HC Deb 20 July 2004 vol 424 cc223-4W
Mrs. Helen Clark

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many qualified craftsmen were employed by the Prison Service in each prison in each of the last five years; and how many of these were in the prison officer grades. [184289]

Paul Goggins

The Prison Service does not currently collect data on the qualifications held by its employees. Craftsmen are a sub-grade of industrial staff. While data are available on overall staffing levels within the industrial grades, specific data on the number of craftsmen employed are not collected centrally and could be obtained only at disproportionate cost.

Mrs. Curtis-Thomas

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how the levels of prison front-line staff have changed since 1997. [182305]

Paul Goggins

Since 1997 the number of staff in front line and delivery support functions has increased by 6164 (19 per cent.).

During this period, the Prison Service has introduced a number of measures to improve overall efficiency, including identifying a number of tasks within establishments previously undertaken by Prison Officers that can more efficiently be undertaken by Operational Support Grade staff. A programme has also been implemented to use industrial grade staff to undertake activities within works departments, which had previously been undertaken by specialist officers. As a result, Prison Officer numbers have not increased as much as overall staffing increases.

Staffing levels in the healthcare and psychology functional areas have increased at a higher rate than the growth in the prisoner population.

Mrs. Gillan

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) pursuant to the answer of 8 June 2004,Official Report, column 330W, on offender management, when decisions will be made as to how many prisons will be market-tested in the first year; and how the competitions will be structured; [184691]

(2) what criteria will be used for selecting which establishments to market test. [184692]

Paul Goggins

It has not yet been decided how many or which prisons will be market tested in the first year. Work is under way to decide how the competition will be structured and what criteria will be used to select prisons to be market tested.