Written question asked by Priti Patel (Conservative) on Monday, 23 April 2012, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Wednesday, 25 April 2012. It was answered by Crispin Blunt (Conservative) on Monday, 30 April 2012 on behalf of the Ministry of Justice.

Prisoners: Pay

Question: (3) how many prisoners have had their earnings deducted to fund victims support services since September 2011.

Answer: The Prisoners' Earnings Act 1996 was brought into force on 26 September 2011. It enables prison governors to apply a levy of up to 40% on the wages of low-risk prisoners who work outside of prison on temporary licence, in order to prepare for their eventual release.In accordance with the statutory provisions, the money goes to Victim Support to enable them to provide direct, practical, paid for services for victims. We intend to publish data on the money raised from these prisoners' earnings next month.National Offender Management Service (NOMS) central recording system does not separately record the number of prisoners working inside prison who receive a weekly wage. To identify these costs would require examining and collating a high number of payment records from each establishment and this would incur disproportionate costs.

Secondary information