To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what is the minimum permitted space per prisoner.

The prison design brief for training establishments published in 1989, which will form the basis for the design of other categories of establishments, lays down the standards for new prison buildings. The brief requires an area of 6·8m² to be provided for a single-person cell with integral sanitation. The area of a cell without integral sanitation in existing establishments built to earlier standards varies.