Recommendation 22

Given its poor experience of developing bespoke technology in its transformation programme, HMPPS told us that it was “very cautious” about commissioning further novel solutions. For example, while tags which monitor multiple drugs at the same time are currently unavailable on the market, it wanted to explore advances in drug testing and how this could be applied in the criminal justice system. HMPPS told us that it had created an £18.5 million innovation fund to explore how the market may be able to help develop tagging services in the future, including possible drug monitoring. In the meantime, it explained that it had started piloting tagging for other groups including domestic abuse perpetrators. It planned to roll out the use of GPS devices for high-risk domestic abuse offenders in 2023.42 Re-procuring contracts