Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Kit Malthouse and Steve Baker

Tuesday 14th December 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Crime and Policing (Kit Malthouse)]

We are working to deliver a transformed prison education service that will improve numeracy and literacy of all prisoners. Prisoners will be assessed on entry and a personal learning plan will be created to monitor and track progress against starting points and resettlement goals. This will include learning in workshops, kitchens and sports activities.

[Mr Baker]

I am glad to hear it. Should core skills not always be part of the prison regime for everybody who needs them? Will the Minister continue to take steps to make sure that people’s employability is enhanced by their stay in prison?

[Kit Malthouse]

My hon. Friend is exactly right. Education is very often the solution to so many of society’s problems. It is a stepping stone towards employment, which, in itself, reduces reoffending very significantly. He will be pleased to know that as part of our plans we will establish a literacy innovation scheme to incentivise new providers to work with us to deliver these kinds of improvement programmes. We will also introduce specific measures of progress to track how successful each prison is at improving prisoners’ English and maths, with governors held to account for poor performance. We agree with my hon. Friend that these basic building blocks of education are key to future success.

Birmingham Attacks and Extinction Rebellion Protests

Debate between Kit Malthouse and Steve Baker

Monday 7th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

I thought the hon. Gentleman was going to refer to Costa Rica, which is, of course far ahead of Scotland in terms of its expertise and the use of technology to solve climate change. We bow to no one in our record on climate change. The previous two Prime Ministers and this one are absolutely committed to our target of net zero emissions by 2050. We are making enormous advances: not least the hon. Gentleman will have seen the reduction in the use of coal in our power industry, which is now virtually eliminated—the first country of any major country across the world to do that. As I said during my statement, we have a record of which we can be proud. He is right that there is much more to do, but that does not mean that we have done nothing and, indeed, that we have not made significant progress.

[Mr Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)]

As we rise to tackle the very real environmental issues we face, does the Minister agree that what we need is reason, vigour and practicality, not alarmism and revolution?

[Kit Malthouse]

Always the voice of reason and moderation, my hon. Friend is quite right and, as usual, consistent. He is a technologist and so am I. Science has solved all of humanity’s problems over the decades, and I am sure it will solve climate change just the same.