Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what recent assessment he has made of the potential merits of community sentences for female offenders as an alternative to short custodial prison sentences.

Sentencing is a matter for the judiciary in individual cases. In line with the Government’s Female Offender Strategy, we want fewer women serving short sentences and more managed effectively in the community successfully. Community sentences offer the opportunity to support women to address the underlying causes of offending behaviour, and to secure and maintain stable accommodation. In addition, disruption to families is significantly less, reducing the risk of intergenerational offending.

To support community provision, in May 2021 we announced £46 million probation funding over three years for services for women coming out of prison or serving community sentences and have invested £9.5m in the women’s community sector since 2018. We also have several initiatives underway that are looking to encourage use of robust community sentences as an alternative to custody for women, including Problem Solving Courts, Community Sentence Treatment Requirements, Electronic Monitoring and a Pre-Sentence Report pilot.