Oral Answers to Questions

Robert Courts Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gauke]

The hon. Lady raises an important and sensitive point, and I would be happy to meet her to discuss the issue.

[Robert Courts (Witney) (Con)]

Education is at the very heart of rehabilitation. What are Ministers doing to ensure that people have access to education and the jobs they need when they leave prison?

[Rory Stewart]

The big change that has been introduced by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State is to ensure that education in prison is linked to employment. This involves talking to the local job market, ensuring that we provide the skills that match that market and, above all, ensuring that we have safe, decent prisons so that we can remove the prisoners from their cells and into work and education so that we can get them into jobs. That reduces reoffending by an average of 7%.