Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what estimate his Department has made of (a) the number of items of prisoner property that were lost in the course of transfers between prisons, and (b) how many prisoners have been affected by this, broken down by month for the past 12 months.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
Information about the instances of lost property is not held centrally. It could not be obtained without incurring disproportionate cost.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, when he plans to respond to the letters from the hon. Member for West Suffolk of 21 July, 23 July, 4 August and 25 August 2026.
Answered by Jake Richards - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
The Department recognises the importance of responding to correspondence from Honourable and Right Honourable Members in a timely manner. The Hon. Member's letters of 21 July, 23 July, 4 August and 25 August have been received and are being considered. I regret that responses have not yet been provided and apologise for the delay. Responses will be issued as soon as possible.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, whether he plans to adopt the policies in the Cutting Youth Crime, Saving Young Lives white paper.
Answered by Jake Richards - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
The new Government is committed to the goals and direction set out in the Youth Justice White Paper in May and is making progress on delivering the significant programme of reforms. As this work progresses, we will continue to develop and refine our approach in line with wider Government priorities – in particular, building on work already underway, we are developing plans to strengthen the role of strategic authorities in youth justice, in line with the Rewiring the State Cabinet statement. We will set out further detail in due course.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if he will provide the itinerary for the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Sentencing, Human Rights and Technology's trip to the USA in July 2026, including the organisations visited and topics discussed.
Answered by Jake Richards - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
This trip took place to support the once-in-a-generation reforms we are making to our youth justice system. In Missouri, as part of the delegation, I visited a family court and hosted a roundtable there on legal advocacy for child offenders. I also visited two youth custody detention centres as the ‘Missouri Model’ of youth justice is recognised across the world for its high-performing rehabilitative approach. In Chicago, I hosted another roundtable on childhood criminal record reform and met with the Obama Foundation’s ‘My Brother’s Keepers Alliance’ at the Obama centre.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, with reference to the press release by the Ministry of Justice entitled Millions to be invested in next generation of legal talent, published on 2 September 2026, what steps will chambers be expected to take to increase representation in the profession.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
We are investing £1.5m to fund up to 100 additional pupillages and widen access to the legal profession. As set out in the guidance available on the Council of the Inns of Court’s website, chambers will be expected to incorporate the following measures in their recruitment process to increase representation in the profession:
Targeted outreach – activity to raise awareness of the pupillage opportunities amongst those from underrepresented groups, including lower socio-economic backgrounds. Examples of suitable targeted outreach activities include attending careers fairs or other events at universities with higher diversity representation; hosting open days/other events for under-represented groups; and mentoring aspiring barristers, including providing practice with applications and interview techniques.
Contextual Recruitment – additionally considering a candidate’s individual circumstances and experiences during the sifting process, such as their socio-economic background, caring responsibilities or experience of care.
The Equal Merit (or tie break) provision – this provision allows chambers to take a protected characteristic into consideration when deciding whom to recruit or promote where people having the protected characteristic are at a disadvantage or are under-represented in chambers. We expect chambers to apply this measure at the final stage of recruitment and only in circumstances where the candidates have been assessed as being as qualified as each other.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what legislation he plans to bring forward to give effect to the statement that the progression model will come into force on 1 October 2026; whether that legislation will amend or revoke the Sentencing Act 2026 (Commencement No. 4) Regulations 2026; and on what date he intends to lay it.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
This Government inherited a prisons system days from collapse. We had no choice but to take decisive action to stop our prisons overflowing and keep the public safe. Our landmark Sentencing Act 2026 will now deliver a more sustainable solution to the prison capacity crisis we inherited, including through the progression model, which will help ensure there are always enough places for the courts to be able to send people to custody in order to keep the public safe.
The Government carefully considered concerns raised by victims, survivors, parliamentarians and the wider public and acted on those concerns. As a result, offenders convicted of unlawful killing offence such as manslaughter, causing death by dangerous driving, as well as further historic child sex offences, will now be excluded, on top of rape and serious child sex offences. This also includes offenders convicted of offences involving the killing of an emergency worker. A full list of exclusions can be found here: Sentencing Act 2026 offence exclusions - GOV.UK.
These exclusions are in addition to the existing exclusion of more than 18,000 offenders serving more serious sentences.
The progression model amends release points for offenders serving Standard Determinate Sentences.
The date from which the progression model will apply, and the date of the first tranche of releases is 1 October 2026. Offenders released under the progression model will be controlled under strict licence conditions and can be recalled to custody where they breach those conditions or their risk can no longer be safely managed in the community.
The Government has made a commencement regulation to revoke the previous order’s commencement date for the Progression Model. Full details are set out in ‘The Sentencing Act 2026 (Commencement No. 6 and Revocation) Regulations 2026’ which is available at Legislation.gov.uk.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, whether he plans to change the content or timing of the ten tranches of prisoners to be released.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
This Government inherited a prisons system days from collapse. We had no choice but to take decisive action to stop our prisons overflowing and keep the public safe. Our landmark Sentencing Act 2026 will now deliver a more sustainable solution to the prison capacity crisis we inherited, including through the progression model, which will help ensure there are always enough places for the courts to be able to send people to custody in order to keep the public safe.
The Government carefully considered concerns raised by victims, survivors, parliamentarians and the wider public and acted on those concerns. As a result, offenders convicted of unlawful killing offence such as manslaughter, causing death by dangerous driving, as well as further historic child sex offences, will now be excluded, on top of rape and serious child sex offences. This also includes offenders convicted of offences involving the killing of an emergency worker. A full list of exclusions can be found here: Sentencing Act 2026 offence exclusions - GOV.UK.
These exclusions are in addition to the existing exclusion of more than 18,000 offenders serving more serious sentences.
The progression model amends release points for offenders serving Standard Determinate Sentences.
The date from which the progression model will apply, and the date of the first tranche of releases is 1 October 2026. Offenders released under the progression model will be controlled under strict licence conditions and can be recalled to custody where they breach those conditions or their risk can no longer be safely managed in the community.
The Government has made a commencement regulation to revoke the previous order’s commencement date for the Progression Model. Full details are set out in ‘The Sentencing Act 2026 (Commencement No. 6 and Revocation) Regulations 2026’ which is available at Legislation.gov.uk.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, whether his Department has undertaken any modelling on the projected adult prison population for each month from August 2026 to February 2028 under scenarios in which (a) the Sentencing Act 2026 is implemented as enacted, (b) the Act is implemented with the offence exclusions announced on 4 August 2026, and (c) the Act is implemented with the exclusion in toto of the section 23 early-release provisions.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
This Government inherited a prisons system days from collapse. We had no choice but to take decisive action to stop our prisons overflowing and keep the public safe.
Our landmark Sentencing Act 2026 will deliver a more sustainable solution to the prison capacity crisis we inherited, including through the progression model, which will help ensure there are always enough prison places for the courts to be able to send people to custody.
The Prime Minister’s review of the progression model carefully considered implications for prison capacity as well as concerns raised by victims, survivors, parliamentarians and the wider public.
To provide transparency, we legislated for a duty to publish an Annual Statement on prison capacity. This will be published later this year.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many victims will be sent letters advising them their perpetrator will be released from prison early as a result of the Sentencing Act 2026 following the relevant offence exclusions.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The Sentencing Act 2026 contains provisions which change the proportion of a standard determinate sentence which must be served in prison before the offender serving such a sentence is released automatically on licence. Eligible victims who have opted into the Probation Service Victim Contact Scheme, where the offender is serving a standard determinate sentence, have been informed of the commencement of the legislation.
On 30 August, the Prime Minister announced that the Government has set out plans to create more headroom in the prison system, so that we can reduce the number of people released early under these changes. This includes excluding sentences for all forms of manslaughter, death by dangerous driving, causing or allowing the death of a child and indecent assault offences from the progression model, in addition to rape and certain child sexual offences previously announced.
Sentences are now being recalculated, and, at this stage, we cannot provide figures on the number of offenders whose release dates will change and, therefore, the number of victims affected. This will continue to evolve whilst the calculations take place. Once sentence calculations have taken place, Victim Liaison Officers will write to victims, confirming if the offender in their case has a changed release date and giving them the opportunity to make representations about licence conditions.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many prisoners converted to a new religion while in prison in the past three years, broken down (a) by the ethnicity of the prisoner, and (b) the religion they were converting to and from.
Answered by Catherine McKinnell - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
To provide the information requested, it would be necessary manually to examine individual prisoner records for the period in question, to ascertain whether any changes to data collected electronically related to instances of conversion, or were made for other reasons, for example to correct a previous error. This could not be done without incurring disproportionate cost.