Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many prison libraries have been operating across the prison estate in each year since 2005; and what percentage of the prison population has had access to a prison library service in each year since 2005.

All prisons are required to have a library and prisoners are routinely offered a minimum of 30 minutes library access a week. We do not currently collect data on prisoner attendance and engagement with the library.

All prisons also offer literacy education as part of their core curriculum. Most education services are outsourced to education specialists (for example Further Education Colleges) and supplemented by bespoke partnership arrangements with third sector organisations who support the teaching of reading. HMPPS are also working to embed literacy skills in workshops and vocational training.

Reliable data from 2005-19 is not available due to changes in the way education provision has been contracted and provided although, since 2019, all prisoners have been screened for literacy, numeracy and Learning Difficulties and Disabilities (LDD) on entry. Prisons provide a range of support according to the needs of the individual and our main education providers are required to put in place provision for prisoners with additional learning needs such as dyslexia.

This table sets out the number of prisoners participating in English functional skills, taking English assessments and prisoners identified as likely to have LDD since 2019 under the current MoJ commissioned contracts. 2020-22 participation figures have been impacted by the reduction in classroom learning during the pandemic, but we are now building back to pre-pandemic levels of learning. Statistics for 2022-23 will be published later this year. Due to the dynamic nature of the prison population, it is also not possible to provide a percentage proportion of prisoners participating.

[1] Levels of learning during April 2020-March 2022 were greatly impacted by the reduction in classroom learning necessary for mitigating the health impacts of the Covid pandemic