Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what her Department's planned timescale is for Derwentside immigration removal centre (IRC) to start holding women who are detained under immigration powers; and what the (a) certified normal accommodation and (b) operational capacity of that IRC will be.

The new Derwentside immigration removal centre (IRC) will provide modern, decent and secure accommodation for around 80 women and we expect that the IRC will start holding women who are detained under immigration powers by the end of the year.

Unlike prisons, IRCs do not operate ‘certified normal accommodation’. In order to meet operational needs and demands, we operate the immigration removal estate in a flexible manner.

The table below sets out the operational capacity for each requested immigration removal centre (if all rooms and beds are in use) on 1^st November 2021.