To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many prisoners were discharged from prison without permanent accommodation during the last year for which figures are available.

This information has not routinely been collected in the past, but consideration is now being given to arrangements for its regular collection in the future. A sample undertaken in the National Prison Survey 1991 then indicated that 9 per cent. of prisoners near their release date said they would become owner-occupiers on release, 40 per cent. said they would go into rented accommodation, 30 per cent. said they would live with their parents or other adult relations, 10 per cent. said they would live in a hostel or other temporary accommodation and 6 per cent. said they would have nowhere to live.