Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, pursuant to the Answer of 12 June 2020 to Question 54062, on Prisoners' Release: Coronavirus, how many and what proportion of prison-leavers released without an address to go to were from BAME backgrounds.

We are working closely across Government to ensure that all individuals released at risk of homelessness receive necessary support to help them secure somewhere to live.

As a result of the pandemic, we have secured up to £8.5 million to support individuals at risk of homelessness on their release from prison for up to eight weeks and help to move on into permanent accommodation. This scheme was originally due to run until 26 June; however, we have recently undertaken our first review and, following this, have extended the scheme until 31 July.

Of the 7,814 offenders released between 23 March-30 April 2020, 5,892 (75%) were from white backgrounds, 1,521 (19%) were from BAME backgrounds and the ethnic background of 401 offenders (5%) is unknown.

Of the 7,814 offenders released, 1,014 were described as homeless (total of rough sleeping and ‘other homeless’ combined). Of these 1,014 offenders, 174 (17%) were from BAME backgrounds, 804 (79%) were from white backgrounds and the ethnic background of 36 (4%) homeless offenders is unknown.

Please note, ‘other homeless’ refers to individuals who identify as homeless but have not been identified as sleeping rough. In some cases, it is not recorded whether an individual that is identified as homeless is rough sleeping.

The table below provides the number of offenders released from custody by accommodation circumstance on the first night. The data covers the period 23 March- 30 April 2020 and is broken down by region.

# Denotes values less than 4, or secondary suppression (suppressed to avoid disclosure).

Regions correspond to National Probation Service division boundaries at the end of March but also include Community Rehabilitation Company managed offenders.

*Young adults are offenders between 18 and 24

** Other male and females are offenders 25 and over

*** “Other homeless” refers to individuals who identify as homeless but have not been identified as sleeping rough. In some cases, it is not recorded whether an individual that is identified as homeless is rough sleeping

Please note, offenders not managed by either the National Probation Service or a Community Rehabilitation Company (including those offenders subject to electronic monitoring) are not included in the dataset. Release on temporary licence (RoTL), End of Custody Temporary Release (ECTR), releases where the offender is subject to same-day recall to custody, and release from unsupervised short sentences are also not included.