Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what proportion of (a) male and (b) female offenders have been (i) engaged in and (ii) declined to engage in work programmes in custody in the latest period for which figures are available.

Work in prisons is a key priority, to ensure prisoners are engaged in real work whilst they are in custody. It also gives them the opportunity to learn skills and develop their work ethic which can increase their chances of finding employment on release, a key element to reducing reoffending.

Under our reforms to the Incentives and Earned Privileges national policy framework, which came into effect in adult prisons on 1 November 2013, prisoners are expected to engage in purposeful activity, as well as demonstrate a commitment towards their rehabilitation, reduce their risk of reoffending, behave well and help others if they are to earn privileges.

The number of prisoners working in industrial activity reported by public sector prisons increased from around 8,600 in 2010-11 (the first year for which figures are available) to around 9,900 in 2013-14. This delivered an increase in the total hours worked in industrial activities from 10.6 million hours to 14.2 million hours, as published in the National Offender Management Service Annual Report 2013-14: Management Information Addendum ( https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/prison-and-probation-trusts-performance-statistics-201314 ).

Private sector prisons have also been supporting this agenda and have reported that they delivered over 1½ million prisoner working hours in commercial and industrial workshops in 2012-13 which provided work for over 1,200 prisoners.

A breakdown of the proportion of the prison population that were working in industrial activities in male and female public sector prison establishments is set out in the table below for 2013-14, alongside the average number of prisoners working and the average population from which the proportions are calculated.

Levels of industrial activity vary between sites. This variation is influenced by a number of factors, chiefly by the category and role of the prison and the types of prisoner available to work. For example the transient nature of the prisoner population in local establishments, as well as the requirements of commercial customers, mean that this is a more challenging, and often less suitable environment into which to introduce work.

The physical capacity of prisons – primarily available space and operating environment – is an additional limiting factor. Many prisoners were built without large work shops.

These differences in capacity and capability are reflected in prison Service Level Agreements and in the performance framework; establishments with higher capacity and capability to deliver industrial activity will have higher target hours and this will carry a higher weighting in the prison rating system than for establishments with lower levels of capacity.

The regime in prisons is changing for convicted prisoners as NOMS implements the benchmark core day and the opportunities it provides to extend the working day as well as the potential to increase time in other activities including education. To support this, recreational activities will take place outside the main working part of the day.

Information on the proportion of prisoners who decline to engage with work programmes is not available centrally and could be obtained only at disproportionate cost.