asked Her Majesty's Government:

What plans they have to improve systems for the booking of visits to prisoners by family members, with particular regard to booking at the prison, on-line or by telephone. [HL853]

The Prison Service, which holds responsibility for these matters on behalf of NOMS, is aware of the difficulties many visitors experience when trying to book visits. The procedures and resources for booking visits are at the discretion of governors and directors in each prison.

The Prison Service has been pursuing improvements to visits booking and is currently examining alternative options such as using a shared service centre to take calls. In 2006, guidelines were sent to all establishments setting out practical ways of improving visits booking including booking at the prison. An IT package, as well as facilities to book by e-mail have also been made available to public sector prisons to streamline the process and ease pressure on the telephone booking lines.

In addition, in September 2007 the Prison Service published a revised policy about visits, which introduced a mandatory requirement for all governors and directors to ensure that any system for visits booking is efficient. In future this will be monitored through the relevant performance standard on visits.