Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether police forces have made changes to their procedures following Operation Safeguard in the last six months.
Under a well-planned operational procedure, police forces are supporting His Majesty’s Prisons Service to respond to pressures on the adult male prison population by making a number of police cells available on a temporary basis.
Police forces retain the custody capacity needed to fight crime and keep the public safe and a key principle of Operation Safeguard is that this is not compromised. We are working closely with the National Police Chiefs’ Council, Ministry of Justice and His Majesty’s Prison Service to manage the situation and ensure that the delivery of operational services is not affected.