Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many convicted sex offenders who have breached the terms of their licence have been (a) recalled and (b) not recalled to prison in each of the last five years.

1. The number of convicted sex offenders who have been recalled to prison following breach of licence in the last five years:

1. We do not hold information centrally about the number of sex offenders in the community who may have breached their licence conditions and are not recalled to custody. To extract this data, would require a review of each separate case file to identify convicted sex offenders and then track their progress on licence.

Public protection is our top priority. Sex offenders on licence are subject to ongoing robust risk assessment and to strict licence conditions to manage that risk. They are supervised under statutory Multi Agency Public Protection Arrangements (MAPPA); under MAPPA the Police and Probation services are required to work together to manage the risks of known sexual offenders. Any offender who fails to comply with his licence conditions can be immediately returned to prison.