HC Deb 15 November 2000 vol 356 cc702-3W
Mr. Wigley

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will list for each prison which is managed by the private sector, the number of(a) prisoners and (b) full-time and part-time equivalent staff at the most recent date for which figures are available, indicating the total annual saving to public funds resulting from the use of private sector operated prisons. [138196]

Mr. Boateng

The number of prisoners and full-time and full-time equivalent staff at private sector prisons is shown in the table.

Prison Prisoners at 13 November 2000 Staff
Wolds 398 262
Blakenhurst 836 315
Doncaster 1,050 618
Parc 841 350.5
Altcourse 795 526
Lowdham Grange 513 254.3
Ashfield 366 253
Forest Bank 706 339.5

The comparative costs of the non-Public Finance Initiative (PFI) private sector prisons (Wolds, Blakenhurst and Doncaster) and their closest public sector counterparts have been reviewed annually. In the most recent report for 1998–99, private sector prisons offered on average a saving of 13 per cent. in terms of cost per prisoner but little or no saving when cost per baseline and in-use places were compared. The contractual Net Present Value (NPV) of the PH prisons assessed against their public sector comparator (PSC) is shown in the table.

Prison NPV(£ million) PSC(£ million) saving (per cent.)
Parc 266 319 17
Altcourse 247 248 less than 1
Lowdham Grange 127 157 19
Ashfield 122 141 14
Forest Bank 204.5 234.5 13
Rye Hill 154 209 26
Dovegate 241 292 18

Work is under way a view to establishing a methodology for comparing the costs of PFI prisons with comparable public sector counterparts.

Forward to