§ Mrs. Curtis-ThomasTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how he intends to improve the information received by magistrates regarding prison alternatives. [182286]
§ Paul GogginsThe National Probation Service has put in place a number of measures to improve the information provided to magistrates on prison alternatives. These include the provision of: a sentencer communications strategy and a sentencer liaison officer in all areas; national and local information about the work of the service; leaflets about the content of successful schemes and programmes attached to pre-sentence reports; and videos on the content of community interventions and the 'what works' initiative.
As the new National Offender Management Service is taken forward we intend to strengthen the liaison arrangements between sentencers and the prison and probation services.
The new Sentencing Guidelines Council will also have a role in providing information to sentencers, for example about sentencing patterns, which will inform discussions at a local level. The council will have key role in re-balancing the system to make better use of resources. In framing sentencing guidelines, the council must, among other things, take account of the cost of different sentences and their relative effectiveness in preventing re-offending. One of its earliest priorities is to produce a guideline on the new generic community sentence.