Written question asked by Lord Bellingham (Conservative) on Wednesday, 29 March 2006, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Tuesday, 18 April 2006. It was answered by Liam Byrne (Labour) on Monday, 11 September 2006 on behalf of the Home Office.

Prisons

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what mechanisms are used to determine whether a prison is meeting the obligations contained in its service level agreement.

Answer: The National Offender Management Service (NOMS) requires Service Providers to deliver high quality services as specified in the Service Level Agreement (SLA), including high performance against an operational requirements specification. Each SLA contains a Performance Measurement System (PMS) that is designed to measure the Service Providers’ delivery of the operational requirements in key areas over an agreed period.Compliance with the requirements of the SLA includes achieving all Service Delivery Targets and providing NOMS with quality assurance systems, principally through a comprehensive self-audit programme supplemented with a range of policy documents and procedural guidance to staff; together with a meetings structure that ensures performance, standards and contractual compliance is achieved.

Secondary information