To ask the Secretary of State for Justice what assessment he has made of any overlap between the work of probation officers and the work of drug intervention programme teams. (308217)

There is no overlap between the work of probation officers and the drug intervention programme (DIP).

Criminal Justice Integrated Teams (CJITs), which implement DP in the community, manage offenders who misuse specified class A drugs (ie heroin or crack cocaine) either pre-sentence or after they are released from prison without statutory supervision.

Offenders with drug misuse problems who are sentenced to a community order with drug rehabilitation requirements (DRRs) or who are released from prison on licence are managed by probation staff.

Where an offender who misuses specified class A drugs is sentenced to a community order without DRRs, probation staff work in partnership with CJITs to address their drug misuse needs.

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice how many staff are employed as part of the Interventions and Substance Misuse Group within the National Offender Management System; and how many were so employed in June 2008. (308219)

The following table shows the number of staff in post and what this equates to in terms of full-time equivalents for the two months specified.

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice what (a) assessment has been made of the merits and (b) estimate has been made of the costs per prisoner of places in dedicated drug treatment prisons. (308220)

The National Offender Management Service has a comprehensive drug treatment framework, based on the National Treatment Agency’s revised models of care, to address the different needs of drug-misusers in prison. The interventions available are designed to meet the needs of low, moderate and severe drug misusers, irrespective of age, gender or ethnicity. Core elements of the framework are available in all adult prisons across England and Wales. Higher intensity services are available in selected sites according to the drug treatment needs of offenders.

Given the large numbers entering prisons with a history of drug misuse and the range of problems that they face, we have not considered it appropriate formally to assess the merits of dedicated drug treatment prisons. However, where prisoners are assessed as suitable for high intensity drug interventions such as therapeutic communities or the 12-step programme every effort is made to move them to an establishment offering that programme.

As no formal assessment has taken place, we have not estimated the cost of places in dedicated drug treatment prisons. However, average costs in 2008-09 indicate that the additional cost of places on prison-based accredited drug treatment programmes (eg 12-step, Therapeutic Communities) can range from £1,200 to £7,200. Variations in cost are dependent upon the mix of staff delivering the programme and its length/intensity.