The HM Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) COVID-19 statistics provides monthly data on the HMPPS response to COVID-19. It addresses confirmed cases of the virus in prisons and the Youth Custody Service sites, deaths of those individuals in the care of HMPPS and mitigating action being taken to limit the spread of the virus and save lives.

Data includes:

• Deaths where prisoners, children in custody or supervised individuals have died having tested positive for COVID-19 or where there was a clinical assessment that COVID-19 was a contributory factor in their death.

• Confirmed COVID-19 cases in prisoners and children in custody (i.e. positive tests).

• Narrative on capacity management data for prisons.

Pre-release access

The bulletin was produced and handled by the ministry’s analytical professionals and production staff. For the bulletin pre-release access of up to 24 hours is granted to the following persons:

Ministry of Justice:

Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice; Minister of State for Prisons and Probation; Permanent Secretary; Private Secretaries (x6); Deputy Director of Data and Evidence as a Service and Head of Profession, Statistics; Director General for Policy and Strategy Group; Deputy Director Joint COVID 19 Strategic Policy Unit; Head of News; Deputy Head of News and relevant press officers (x2)

HM Prison and Probation Service:

Chief Executive Officer; Private Secretary - Chief Executive Officer; Director General Operations; Director General Chief Executive Officer; Deputy Director of COVID-19 HMPPS Response; Deputy Director Joint COVID 19 Strategic Policy Unit

Related links

Update on COVID-19 in prisons

Prison estate expanded to protect NHS from coronavirus risk

Measures announced to protect NHS from coronavirus risk in prisons

Data include COVID-19 related deaths and confirmed cases of COVID-19 in custodial settings among service users.

Pre-release access

The bulletin was produced and handled by the ministry’s analytical professionals and production staff. For the bulletin pre-release access of up to 24 hours is granted to the following persons:

Ministry of Justice:

Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice; Minister of State for Prisons and Probation; Permanent Secretary; Minister and Permanent Secretary Private Secretaries (x2); Special Advisors (x2); Director General for Policy and Strategy Group; Deputy Director, Prison and Probation Operational Analysis; Acting Head of Profession, Statistics; Head of Operational Analysis; Head of News; Deputy Head of News and relevant press officer.

HM Prison and Probation Service:

Chief Executive Officer; Director General Prisons; Chief Executive and Director General Private Secretaries and Heads of Office (x4); Deputy Director of COVID-19 HMPPS Response; Deputy Director Joint COVID 19 Strategic Policy Unit (x2); Director General of Probation and Wales; Executive Director Probation and Women; Executive Director of Youth Custody Service; Executive Director HMPPS Wales; Executive Director, Performance Directorate; Head of Health, Social Care and Substance Misuse Services; Head of Capacity Management and Custodial Capacity Manager.

Related links

Update on COVID-19 in prisons

Prison estate expanded to protect NHS from coronavirus risk

Measures announced to protect NHS from coronavirus risk in prisons

The Annual Prison Performance Ratings are published to ensure transparency of the final performance assessments of both public sector and privately-managed prisons across England and Wales.

Due to the impact of COVID-19 on prison delivery during the year and impact on data reliability, a data-informed, rather than data-driven, assessment took place in 2021/22 to identify the rating for each prison. A two-tier rating system is used for 2021/22 performance ratings, where prisons have been rated as either having:

• Performance is at least acceptable in the circumstances of COVID-19
• Performance is of concern in the circumstances of COVID-19

This publication covers reporting for the period between the 1 April 2021 and the 31 March 2022.

Pre-release access:

The Annual Prison Performance Ratings publication is produced and handled by the Ministry of Justice’s (MOJ) analytical professionals and production staff. Pre-release access of up to 24 hours is granted to the following persons:

Ministry of Justice:

Secretary of State and Lord Chancellor; Permanent Secretary; Director General of Probation; Chief Probation Officer; Chief Financial Officer; Minister of State, Prisons and Probation; Deputy Private Secretary; Principal Private Secretary; Deputy Principal Private Secretary, Head of Prisons and Probation Desk; Private Secretary; Deputy Private Secretary; Head of Office; Deputy Director, Office of Director General for Probation; Programme Director, Probation Programme; Deputy Director, Probation Programme; Chief Executive, New Futures Network; Head of Performance Intelligence Function; Deputy Director, Effective Practice and Service Improvement; Head of Policy and Briefing; Directorate of Reducing Reoffending, Partnerships and Accommodation; Deputy Director Rehabilitation Policy; Press Officer (x14); Head of Data and Insight, New Futures Network; Probation Reform Programme - Policy and Briefing; Acting Deputy Director, Office of the Director General for Probation, Wales and Youth; Communications Manager – Community Accommodation Service (CAS); CAS Project Support Officer; Chief Operating Officer, New Futures Network; Head of Profession; Head of HMPPS Performance; Deputy Director of Data and Evidence as a Service; Director of Data and Analysis; Performance Analyst (x7); Operational Researcher; Business Intelligence Support Analyst; Principle Social Researcher, Criminal Justice Analytical Priority Projects; Head of Criminal Justice Analytical Priority Projects; Principal Research Officer, Reducing Reoffending (x2); Head of Reducing Reoffending Business Partnering Team; Director of Prison Policy; Director General of Policy; Head of Prison Performance; Prison Performance Analyst (x3).

HM Prison and Probation Service:

Chief Executive Officer of HMPPS; Executive Director - Strategy Planning and Performance; Director General of Prisons; DG and COO Prisons; Chief Operating Officer of Prisons; Executive Director - Prisons South; Executive Director - Prisons North; Executive Director - Long Term High Secure Estate; Executive Director - HMPPS Wales; Executive Director - Privately Managed Prisons; Executive Director - Youth Custody Service; Deputy Director - Effective Practice and Service Improvement Group; Head of Performance Improvement; Head of Performance Intelligence; Head of Information - Youth Custody Service.

The HMPPS workforce bulletin provides statistics on staffing levels and staff inflows and outflows in England and Wales. This publication updates statistics on HMPPS staffing levels up to the end of September 2020.

The probation officer recruitment annex provides the difference between required and current staffing levels of Probation Officers, and the number of Trainee Probation Officers and other qualified staff.

This statistics release provides data on COVID-19 amongst staff in HMPPS in England and Wales – on deaths, cases and absence.

The bulletin is released by the Ministry of Justice and produced in accordance with arrangements approved by the UK Statistics Authority.

Pre-release list

HMPPS workforce bulletin is produced and handled by the Ministry of Justice’s (MOJ) analytical professionals and production staff. Pre-release access of up to 24 hours is granted to the following persons:

Ministry of Justice

Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State; Minister of State for Justice; Parliamentary Under Secretary of State; Permanent Secretary; Director, Prison Reform Policy; Director General, Justice Analysis & Offender Policy; Director of Prison Safety & Reform Programme; Director of Analytical Services; Chief Statistician and Deputy Director Justice Statistics Analytical Services; Deputy Director, Head of Data Science & HR Analytical Services; Head of HR Analysis, Reporting and Modelling; Deputy Director, Prison Reform Policy; Deputy Director, Prison and Probation Analytical Services; Deputy Director - Human Resources, Head of Data and Insight; Director of Communications; Prison Officer Recruitment – Head of Data and Insight; Press officers (x9); Private secretaries (x8); Special advisors (x2)

HM Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS)

Chief Executive Officer; Head of CEO’s Office; Head of Executive Management Team; HR Director; Head of HR Reform; Deputy Director of HR Prisons; Deputy Director of HR Probation; Deputy Director of Recruitment and Retention.

The report presents key statistics on activity in the criminal justice system for England and Wales. It provides information up to the year ending September 2020 with accompanying commentary, analysis and presentation of longer-term trends.

The COVID-19 pandemic continues to cause MoJ to review our data gathering, access and release practices, focusing efforts on priority analysis and statistics. Our statement explains this further and in particular, we have limited access to the Police National Computer, to minimise non-essential travel by our analysts. In line with guidance from the Office for Statistics Regulation, the decision has been made to delay the following publications:

• Cautions data to September 2020 is planned for publication on 20 May 2020
• First Time Entrants (FTE) data to March 2020 is planned for publication on 20 May 2021
• FTE data to June 2020 is planned for publication on 20 May 2021
• FTE data to September 2020 is planned for publication on 20 May 2021

Statistician’s comment:

The figures published today highlight the impact on criminal court prosecutions and convictions of the COVID-19 pandemic. Latest short-term trends are mostly reflective of the impact of the pandemic on court processes and prioritisation rather than a continuation of the longer-term series.

The monthly data shows that following the sharp falls in prosecutions and convictions immediately following the March 2020 ‘lockdown’, these have recovered by September 2020, although not quite to pre-pandemic levels.

Custody rates and average sentence lengths have both increased overall. For custody rates, this is likely to partially reflect the prioritisation in courts of more serious offences since April 2020 – meaning a greater concentration of court time for offences more likely to get a prison sentence. The increase in average sentence lengths continues the trend of the last 10 years, and it is less clear from the monthly data what impact, if any, the pandemic may have had.

Pre-release access

The bulletin is produced and handled by the ministry’s analytical professionals and production staff. Pre-release access of up to 24 hours is granted to the following persons:

Ministry of Justice

Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice; Minister of State for Prisons and Probation; 2 Parliamentary Under Secretary of States; Permanent Secretary; Principal Private Secretary; Deputy Principal Private Secretary; Deputy Private Secretary; 5 Private Secretaries; Special Advisor; Head of News; Chief Press Officer; 4 Press Officers; Director, Family and Criminal Justice Policy; Chief Statistician; Director of Data and Analytical Services; Director General for Policy and Strategy Group; Chief Financial Officer & Director General for the Chief Financial Officer Group; Deputy Director, Bail, Sentencing and Release Policy; 2 Section Heads, Criminal Court Policy; Director, Offender and Youth Justice Policy; Statistician, Youth Justice Board; Data Analyst, Youth Justice Board; Deputy Director, Crime; Crime Service Manager (Case Progression) - Courts and Tribunals Development; Deputy Director, Legal Operations - Courts & Tribunals Development Directorate; Head of Criminal Law policy; Policy Manager – Youth Courts and Sentencing; 7 Policy Advisors; Head of Custodial Sentencing; Head of Criminal Courts Statistics.

Home Office

Home Secretary; Private Secretary to the Home Secretary; Permanent Secretary, Home Office; Assistant Private Secretary to the Home Office Permanent Secretary; Minister of State for Policing and the Fire Service; Assistant Private Secretary Minister of State for Policing and the Fire Service; Director of Crime, Home Office; Head of Crime and Policing Statistics, Home Office; Head of Recorded Crime Statistics.

The Judiciary

Lord Chief Justice; Private Secretary to the Lord Chief Justice; Private Secretary to the President of the Queen’s Bench; Lead for Criminal Justice for the Senior Judiciary.

Other

Principal Analyst (Justice), Cabinet Office

This publication provides final proven reoffending statistics for Community Rehabilitation Companies under Payment by Results and for the National Probation Service.

Final figures are provided for the quarterly cohorts from October 2015 up to June 2018, and the 2015/16, 2016/17 and 2017/18 annual cohorts.

The bulletin is produced and handled by the Ministry of Justice’s (MoJ) analytical professionals and production staff.

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused the MoJ to have to change its data gathering, access and release practices, focusing efforts on priority analysis and statistics. In particular, we have paused access to the Police National Computer, essential in the production of the interim statistics, to minimise non-essential travel by our analysts. In line with guidance from the Office for Statistics Regulation (https://www.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Regulatory-guidance_changing-methods_Coronavirus.pdf), the decision has been made to cancel the release of interim figures within this publication. For the same reason, it also has not been possible to publish the data tool providing final proven reoffending data for the CRCs and the NPS by age group and gender as part of this release.

Please take some time to read and respond to the decision to discontinue production of interim proven reoffending statistics outlined on the back page of the bulletin.

Pre-release access of up to 24 hours is granted to the following persons:

Ministry of Justice

Ministry of Justice Secretary of State; Minister of State for Justice; Minister of State for Justice for the Criminal Justice System; Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice; Permanent Secretary; Director General of Policy, Communications and Analysis Group; Director of Prison Policy; Director of Youth Justice and Offender Policy; Director of Analytical Services; Director of Probation Reform; Director of Community Interventions; Deputy Director of Probation Policy; Chief Statistician & Deputy Director Justice Statistics Analytical Services; Deputy Director of Prison and Probation Analytical Services; Deputy Director, Head of Offender Management and Public Protection Group; Deputy Director of Reducing Reoffending; Deputy Director of Community Rehabilitation Companies Contract Management; Deputy Director of Rehabilitation Systems and Support Services; relevant private secretaries (x7), special advisors (x3); press officers (x5); analysts (x9); and policy officials (x9).

Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS)

Director General of Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service.

Home Office

Secretary of State, and the relevant private secretaries.