Asked by: Lord Bishop of Gloucester (Bishops - Bishops)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many prisoners (1) applied for, and (2) were granted, early release on compassionate grounds in each of the past five years.
Answered by Lord Timpson - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The Secretary of State has a statutory power to grant the early release of prisoners serving a sentence or term of imprisonment in custody on compassionate grounds. The power is used in exceptional circumstances only and in accordance with the HMPPS Early Release on Compassionate Grounds Policy Framework.
The table shows the number of prisoners granted early release on compassionate grounds from 2021 to 2025. We do not centrally collate information on the number of applications for such early release.
Calendar year | Total |
2021 | 11 |
2022 | 1 |
2023 | 7 |
2024 | 6 |
2025 | 3 |
The figures from this table have been drawn from administrative IT systems which, as with any large-scale recording system, are subject to possible errors with data entry and processing.
The Policy Framework makes clear that there are no prescribed timescales for completing an application for release. However, it is imperative that applications are expedited as far as possible and that they provide all the necessary information, including medical evidence, for an informed decision to be made without delay.
Medical evidence must include a report from the prison GP and an additional report from the medical specialist involved in the care of the prisoner. These reports should provide a diagnosis, an assessment for incapacity/frailty, prognosis, treatment pathway/plan and, where applicable, a clear indication of life expectancy.
Asked by: Lord Bishop of Gloucester (Bishops - Bishops)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether a three-month prognosis is required for a prisoner to be considered for early release on compassionate grounds.
Answered by Lord Timpson - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The Secretary of State has a statutory power to grant the early release of prisoners serving a sentence or term of imprisonment in custody on compassionate grounds. The power is used in exceptional circumstances only and in accordance with the HMPPS Early Release on Compassionate Grounds Policy Framework.
The table shows the number of prisoners granted early release on compassionate grounds from 2021 to 2025. We do not centrally collate information on the number of applications for such early release.
Calendar year | Total |
2021 | 11 |
2022 | 1 |
2023 | 7 |
2024 | 6 |
2025 | 3 |
The figures from this table have been drawn from administrative IT systems which, as with any large-scale recording system, are subject to possible errors with data entry and processing.
The Policy Framework makes clear that there are no prescribed timescales for completing an application for release. However, it is imperative that applications are expedited as far as possible and that they provide all the necessary information, including medical evidence, for an informed decision to be made without delay.
Medical evidence must include a report from the prison GP and an additional report from the medical specialist involved in the care of the prisoner. These reports should provide a diagnosis, an assessment for incapacity/frailty, prognosis, treatment pathway/plan and, where applicable, a clear indication of life expectancy.
Asked by: Neil Shastri-Hurst (Conservative - Solihull West and Shirley)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, when his Department plans to publish the Prisons and Probation Ombudsman's independent review into the use of restraints on pregnant women during hospital escorts between 2021 and 2025.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
The Prisons & Probation Ombudsman will publish the report of his investigation once it has concluded. We understand that no publication date has been set at this stage.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many prison officers have been (a) investigated, (b) disciplined and (c) dismissed for illicit relationships with inmates in each year since 2020, broken down by sex.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
We only hold data on cases where staff were recommended for dismissal, as individuals may choose to resign before a dismissal can be formally enacted. As a result, we have used this field to respond to the question to avoid undercounting the number of people involved. This data can be found in the following tables.
Table 1: Band 3-5 prison officers(1) investigated(2) due to an allegation of 'Inappropriate Relationship with a Prisoner / Ex-Prisoner'
| 2019/20 | 2020/21 | 2021/22 | 2022/23 | 2023/24 | 2024/25 |
Female | 31 | 36 | 24 | 32 | 34 | 31 |
Male | 9 | 9 | 4 | 7 | 6 | 11 |
Total | 40 | 45 | 28 | 39 | 40 | 42 |
Table 2: Band 3-5 prison officers facing a conduct and discipline(3), (4)charge of 'Inappropriate Relationship with a Prisoner / Ex-Prisoner'
| 2019/20 | 2020/21 | 2021/22 | 2022/23 | 2023/24 | 2024/25 |
|
Female | 9 | ~ | ~ | 12 | 16 | 18 |
|
Male | 3 | ~ | ~ | 5 | 3 | 5 |
|
Total | 12 | 11 | 14 | 17 | 19 | 23 |
|
Table 3: Band 3-5 prison officers recommended for dismissal following a conduct and discipline(3) charge of 'Inappropriate Relationship with a Prisoner / Ex-Prisoner'
| 2019/20 | 2020/21 | 2021/22 | 2022/23 | 2023/24 | 2024/25 |
Female | ~ | ~ | ~ | ~ | ~ | ~ |
Male | ~ | ~ | ~ | ~ | ~ | ~ |
Total | 8 | ~ | ~ | 12 | 14 | ~ |
Notes to tables:
1. Band 3-5 Officers includes Bands 3-4 / Prison Officers (incl specialists), Band 4 / Supervising Officers, and Band 5 / Custodial Managers.
2. Staff subject to at least one investigation that was concluded during the relevant year.
3. Conduct and discipline cases are defined as where a penalty has been imposed on a member of HMPPS staff for a reason of conduct.
4. Staff with at least one conduct and discipline case concluded during the year. Equally staff involved in more than one case during the year are counted only once.
5. Allegations which meet a criminal threshold will be referred to the Police for investigation. If a criminal justice outcome is secured, this will result in a summary dismissal as per PSI 10/2016 Conduct and Discipline and will not be recorded against a specific ‘type’ of misconduct in the Conduct and Discipline data,
6. Years run from 1st April to 31st March.
7. In terms of the Gender data presented, the MoJ HR system holds demographic data on staff. In the HR system there is a database field called Gender. The Gender field can only be one of two options – male or female. It is filled in for all staff when new staff records are created using details to confirm identity (i.e. name, date of birth, address) from official documentation supplied by the successful job applicant. However, it is possible for this information to be updated in line with departmental policy. The Office for Statistics Regulation recognises that this is an evolving area both for society and statistics, so advice and guidance is likely to change over time.
~ denotes suppressed values of 2 or fewer or other values which would allow values of 2 or fewer to be derived by subtraction. Low numbers are suppressed to prevent disclosure in accordance with the Data Protection Act, 2018.
Additional Note:
As with all HR databases, extracts are taken at a fixed point in time, to ensure consistency of reporting. However the database itself is dynamic, and where updates to the database are made late, subsequent to the taking of the extract, these updates will not be reflected in figures produced by the extract. For this reason, HR data are unlikely to be precisely accurate.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many court interpreters have been requested for translation services in each year since 2020, broken down by the language requested.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
The Ministry of Justice publishes quarterly data on the volume of completed language interpreter and translation services requests, split by requestor type, as part of the Criminal court statistics release. However, published data is not broken down by language.
Criminal Court Statistics: Criminal court statistics - GOV.UK
The Ministry of Justice has provided a table in the attachment showing the number of completed service requests both through contracts (with thebigword Group Ltd and Clarion UK Ltd) and off-contract, for each year from 2020 to 2024, split by language. The table is a breakdown of the published figures, split by language.
Given the request for ‘court interpreters’, we have filtered the data to include criminal courts and civil & family courts. We have not included data for Tribunals or other types of Ministry of Justice interpreter usage.
Data has not been provided for 2025 as we do not yet have a complete dataset for this year.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what estimate has his Department made for capital spending on the youth secure estate for the next year.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
Budget allocation for the 2026/27 financial year within the Department has not yet been concluded and as such forecasted spend on the youth secure estate has not been committed.
Asked by: Shivani Raja (Conservative - Leicester East)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what proportion of the prison population is made up of foreign national offenders; and how many foreign national offenders have been removed from the UK in the last 12 months.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
As of 31 December 2025, Foreign National Offenders (FNOs) made up 12% of the prison population of England and Wales. This is the latest available published data and can be found at Table 1_Q_11 in the attached link: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6978d8c475d4437096552064/prison-population-31-Dec-2025.ods
The Home Office are responsible for the removal of FNOs, and their latest published data shows that between 1 February 2025 and 31 January 2026 there were 5,689 FNOs removed of which 3,044 were removed under the Early Removal Scheme. The full data can be found here: Returns from the UK between 1 December 2022 and 31 January 2026 - GOV.UK
All Foreign National Offenders who receive a prison sentence in the UK are referred for deportation at the earliest opportunity and will be barred from ever returning to the UK. Deportations of foreign national offenders including murderers and rapists are up 32%, with more than 8,700 deported since this Government came into power.
Asked by: Richard Quigley (Labour - Isle of Wight West)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what progress his Department has made on plans for the redevelopment of the former Camp Hill prison site on the Isle of Wight, including its sports facilities.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
The Ministry of Justice is currently evaluating all potential options for the site and is maintaining engagement with the local authority to explore appropriate future uses for both the site and the sports pitch once it is designated as surplus to operational requirements.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many offenders released on licence since 5 July 2024 and recalled to custody had not been returned to custody by the end of December 2025.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
The information requested could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.
Once an offender’s licence has been revoked, it falls to the Police to apprehend the offender and return them to prison custody.
Asked by: Shaun Davies (Labour - Telford)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many Crown Court Judges were assigned to Shrewsbury Crown Court on 1 March in each of the last 5 years including 2026.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
This question has been interpreted to mean the total number of salaried Crown Court Judges assigned to Shrewsbury Crown Court on 1 March and not the number that actually sat on 1 March each year. 1 March 2025 and 1 March 2026 were on a Saturday and Sunday respectively.
The number of salaried Crown Court Judges assigned to Shrewsbury Crown Court on 1 March for each of the past 5 years are as follows:
1 March 2022: In Post: 3 – Full Time Equivalent: 1.9
1 March 2023: In Post: 3 – Full Time Equivalent: 2.1
1 March 2024: In Post: 3 – Full Time Equivalent: 2.2
1 March 2025: In Post: 4 – Full Time Equivalent: 3.2
1 March 2026: In Post: 3 – Full Time Equivalent: 3