Oral Answers to Questions

Grant Shapps Excerpts

Wednesday 28th October 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

6. In which countries her Department is working with the Ministry of Justice to build prisons to facilitate the return of foreign national offenders from the UK.

[The Minister of State, Department for International Development (Grant Shapps)]

This summer, in my capacity as a joint Foreign and Commonwealth Office Minister, I visited Tower Street prison, Jamaica, where we have negotiated a prison build and transfer arrangement to return foreign national offenders, as reported by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister.

[Mr Hollobone]

Given that we spend £300 million a year on incarcerating foreign national offenders in this country, it makes sense to use the DFID budget to build prisons in other countries so that they can be returned. Would the Minister be kind enough to consider Pakistan, Bangladesh and Vietnam for future projects?

[Grant Shapps]

My hon. Friend will be pleased to hear that we work in various countries, through the returns and reintegration fund. I mentioned Jamaica. There are also examples in Ghana, which I will shortly visit, and Nigeria, where I have just been.

[Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)]

Where does building prisons fit into the UK’s stated spending priorities for foreign aid? Does the Minister understand concerns about aid money perhaps increasingly being siphoned off for other purposes?

[Grant Shapps]

As the hon. Lady knows, we have a strict regime for where money is spent and how it fits into official development assistance expenditure. In the end, this is about security both in those countries and at home.