(2) what penalties apply to escort providers in cases where juveniles are delivered to young offender institutions after HM Prison Inspectorate's recommended latest delivery time of 7.00pm; and what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of these penalties.
The contracts are funded to enable contractors to escort juvenile prisoners to young offender institutions by their stated closure times. No additional funding has been provided. Other factors such as the time juvenile prisoners are finished in court and the distances they travel to their destinations can delay their arrival.
Under the terms of the contract, performance measures are incurred by contractors if they fail to deliver prisoners to those young offender institutions that have stated closure times by those times and they are unable to demonstrate that the reasons for the failure were outside their control. The stated closure times vary from establishment to establishment. An assessment of the effectiveness of the performance measures relating to the escort of juvenile prisoners will be undertaken in March 2009 as part of a general review of performance measures. If appropriate, consideration will be given to enhancing the performance measures within the existing contracts.