Oral Answers to Questions

Mohammad Yasin Excerpts

Tuesday 25th February 2020 Commons Chamber

[Lucy Frazer]

My hon. Friend is right to highlight the importance of removing foreign offenders to serve sentences in their own countries, and we have removed 51,000 such offenders from our prisons since 2010. He is right to highlight that we have a number of nationalities within our prisons, including a high number of Albanian, Polish and Romanian prisoners. We are considering all these matters in some detail.[Official Report, 17 March 2020, Vol. 673, c. 7MC.]

[Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab)]

12. What assessment he has made of trends in the level of violence in prisons.

[The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Lucy Frazer)]

We have seen a slight decrease in assaults, and this year is the first time that we have seen assaults fall since 2013. However, we of course recognise that there is still more to do in this area.

[Mohammad Yasin]

When the Minister visits HMP Bedford tomorrow, can she look the governor in the eye and say that she is doing all she can to ensure the health, safety and welfare of his staff when the last Independent Monitoring Board report on Bedford prison revealed chronic levels of sickness, with nearly a quarter of officers off sick at times?

[Lucy Frazer]

I am looking forward to visiting the prison in the hon. Member’s constituency tomorrow and to speaking to the governor this afternoon. I recognise that the prison has some challenges, but I have heard that it is making real progress. I look forward to discussing the measures being taken in Bedford and talking about how we can support the prison to improve morale and the work of prison officers and to rehabilitate the prisoners.