Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, with reference to his Department's press release entitled AI tech ambition to deliver smarter justice for victims, published on 9 June 2026, if he will list the companies involved in developing the AI legal assistants.

Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)

No companies are currently involved in developing AI legal assistants. Any collaboration with external suppliers will follow the Department’s usual commercial and procurement processes.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many staff members within the Ministry of Justice Policy Group are responsible for delivering the Lord Chancellor’s duty to encourage judicial diversity; and what the annual budget of this team is.

Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)

Work within Judicial Diversity has been a longstanding policy area in the Ministry of Justice, with the current structure operating since 2022.

There are three dedicated roles in the Judicial Diversity team in the Ministry of Justice Policy Group – the team responsible for delivering the Lord Chancellor’s duty to encourage judicial diversity. This represents 2.4 FTE and equates to an expected staffing cost, inclusive of pension contribution and National Insurance, of £176,670 over 2026/27.

In addition to staffing costs, the team has a programme budget in 2026/27 of £83,000 to support this delivery.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many courtrooms in crown courts were not sitting on each day in the past month.

Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)

The Crown Court operates from 84 buildings across England and Wales, with a core estate of over 500 courtrooms. The table below outlines the number of courtrooms in the Crown Court that were not sitting each day in April 2026. To contextualise these figures, in April 2026 the Crown Court sat a total of 9,019 days. This compares to 8,751 in April 2025, 9,571 in April 2024, 7,337 in April 2023, 7,041 in April 2022 and 7,487 in April 2021.

It would be extremely unusual to have 100% courtroom utilisation in any jurisdiction, not least because the system needs to flex at short notice to meet unexpected capacity loss, cope with surges in demand, or accommodate overrunning trials and to allow for additional public and press access.

There is also a difference between system capacity and physical capacity. Running courtrooms requires not just available rooms but also, for example (but not limited to), judicial time, court staff, and sufficient numbers of barristers and solicitors.

We have invested a record £2.78 billion in our courts and tribunals service in 2026/27, including uncapped sitting days in the Crown Court for 2026/27 so that it can run at maximum system capacity. We have also announced additional investment in the workforce and legal professionals, including an additional £92 million per year for criminal legal aid solicitor fees, up to £34 million per year extra for criminal legal aid advocates, and match-funded criminal law pupillages to open a career at the Criminal Bar to more young people from across society.

This financial investment is just one element of our work to tackle the crisis in our criminal courts as it is only by pulling all levers at our disposal – financial investment, modernisation and pragmatic structural reform – that we can put the criminal courts onto a genuinely sustainable footing.

Source System - HMCTS Management Information (Courtroom Planner)

1 - Data extracted from Courtroom Planner on 4 June 2026, for courtrooms allocated to the Crown Court.

2 - Data is based on individual courtrooms in the Crown Court estate. These are rooms whose primary use has been assigned to the Crown Court, not necessarily in a Crown Court venue and excludes rooms that were unavailable to sit for another reason.

3 - Although care is taken when processing and analysing the data, the details are subject to inaccuracies inherent in any large-scale case management system and is the best data that is available.

4 - Data are management information and are not subject to the same level of checks as official statistics.

5 - Data are taken from a live management information system and can change over time and for that reason might differ slightly from any previously published information.

6 - Data has not been cross referenced with case files.

7 - Crown courts do not normally sit on bank holidays or weekends so these have been removed.

8 – Crown court sittings can be intentionally reduced over Christmas and Easter holiday periods, as reflected in the table.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, regarding the establishment of a Business and Property Division of the High Court, what consideration he has given to supporting the retention of the name Chancery Division.

Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)

A Written Ministerial Statement was submitted to Parliament on 2 June, announcing the creation of a Business and Property Division of the High Court. This initiative is being led by the judiciary. The name provides greater clarity to court users and strengthens the international profile of this globally significant hub for litigation.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many seizures have been made from prisons of material that promotes or supports acts of terrorism, extremism or radicalisation within the past year.

Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip

Material that promotes or supports acts of terrorism, extremism or radicalisation is banned, in accordance with the Prison Public Protection Policy Framework.

Records of individual seizures are not held centrally, and the information could not be provided without incurring disproportionate cost.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, with reference to the trialling of artificial intelligence in Immigration and Asylum Tribunals that will allow judges to transcribe case notes and alleviate admin pressures, to confirm whether it will be used in tribunals involving sex offenders.

Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)

The application can be used by judges on all immigration and asylum appeals including those where the appellant may also be a foreign national offender. Use of the application may enable judges to produce decisions with greater efficiency using AI speech to text for dictating case notes only.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, who advises the standing members of the Judicial and Legal Diversity Board.

Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)

Each organisation determines its own arrangements for advising its members of the Board.

Ministry of Justice officials advise the Deputy Prime Minister in his role as co‑chair of the Judicial and Legal Diversity Board.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, with reference to his Department's press release entitled AI tech ambition to deliver smarter justice for victims, published on 9 June 2026, what safeguards will be put in place to ensure AI legal assistants will be accurate and avoid citing non-existent cases.

Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)

The MoJ requires AI tools to be tested and evaluated for accuracy, bias, fairness and reliability before they are deployed, and their performance is monitored on an ongoing basis. AI tools are used to assist, not replace, professional judgement. Their outputs are reviewed by a qualified person and verified against authoritative sources before being relied upon. Oversight is provided by the department's senior AI, digital and technical leadership.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, beyond the standing members, who else (a) was invited to attend the first Judicial and Legal Diversity Board meeting and (b) will be invited to attend future meetings.

Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)

At the first Judicial and Legal Diversity Board (JDLB) meeting on 21 May, alongside the standing members (which also included one observer per organisation) and supporting officials, the Director of Policy for the Crown Prosecution Service, two members of the Judicial Race Working Group and the Lead Judge for Diversity and Inclusion were invited to attend.

Invitees for future meetings may vary according to the agreed agenda and have therefore not been confirmed.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, with reference to the trialling of artificial intelligence in Immigration and Asylum Tribunals that will allow judges to transcribe case notes and alleviate admin pressures, what specific admin pressures is it being used to alleviate.

Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)

The application uses AI for the dictation of case notes. It is also used for inserting standard legal text into pre-formatted decision templates generated by the app for the Judge to then review. This reduces the judges’ manual administrative load.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, whether the Ministry of Justice has provided any funding to any of its staff networks in the past year.

Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip

The Ministry of Justice has not provided any funding to any of its staff networks in the past year.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, whether the Ministry of Justice carried out an Equality Impact Assessment prior to publishing the Public Appointments Diversity and Outreach Strategy 2026.

Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip

In developing the Strategy, the Ministry of Justice considered equality issues - as it is required to do by the Equality Act’s Public Sector Equality Duty. Equality Impact Assessments are just one form of recording such work and are not required by the duty, which is focused on substance rather than form.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many escaped prisoners are currently at large; and what is the immigration status of each of them.

Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip

Data on escapes from HMPPS custody is published annually in the HMPPS Annual Digest, with the latest data published up to March 2025. Information on more recent escapes will be published in subsequent Digests, with the next release, covering escapes to March 2026, due for publication in July.

The Ministry of Justice is obliged to comply with the Code of Practice for Official Statistics. Specifically, it requires producers of official statistics to ensure that no indication of the substance of a statistical report is made public prior to publication.

Public protection is our top priority. When a prisoner escapes, police are immediately notified and are responsible for locating the offender. The majority of absconders are quickly recaptured and returned to custody. Those who abscond face serious consequences, including being returned to closed prison conditions, where they may serve up to two additional years on conviction.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how much the Ministry of Justice Public Appointments Diversity and Outreach Strategy 2026 cost to produce.

Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip

The Ministry of Justice Public Appointments Diversity and Outreach Strategy 2026 was developed using existing departmental resources and did not incur any additional costs.

The work was undertaken by Ministry of Justice officials as part of their normal duties.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how much was spent by the Ministry of Justice on anti-racism training in the financial years (a) 2024-25 and (b) 2025-26.

Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip

The Ministry of Justice can confirm standalone EDI roles are incorporated into HR, with delivery of EDI priorities embedded within broader HR responsibilities across the employee lifecycle. As a result, this information is not held centrally.

The Ministry of Justice also does not centrally hold information on training expenditure at the level of specific themes such as anti-racism. Training available through Civil Service Learning includes equality, diversity and inclusion content within broader programmes, rather than as standalone thematic course.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what was the total annual salary cost for those employed in diversity, equity, and inclusion roles within a) the Ministry of Justice, b) His Majesty's Prison and Probation Service, c) His Majesty's Courts and Tribunals Service, d) the Legal Aid Agency, and e) Office of the Public Guardian in 2025-26.

Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip

The Ministry of Justice can confirm standalone EDI roles are incorporated into HR, with delivery of EDI priorities embedded within broader HR responsibilities across the employee lifecycle. As a result, this information is not held centrally.

The Ministry of Justice also does not centrally hold information on training expenditure at the level of specific themes such as anti-racism. Training available through Civil Service Learning includes equality, diversity and inclusion content within broader programmes, rather than as standalone thematic course.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many prisoners have absconded from Category D prisons in the last year; and how many remain at large.

Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip

Data on absconds are published annually in the HMPPS Annual Digest. Currently, data on absconds is published to the end of March 2025. Data to the 12 months to March 2026 will be published on the 30 July.

Public protection is our top priority. When a prisoner absconds, police are immediately notified and are responsible for locating the offender. The majority of absconders are quickly recaptured and returned to custody. Those who abscond face serious consequences, including being returned to closed prison conditions, where they may serve up to two additional years on conviction.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what the cost to the public purse was of operating E Wing in HMP Downview in 2025/26.

Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip

We do not hold this information.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, whether any compensation payments have been made to prisoners convicted of terrorism offences in the past two years.

Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip

In certain cases where there is a court order or a settlement agreed with an incontestable claim, compensation payments have been made to prisoners convicted of terrorism offences in the past two years. Such payments may relate to issues such as injury, negligence, or unlawful treatment. All cases are handled with thorough legal oversight.

The Department defends claims in line with the established policy of contesting all litigation brought by prisoners convicted of terrorist offences, a policy that has remained consistent under successive governments. Similar cases were defended and lost by the previous Government and compensation paid.

We are taking action to reduce the cost of compensation to the taxpayer by addressing issues in prisons that can lead to claims, and by improving case handling. HM Prison & Probation Service successfully defends around two-thirds of all litigation cases brought by prisoners. Where damages are awarded to prisoners, we seek to ensure that payments are offset against any outstanding debts owed to victims and the courts.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many prisoners have sued the Ministry of Justice or HMPPS over alleged breaches of the Public Sector Equality Duty in the past two years.

Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip

The information requested is not held in a format that can be easily drawn down from recording systems as cases are not categorised in a way that distinguishes between different types of equality-related issues.

Collating the data would require looking at all equality related claims and could therefore only be obtained at disproportionate costs.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how much his Department paid to Stonewall in 2024/25 and 2025/26.

Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip

The Ministry of Justice made no payments to Stonewall in either 2024/25 or 2025/26.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many members does each of the Ministry of Justice's staff networks have.

Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip

The information requested is not held centrally.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, whether any prison officers or staff have been assaulted by inmates held in the E-Wing at HMP Downview in the past two years.

Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip

Prisoners on E Wing are held separately from other prisoners at HMP & YOI Downview.

Individuals may access the regime in the wider prison to attend work, education, interventions, and faith services but only where this has been risk assessed as being safe to do so. Any prisoners receiving such access are under the constant supervision of staff at all times.

There have been no assaults on prison staff committed by individuals placed on E Wing in the time period queried.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, whether prisoners held in E-Wing at HMP Downview have contact with female prisoners in the general estate, including in activities, education, faith services and social visits.

Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip

Prisoners on E Wing are held separately from other prisoners at HMP & YOI Downview.

Individuals may access the regime in the wider prison to attend work, education, interventions, and faith services but only where this has been risk assessed as being safe to do so. Any prisoners receiving such access are under the constant supervision of staff at all times.

There have been no assaults on prison staff committed by individuals placed on E Wing in the time period queried.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, with reference to the trialling of artificial intelligence in Immigration and Asylum Tribunals that will allow judges to transcribe case notes and alleviate admin pressures, what specific safeguards are in place to ensure accuracy.

Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)

The Ministry of Justice requires AI tools to be tested and evaluated for accuracy, bias, fairness and reliability before they are deployed, and their performance is monitored on an ongoing basis. AI tools are used to assist, not replace, professional judgement. Their outputs are reviewed by a qualified person and verified against authoritative sources before being relied upon. Oversight is provided by the department's senior AI, digital and technical leadership.

The AI tool does not evaluate evidence or present findings and all decisions will continue to be made by judges.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many outstanding claims in the County Court Business Centre (Northampton) (a) for which the latest data is available and (b) were there on 1 June 2025.

Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)

As of 1 June 2026, the below is the founding claims to be issued at Civil National Business Centre, Northampton: (Paper claims -a 5 days)

The information requested for 1 June 2025 is not held. HMCTS does not collect historic data on the outstanding claims in the Civil National Business Centre.

Please note that the figures supplied have been extracted from live case management systems/manual returns and have not been verified to the same standards as National Statistics. Every effort is made to ensure that the figures presented are accurate and complete. However, it is important to note that the data have been extracted from a manual collation of management information by staff and so may contain errors inherent in any operational system. Consequently, care should be taken to ensure data collection processes and their inevitable limitations are taken into account when data are used.