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Prisons: Drugs

Volume 504: debated on Thursday 28 January 2010

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice how many (a) visitors, (b) staff and (c) prisoners were caught attempting to smuggle illegal drugs into each prison in England in each of the last five years; and what steps have been taken in respect of those so caught. (303548)

The data are not available in the form requested.

It is the National Offender Management Services' policy to report to the police all incidents where drugs are found in the possession of visitors. National data for the number of visitors arrested is given in the following table.

Number of visitors arrested1

2004-05

439

2005-06

429

2006-07

374

2007-08

424

2008-09

460

1 These figures include all incidents, the majority will be drug related.

Note:

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. The data are not subject to audit. To disaggregate into individual prison data would require an investigation into each regional return for the past five years and would be at disproportionate cost.

Prisons often take action against visitors based on suspicion, and before they are caught in possession of drugs, including visit bans, closed visits or closely supervised visits.

Data on the number of prison officers caught attempting to smuggle illegal drugs into an establishment are held locally and could, only be obtained by consulting all prisons across England and Wales. This would incur disproportionate cost.

Prisoners caught attempting to smuggle illegal drugs into prison are referred, to the police. Data on the number of prisoners caught attempting to smuggle illegal drugs into an establishment are held locally and could be obtained only by consulting all prisons across England and Wales. This would incur disproportionate cost.