To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many women are in prison for drug offences; how many were in prison for drug offences in 1997; and if he will make a statement. (126435)

At the end of January 2007 there were 1,241 women held in prison in England and Wales for drugs offences. On 30 June 1997 the number was 815.

These figures have been drawn from administrative data 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.