Written question asked by Nick Clegg (Liberal Democrat) on Monday, 2 July 2007, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Wednesday, 4 July 2007. It was answered by Lord Hanson of Flint (Labour) on Thursday, 5 July 2007 on behalf of the Ministry of Justice.

Databases

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice when he expects the database under development by the Pre-Release Section to be operational.

Answer: A new database for the Public Protection Unit in the National Offender Management Service in the Ministry of Justice is currently in development. For the Pre-Release Section in that unit, the database will allow, among other things, information to be recorded accurately relating to the tariff, Parole Board reviews and release of indeterminate sentence prisoners. There will need to be substantial data migration and testing of the new database, and this means that it is not likely to be operational until at least the end of the year.

Secondary information