§ Ms RuddockTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what is the cost of the contract with Group 4 covering court escort duties in Humberside and east midlands over five years; and if he will set out the cost of this service for the previous five years.
§ Mr. Peter LloydResponsibility for this matter has been delegated to the Director General of the Prison Service who has been asked to arrange for a reply to be given.
Letter from Philippa Drew to Ms Joan Ruddock, dated July 1993:
The Home Secretary has asked me in the temporary absence of Mr. Lewis, the Director General, to reply to your recent Question asking about the cost of the contract with Group 4 covering court escort and custody duties in Humberside and East Midlands over five years; and the cost of this service for the previous five years.I am not sure that I can add substantively to Mr. Dunbar's letter of 4 May to you in response to a Question from you covering similar ground [Official Report 5 May, columns 75–76, copy attached].The information in that letter was collected as a result of special survey work to separately identify time spent on court escort and custody duties by police and prison officers in the area, which was then costed. Information on the cost of the court escort and custody service is not routinely collected by either the police or the Prison Service, and would have varied over the previous 5 years with the size of the task. This in turn would have varied with the number of persons brought in custody before the courts for first appearance; the prison population and prison catchment areas; and changes in numbers and locations of court rooms and police stations. Similarly, the costs under the contract will vary over the coming 5 years as the size of the task varies. I am confident, however, that the figures given in Mr. Dunbar's letter represent a genuine comparison between the costs of the current service and the pre-existing one.