§ Mr. CoxTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will make a statement on the current prison education budget for prisons in England and Wales; and what was the outturn figure for 1995–96. [23289]
§ Ms QuinThe outturn figure for spend on prison education in 1995–96 was £36,956,000. That is very close to the outturn figure for 1996–97, which was £34,481,000. The Prison Service estimates that in 1997–98, it will have spent just over £36 million.
Each governor has responsibility for deciding how his or her establishment's budget should be allocated for all purposes, including education. But my right hon. Friend is aware of concerns at planned levels of education spending in some Prison Service establishments. The Government see education in prisons and Young Offender Institutions as an important part of the criminal justice strategy, and all policy priorities and spending plans are subject to the outcome of the Comprehensive Spending Review.
574WMeanwhile:
governors are being encouraged to make education provision more purposeful—targeting it specifically at achieving the overall aim of reducing re-offending;education is increasingly being provided as an integral part of a managed sentence with specific aims;there is a significant rise in the number of prisoners undertaking nationally accredited courses with clear start and finish points with the result that fewer prisoners are engaged in full-time education;alternative ways of delivering basic education are under development, such as training industrial instructional officers to teach basic skills in the workplace.