Recommendations & Conclusions
6 items
2
Recommendation
Fifty-Second Report - Key challenges fa…
Not Addressed
The pandemic has significantly impacted the wellbeing and life chances of prisoners, making it critical that the Ministry and HMPPS accelerate their work to improve the mental health of prisoners. The need for restrictive regimes to maintain social distancing in prisons during the pandemic has exacerbated the existing mental health …
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The pandemic has significantly impacted the wellbeing and life chances of prisoners, making it critical that the Ministry and HMPPS accelerate their work to improve the mental health of prisoners. The need for restrictive regimes to maintain social distancing in prisons during the pandemic has exacerbated the existing mental health challenges that prisoners face. In 2019–20, the incidents of self-harm in prisons remained high, particularly in the female prisoner population. We welcome HMPPS’ work to specifically address the issues facing female prisoners, including maintaining family contact and one-to-one counselling support. It is vital that HMPPS continues to learn lessons from how it manages the impact of the pandemic on prisoner wellbeing and that it sustains this work in the long term. We are encouraged by HMPPS’s commitment to improve its work with others, including the Samaritans and CLINKS. Recommendation: In its Treasury Minute response to this report, the Ministry and HMPPS should set out what progress they have made with the initiatives they put in place to support prisoner mental health since the beginning of the pandemic and the impact this has had on those in prison.
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Government response AI summary
The government's response is irrelevant to the recommendation, discussing DHSC and NHS Digital's identification of vulnerable people and health data strategy, rather than progress on prisoner mental health initiatives by the Ministry of Justice and HMPPS.
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HM Treasury
3
Recommendation
Fifty-Second Report - Key challenges fa…
Not Addressed
We have limited confidence in the Ministry’s plans for reducing the backlog in the court system, particularly in criminal courts. The backlog in criminal courts was growing before the pandemic, and many organisations have warned that it could take years to clear the backlog. But the Ministry and HMCT could …
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We have limited confidence in the Ministry’s plans for reducing the backlog in the court system, particularly in criminal courts. The backlog in criminal courts was growing before the pandemic, and many organisations have warned that it could take years to clear the backlog. But the Ministry and HMCT could not tell us what level of outstanding caseload is, in their view, acceptable. It is therefore not clear to us what the Ministry is aiming for in its plans to reduce the backlog. What is abundantly clear is the impact that delaying access to justice has on victims and witnesses, who in some cases find themselves waiting years to access justice. There is a risk that the Ministry is overly relying on the potential of technology 6 Key challenges facing the Ministry of Justice to manage the increased demand in the court system, without yet having a clear understanding of how the rapid expansion of remote justice impacts on court users or justice outcomes. Recommendation: The Ministry should write to the Committee within one month to set out its plan, including clear projections and timeframes, to reduce the backlog in the court system, particularly in criminal courts where the backlog is most acute.
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Government response AI summary
The government's response is irrelevant to the recommendation, discussing NHS Digital and DHSC's analysis of local variation in the Shielded Patient List rather than the Ministry's plan to reduce court backlogs.
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HM Treasury
4
Recommendation
Fifty-Second Report - Key challenges fa…
Not Addressed
Despite previous warnings, the Ministry and HMCTS do not yet have a firm grip on the data they need to understand how effective the court reform programme is or its impact on users. Despite past delays, the Ministry says that the court reform programme was on track to deliver to …
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Despite previous warnings, the Ministry and HMCTS do not yet have a firm grip on the data they need to understand how effective the court reform programme is or its impact on users. Despite past delays, the Ministry says that the court reform programme was on track to deliver to its revised timescale. The pandemic accelerated plans to introduce more video hearings, and it says that delays to other areas of the reform programme are within planned contingencies. The Ministry recognises that collecting the right data consistently is key to understanding whether its reforms are working and how they are impacting users in the justice system. It has plans to publish the data it has collected on the impact of remote hearings, but we are disappointed that it does not yet have a better handle on what data it needs to assess the success of the court reform programme. This is particularly worrying given our past recommendations and those published in the 2019 Digital Justice Report the Ministry itself commissioned. The Ministry accepted all the recommendations, but it appears not to have made any tangible progress. Recommendation: In its Treasury Minute response, the Ministry should explain how it is managing the impact of the pandemic on the court reform programme, including its plans to respond to the recommendations set out in the 2019 Digital Justice report.
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Government response AI summary
The government response discusses shielding support for clinically extremely vulnerable individuals and the role of local councils, failing entirely to address the recommendation regarding the court reform programme and the Digital Justice report.
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HM Treasury
6
Recommendation
Fifty-Second Report - Key challenges fa…
Not Addressed
Despite the efforts of staff during the pandemic, there are clear signs of strain on people working across courts and tribunals, prisons and probation services. We remain concerned about the unprecedented pressures facing frontline staff at this time. HMPPS says that probation officer caseloads are high but manageable, and that …
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Despite the efforts of staff during the pandemic, there are clear signs of strain on people working across courts and tribunals, prisons and probation services. We remain concerned about the unprecedented pressures facing frontline staff at this time. HMPPS says that probation officer caseloads are high but manageable, and that it is seeking to address high and unbalanced caseloads for probation officers as part of the unification of probation services in June 2021. HMPPS also says that managing prison staff absences during the pandemic has been a big challenge, though at the time of our evidence session, 10% of prison staff were absent, and more staff are returning to work. We welcome the news that HMPPS has pressed on with recruiting new prison officers, particularly given the expected increase in the number of prisoners as government recruits 20,000 new police officers. Recommendation: The Ministry, HMCTS and HMPPS should identify and agree with relevant professional bodies specific actions to support staff working across the system to manage the strain of pandemic recovery efforts, and how it will monitor and support staff through to the end of the pandemic. 8 Key challenges facing the Ministry of Justice 1 Recovering from the pandemic
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Government response AI summary
The government response is boilerplate text about the Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund and does not address the recommendation to identify and agree specific actions with professional bodies to support staff managing pandemic recovery strain.
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HM Treasury
1
Conclusion
Fifty-Second Report - Key challenges fa…
Not Addressed
We took evidence from the Ministry of Justice (the Ministry) and its executive agencies, HM Courts & Tribunals Service (HMCTS) and HM Prisons and Probation Service (HMPPS) on the challenges facing the justice system, including courts, prisons and probation services.
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We took evidence from the Ministry of Justice (the Ministry) and its executive agencies, HM Courts & Tribunals Service (HMCTS) and HM Prisons and Probation Service (HMPPS) on the challenges facing the justice system, including courts, prisons and probation services.
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Government response AI summary
The government response provides a general introduction to the committee report and its own response, reiterating the context of the committee's inquiry and the challenges faced by the justice system due to the pandemic.
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HM Treasury
18
Conclusion
Fifty-Second Report - Key challenges fa…
HMPPS assured us that as the programme to reunify probation services was on scheduled to complete in June 2021. It told us that it was consistently monitoring the caseloads of probations officers but that these remain high. HMPPS told us it had committed £155 million to improving IT systems to …
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HMPPS assured us that as the programme to reunify probation services was on scheduled to complete in June 2021. It told us that it was consistently monitoring the caseloads of probations officers but that these remain high. HMPPS told us it had committed £155 million to improving IT systems to help probation officers do their jobs more efficiently and to recruit more staff.28 21 Public Accounts Committee, Improving the prison estate, Fifteenth Report of Session 2019–21, HC 244, 11 September 2020 22 Qq 66–69 23 The Bar Council submission, para 10 24 Q 4, 35, 38–40 25 Qq 4, 35 26 Qq 35–37 27 Q 4 28 Qq 53–57 Key challenges facing the Ministry of Justice 13
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HM Treasury