Source · Select Committees · Justice Committee
Recommendation 17
17
Deferred
Set out detailed plans for the 500 new female prison places, including modelling.
Recommendation
The Committee notes the concerns raised by witnesses that the commitment to build 500 prison places in the female estate appears at odds with the aims of the Female Offender Strategy. However, we also recognise that the 500 additional prison places have the potential to improve custodial conditions for those who are imprisoned, as well as going some way towards achieving the Strategy’s aim of making the female estate more trauma informed. We would welcome further clarity on the Government’s plans for the 500 places. The Ministry of Justice and HMPPS should set out: • A breakdown of how the 500 prison places will be used. For example, how many places will be allocated as open prison places; how many places will be allocated to replace old for new prison places and how many will be entirely new places in the closed estate; • How many old prison places in the female estate have been decommissioned since the announcement of 500 new places, and how many it anticipates will be decommissioned in the coming years; • How many new prison places have already been built, and what the timeline is for completing the construction of the remaining places; and • The modelling the MoJ and HMPPS undertook to determine that 500 places were needed. (Paragraph 102) Women in Prison 77
Government response summary AI-generated
The government accepted the recommendation but responded by detailing reforms in the draft Mental Health Bill to prevent prisons from being used as a place of safety and enable direct transfer to therapeutic settings, rather than clarifying plans for 500 new prison places.
Summary of the government's response below — read the verbatim text to verify.
Government Response
Deferred
HM Government · verbatim extract
Deferred
We accept this recommendation. The new facilities in the women’s prison estate will aim to provide 456 additional places through a mix of twelve open (25 places per unit) and six closed units (26 places per unit) across five women’s prisons: HMPs Drake Hall, Eastwood Park, Foston Hall, Send and Styal. Additional funding from NHSE will support health and wellbeing services for this new provision, working collaboratively with agencies and using a gender specific approach to health, wellbeing, and trauma informed care. The new smaller communities of accommodation are specifically designed to be trauma informed with visible aspects such as windows without bars, smaller units, better layouts and bigger association spaces. What is not included in the design, and what has been avoided, are just as important. For example, dark, narrow corridors and blind corners may trigger responses linked to sexual assault, or communal showers or areas that require undressing in front of others may trigger sexual abuse trauma. The programme is currently moderating tenders for the design and construction contract, and we expect a contractor to be onboarded by the end of October 2022. We have started the pre-planning application enquiry process and submitted these to local planning authorities in December 2021. We anticipate submitting full planning applications later this year to support our current plans for construction starting by the end of 2023. We expect the first women to be in the new facilities in early 2025. Due to the age and condition of the prison estate it is inevitable that some prison buildings will reach the end of their useable, economically viable lifespan necessitating removal from use. Since late 2020, 240 places which no longer met statutory fire safety standards have been permanently decommissioned in the women’s prison estate. The most recent prison population projections were published in November 2021 and show that the adult female population is predicted to increase to 4,300 by the end of 2026. This compares to the population of 3,195 as of July 2022. This increase is due to an additional recruitment of 20,000 police officers, the impact of courts recovering from Covid-19 and long-term sentencing trends. If the predicted increase does not occur, we have committed to using the new places as an opportunity to close down older facilities in the women’s estate.
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