Written questions by Obese-Jecty.

With reference to page 25 of the National Security Strategy 2025, published on 24 June 2025, if she will take legislative steps to introduce a new offence for (a) acts preparatory to extreme violence and (b) individuals identified as violence fixated.

As mentioned in the National Security Strategy 2025, the Government accepts and strongly supports the Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation’s (IRTL) recommendation to consider creating a new offence to capture individuals intending to kill multiple people and planning for such attacks.As recognised by the IRTL, this is a complex area of law and will require working through difficult legal and ethical issues to avoid unintended consequences. We are considering carefully the best way to close the gap in the legislation.The Government is also working at pace to understand the causal factors and adequacy of public policy interventions to address the risk posed by individuals fascinated with extreme violence and/or mass casualty attacks, but who do not meet the terrorism threshold.

What progress she has made on the Rapid Deployment Cells project.

As outlined in the December 2024 10-Year Prison Capacity Strategy, this Government is committed to delivering an additional 14,000 prison places through the 20,000 prison places programmes.The Rapid Deployment Cells Programme is a key part of our strategy to increase prison capacity and reduce pressure on the existing prison estate. Based on current plans, the programme will deliver approximately 1,800 places. As of September 2025, the project has installed 828 Rapid Deployment Cells across 16 sites.

How many prison officers require stab vests due to the danger of the prisoners in their charge.

The previous Lord Chancellor announced in June the mandatory use of Protective Body Armour (PBA – also known as stab vests), for staff in specialist units, which includes Close Supervision Centres, Separation Centres and Segregation Units in the Long-Term High Security Estate. Following this announcement, 750 vests have been ordered.PBA is available for use when deemed necessary in prisons, including:Operational Response and Resilience Unit staff who wear protective body armour when deployed. This includes the National Tactical Response Group and the National Dog and Tactical Support Group staff.Staff mobilised under ‘Operation Tornado’, a national mutual aid plan by which prisons support one another in the event of a serious incident or occurrence requiring a reinforcement of staff, are issued with PBA as part of their personal protective equipment.Prison Officers are required to wear PBA, along with other Personal Protective Equipment, when they engage in the planned use of force or where safe systems of work for the management of high-risk prisoners dictates.

What recent progress she has made on the electronic monitoring expansion programme.

The Electronic Monitoring Expansion programme was set up to expand the impact, use and efficiency of electronic monitoring (EM) as a tool for managing offenders in the community. All expansion initiatives to deliver new EM-related services have been delivered. The remaining project, to successfully transition delivery of the service to new suppliers (Serco and Allied Universal), is nearing completion with the majority of cases now transitioned to the new systems. Migration of the remaining cohort is underway and expected to complete in Autumn 2025.The EM expansion programme has funded evaluations into electronic monitoring and its pilots and has since published 6 research reports. An impact evaluation of the acquisitive crime pilot was published on 28 August 2025, and demonstrated offenders electronically monitored as part of the pilot were 20% less likely to reoffend within 12 months of release from prison. An impact evaluation of Radio Frequency EM as part of a community order found that adult offenders were significantly less likely to be reconvicted of another offence whilst being electronically monitored.

How many of the 14,000 additional prison places will be delivered through the Rapid Deployment Cells project.

As outlined in the December 2024 10-Year Prison Capacity Strategy, this Government is committed to delivering an additional 14,000 prison places through the 20,000 prison places programmes.The Rapid Deployment Cells Programme is a key part of our strategy to increase prison capacity and reduce pressure on the existing prison estate. Based on current plans, the programme will deliver approximately 1,800 places. As of September 2025, the project has installed 828 Rapid Deployment Cells across 16 sites.

What stab vests are issued to prison officers.

Protective body armour (PBA) is currently issued in the following circumstances:Operational Response and Resilience Unit staff wear PBA when deployed. Where necessary, ballistic protection may be required.Operation Tornado mobilised staff are issued PBA as part of their PPE.Prison Officers are required to wear PBA during planned use of force or when managing high-risk prisoners.Following a violent attack at HMP Frankland in April 2025, the Ministry of Justice conducted a snap review. As a result, rollout of PBA was announced for officers working in:Close Supervision CentresSeparation CentresSegregation Units within the high-security estateThe rollout is ongoing and includes individual fitting to ensure maximum protection.All body armour conforms to the Home Office 2017 standards and all versions have knife and spike resistant protection.

What recent progress she has made on the Small Secure Houseblocks programme.

The Government’s commitment is to deliver 14,000 additional prison places, by 2031, as set out in the 2024 Prison Capacity Strategy. Since July 2024, we have already delivered c.2,500 additional prison places.The Small Secure Houseblocks (SSH) Programme is a key component of our plans to increase capacity. Based on current plans, this programme will deliver c.1,000 new Category C places across the estate. The design stage of the SSH programme is now complete and main construction work is underway.

Pursuant to the Answer of 2 June 2025 to Question 53712 on Prisons: Construction, how many Category A prison places she plans to be built as part of the Prison Capacity Strategy.

This Government will get the prison places built that the previous Government failed to deliver or fund. We are delivering 14,000 additional prison places and aim to do so by 2031, as set out in the 10-Year Prison Capacity Strategy. This consists of the construction of four new prisons, including the recently delivered HMP Millsike, as well as the expansion and refurbishment of the existing estate and temporary accommodation. These places are all within the Category B, Category C, and Category D estates, where the greatest level of demand is projected.

How many (a) Category A, (b) Category B, (c) Category C and (d) Category D prison spaces her Department plans to build by 2031 as part of the Prison Capacity Strategy.

The prison population has nearly doubled in the past three decades, with just 500 extra prison places added in the last 14 years. To put an end to this crisis, the Government confirmed plans to invest £4.7 billion more in prison building, putting the Government on track to open 14,000 places by 2031. This is the largest prison expansion programme since the Victorians. Since July 2024, 2,400 places have already been opened.As set out in the 10-Year Prison Capacity Strategy, we are committed to delivering the remaining 14,000 places of the 20,000 prison place programmes and aim to do so by 2031. Around 8,500 of these places have been delivered through three new Category C prisons, hundreds of rapid deployment cells, essential refurbishments and modern houseblocks.We plan to deliver three more new prisons; these include a new prison in Leicestershire which will add c.1,700 places to the Category B estate, a new prison in Buckinghamshire that will add c.1,500 places to the Category C estate and a new prison in Lancashire that will add c.1,700 places to the Category C estate.We also plan to deliver additional places through the expansion and refurbishment of the existing estate and temporary accommodation. These places will add c.1,750 places to the Category B estate, c.4,200 places to the Category C estate, c.1,550 places to the Category D estate.

How many prison spaces were available across all Category C specialist sex offender prisons as of 30 April 2025.

There are 9 specialist category C prisons that hold only prisoners convicted of sexual offences. These are listed below, alongside their published operational capacity on 28 April 2025.PrisonOperational Capacity (28 April 2025)Ashfield416Bure643Littlehey1241Risley1034Rye Hill1008Stafford761The Verne608Usk276Whatton836

How many prison spaces are (a) available and (b) projected to be available at HMP Littlehey over the next three years; and what the maximum capacity is at that prison.

The operational capacity of each prison is published monthly at Prison population: monthly prison figures 2025 - GOV.UK. The current operational capacity of Littlehey is 1241, and there are currently no plans to change this.

How many staff in her Department have been issued with a (a) laptop, (b) phone and (c) both.

Please find the figures for the number of phones, laptops and both issued by the Department. Please note this data does not include missing devices: Laptop Phone Both MOJ 9995120097338HMCTS 1576363205435HMPPS 347073148523759ALBs 629634052535 The Ministry of Justice is a large operational department with over 90,000 employees. The laptops and phones issued are always encrypted.

What assessment she has made of the potential merits of updating the Sexual Offences Act 2003 to reflect that rape can be committed by either sex.

The offence of rape under section 1 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 is committed whenever there is penile penetration without consent or reasonable belief in consent. Non-penile penetration without consent or reasonable belief in consent is criminalised by the offence of assault by penetration under Section 2 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003.The law in this area is rightly robust, well-understood and working effectively. We therefore have no plans to amend the legal definition of rape.

How many prison places are required to end early prisoner release schemes.

In July 2024, the Lord Chancellor announced a change to the automatic release point for those serving eligible Standard Determinate Sentences (SDS) from 50% to 40%. SDS40 is a necessary measure to avoid prison capacity pressures causing gridlock in the Criminal Justice System. Whilst the SDS change provided the intended medium-term relief to the system, this is not intended to be a long-term solution. To ensure we are never in a position where we run out of prison places again, the Lord Chancellor announced the Independent Review into Sentencing, alongside a series of prison capacity measures. This included reforming our recall practices to target the unsustainable growth in the recall population since the pandemic and an extension of the maximum period offenders can spend on Home Detention Curfew from 6 to12 months. We also recently published our 10-year capacity strategy which sets out our ambition to build 14,000 prison places by 2031. This includes our new prison of nearly 1,500 prison places at HMP Millsike, which received its first prisoners this week.The Independent Sentencing Review published its Part 1 report on 18 February. The Review’s final report is expected to be published in the spring of this year and will set out the immediate and longer-term recommendations for reform. As the Lord Chancellor has previously announced, the SDS40 policy will be reviewed after 18 months.

How many religious conversions of prisoners have taken place in 2024-25; and to which religions.

While we collate details of religious affiliation recorded when prisoners enter custody, in order to establish the number of conversions, we would need to undertake a search of individual records, and this could not be done without incurring disproportionate cost.

How many new prisons are planned to be completed by July 2029.

In the recently published 10-Year Prison Capacity Strategy the Lord Chancellor has committed to delivering three new prisons, one in Leicestershire (next to HMP Gartree), one in Buckinghamshire (next to HMPs Grendon and Springhill) and one in Lancashire (next to HMPs Garth and Wymott).We aim to deliver these places by the end of 2031. This is in addition to the three new prisons that have already been delivered as part of the 20,000 prison place programmes to date; HMP Five Wells, HMP Fosse Way and HMP Millsike, which was officially opened on 27 March 2025.

How many (a) phones, (b) laptops and (c) other electronic devices have been lost by their Department since 5 July 2024.

The figures for the number of phones, laptops and other electronic devices lost by the Department since 5 July 2024 are as follows:LaptopsPhonesOther Hardware515322153Lost devices constitute to devices that are misplaced and cannot be found by the user.

Pursuant to the Answer of 24 March 2025 to Question 40749 on Human Trafficking: Children, what steps she is taking to improve the accuracy of recording the number of child victims of human trafficking.

The Ministry of Justice publishes criminal court outcomes against offences as defined in legislation, including offences where the age of victims is recorded only if that is part of the specific offence wording.The Department does not capture or hold the information on victim age within court record management system more generally, because there is no operational business need to do so.Information on victim age may be held and recorded earlier in the criminal justice process by partners such as the police and the Crown Prosecution Service.

Pursuant to the Answer of 27 March 2025 to Question 40749 Human Trafficking: Children, what steps she is taking to enable victim age to be recorded in the Court Proceedings Database.

The Ministry of Justice publishes criminal court outcomes against offences as defined in legislation, including offences where the age of victims is recorded only if that is part of the specific offence wording.The Department does not capture or hold the information on victim age within court record management system more generally, because there is no operational business need to do so.Information on victim age may be held and recorded earlier in the criminal justice process by partners such as the police and the Crown Prosecution Service.

How many people have been convicted of child trafficking by (a) nationality and (b) arresting police force in each year since 2010.

The Ministry of Justice publishes data on convictions for a wide range of offences, including human trafficking up to and including June 2024 in the Outcomes by Offences data tool, that can be downloaded from the Criminal Justice Statistics landing page here: Criminal justice statistics - GOV.UK.These include all human trafficking offences convicted, not just those against children. It is not possible to separately identify all such convictions that relate to children as the information on the victim age is not recorded in the Court Proceedings Database held by the Ministry of Justice.Data held centrally does not include the nationality of the offender. The police force recorded in the Court Proceedings Database relates to the police force area associated with the court where the case was heard and not the arresting police force. The arresting police force is not held centrally in the Court Proceedings Database.