.

[Catherine Atkinson (Derby North) (Lab)]

The public are safer when people leave prisons with the skills to find work and stay out of crime. Despite the Coates review calling for education to be put

“at the heart of the prison regime”,

a decade later, cuts have halved the number of education hours in some of our prisons. Today, Ofsted and the chief inspector of prisons have both published a letter calling on Ministers to act on the review’s recommendations, and to tackle poor performance on purposeful activity in prisons. What is being done to ensure that prisoners receive the education that they need to find work and stay out of prison?

[Alex Norris]

I am grateful for that question from the Chair of the Justice Committee, because that too is a crucial point. We are in a self-defeating cycle: the capacity problems in our prisons, which have been talked about in this Chamber for months, impair governors’ ability to move individuals around and get them to the right place, be it to substance abuse treatment, mental health treatment, educational classes or work training. That is why the steps that we have taken are so important. However, I recognise the vigour with which the Chair and the Committee make their comments, and I certainly intend to work closely with them to deliver on this.