To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many (a) non-British EU nationals and (b) non-EU foreign nationals are held in prisons in England and Wales, broken down by their country of origin. (79775)

Information on the nationality of foreign nationals held in prison establishments in England and Wales is given in the population in custody detailed table 2.14 of Offender Management Caseload Statistics Quarterly Brief October to December 2005, available at the following web address:

http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/omcs.html

These figures have been drawn from administrative IT systems. Although care is taken when processing and analysing the returns, the detail collected is subject to the inaccuracies inherent in any large scale recording system, and so is not necessarily accurate to the last whole number.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many of the foreign nationals detained at (a) Highdown and (b) Downview prisons on 1 July 2005 had been released by 1 April 2006; and how many of those released have subsequently been deported. (84102)

[holding answer 12 July 2006]: Information on discharges is not available in the detail the hon. Gentleman requests.