Any person who films, photographs, or transmits images from within a prison for reception outside the prison commits an offence under section 40D(1) of the Prisons Act 1952. A person convicted of an offence under section 40D(1) may, on conviction on indictment, be sentenced to a maximum term of two years' imprisonment, an unlimited fine, or both.

His Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) has issued a number of communications to governors and staff highlighting the risks associated with filming near prisons, and providing guidance on operational practice, police engagement, and staff safety. Where footage has been posted online, HMPPS has sought its removal from the relevant social media platform.

Determinate sentence prisoners, including those convicted of sex offences, are eligible to be considered for a move to open prisons when within five years of their earliest release date. Before they can transfer, however, their risk must be assessed as low enough to be safely managed in open conditions. The assessment looks at a wide range of factors, including risk of harm to the public, risk of continued criminality, and risk of abscond.

To be eligible for re-categorisation to open conditions, prisoners serving an indeterminate sentence must have their suitability assessed by the Public Protection Casework Section of HM Prison & Probation Service, on behalf of the Secretary of State.

The Security Categorisation Policy Framework requires that, when assessing a prisoner’s suitability for transfer to open conditions, which is a categorisation review, prisons must establish whether any victims are engaged with the Victim Contact Scheme and take account of any relevant victim-related considerations. Where a victim is engaged in the Scheme, their allocated Victim Liaison Officer will notify them that a re-categorisation review is taking place and seek any information they wish to provide regarding potential risks. Victims are also given the opportunity to submit representations on additional licence conditions, such as, exclusion zones or non-contact conditions. The policy is clear that a check must be undertaken on every occasion that re-categorisation is considered, as victims may choose to join the Victim Contact Scheme at any stage during an offender’s sentence.

In this case, due to a legal challenge by the offender, the prison in which he was held was required to make a fresh decision regarding his suitability for open conditions. While this process affected the usual timeframe for engagement with Victim Liaison Unit staff, the prison confirmed that a transfer to open conditions would not be progressed without input from the Victim Liaison Unit. The prison subsequently liaised with the allocated Victim Liaison Officers, and Mr Paterson did not transfer to an open prison because the re-categorisation decision to Category D was ultimately rescinded.

The Security Categorisation Policy Framework was last updated and published in April 2025; in this update, the process for allowing victim input into categorisation assessments for open conditions was strengthened, including the introduction of a minimum 14-day notification period, to allow Victim Liaison Officers sufficient time to consult victims. Alongside this update, the HMPPS Victims Team has issued communications to Victim Liaison Officers reinforcing the process for open conditions, including guidance on when victims should be notified and the information that may be shared with them.

Securing employment is a key factor in reducing reoffending with evidence showing that finding work can reduce the likelihood of reoffending by 9 percentage points. Open prisons play a key role in supporting this as they enable suitable, risk-assessed prisoners to undertake work in the community, developing their skills and preparedness for release. The Government remains ambitious to increase the range and availability of employment opportunities for prisoners in open prisons.

Release on Temporary Licence (RoTL) is an important rehabilitative tool that allows eligible prisoners to take up employment outside the prison, where they are paid at normal market rates and gain valuable work experience. In addition, prison industries and workshops provide paid work opportunities within prisons enabling prisoners to build work-ready skills and gain work experience in a variety of sectors. For example, HMP Leyhill, a Category D open prison, which is close to the member’s constituency, offers prison work in print, woodwork, prison laundries, and land-based activities.

This is supported by New Futures Network, the prison service’s specialist employment team, which works proactively with employers to source employment opportunities on release, as well as jobs and training in custody, including in open prisons. Each prison is also supported by a dedicated employment lead and a regional employment advisory board, which brings together local employers to increase access to jobs and strengthen links between prisons and the labour market. Prisoner apprenticeships which offer paid training with employment on completion have been available in open prisons since 2022 with successful completions in hospitality, warehousing and logistics.

The power to recall is a vital public protection measure. Where an offender serving an IPP sentence is recalled to custody, it is because the Probation Service has assessed that the offender’s risk has escalated to the point where the offender may no longer be safely managed in the community and has evidence that the offender’s behaviour is similar to the behaviour at the time of the offending which attracted the IPP sentence. This means that an IPP offender does not have to have committed a further offence to be recalled.

Successive thematic reviews conducted by HM Chief Inspector of Probation have found that the Probation Service is using recall appropriately and for public protection purposes.

Table 1: Number and Proportion of IPP Recalls Not Involving a Charge for a Further Offence, 2023-2025 [note 1]

With regards to the cost of Parole Board hearings relating to people serving an IPP sentence who had been recalled to custody having not committed a further offence, the data are not routinely available to provide a reasonable estimate, and the work to collate it could not be completed without incurring disproportionate costs.

Table 3: Number and proportion of Parole Board IPP recall review outcomes of release and open conditions from completed cases, 2022/23 to 2024/25 [note 2] [note 3]

Table 4: Number and proportion of Parole Board IPP recall review outcomes of release and open conditions from completed cases, where the offender was not facing a charge for a further offence, 2022/23 to 2024/25 [note 2] [note 3] [note 4]

We may not disclose the number of recalled IPP prisoners in custody as of 30 April 2026 as the data are a subset of data scheduled to be published at the end of July.

Table notes:

[note 1] The proportions are of total number of IPP recalls. An offender can be recalled multiple times in a year or across years.

[note 2] The outcomes are the final outcomes of each review and do not include intermediate decisions that were subsequently remade such as through reconsideration mechanism.

[note 3] Completed cases are cases that resulted in one of release, knockback and open conditions.

[note 4] Offenders not facing a charge of further offence are those who were not facing a charge of further offence at the point of their recall prior to the recall review.

The power to recall is a vital public protection measure. Where an offender serving an IPP sentence is recalled to custody, it is because the Probation Service has assessed that the offender’s risk has escalated to the point where the offender may no longer be safely managed in the community and has evidence that the offender’s behaviour is similar to the behaviour at the time of the offending which attracted the IPP sentence. This means that an IPP offender does not have to have committed a further offence to be recalled.

Successive thematic reviews conducted by HM Chief Inspector of Probation have found that the Probation Service is using recall appropriately and for public protection purposes.

Table 1: Number and Proportion of IPP Recalls Not Involving a Charge for a Further Offence, 2023-2025 [note 1]

With regards to the cost of Parole Board hearings relating to people serving an IPP sentence who had been recalled to custody having not committed a further offence, the data are not routinely available to provide a reasonable estimate, and the work to collate it could not be completed without incurring disproportionate costs.

Table 3: Number and proportion of Parole Board IPP recall review outcomes of release and open conditions from completed cases, 2022/23 to 2024/25 [note 2] [note 3]

Table 4: Number and proportion of Parole Board IPP recall review outcomes of release and open conditions from completed cases, where the offender was not facing a charge for a further offence, 2022/23 to 2024/25 [note 2] [note 3] [note 4]

We may not disclose the number of recalled IPP prisoners in custody as of 30 April 2026 as the data are a subset of data scheduled to be published at the end of July.

Table notes:

[note 1] The proportions are of total number of IPP recalls. An offender can be recalled multiple times in a year or across years.

[note 2] The outcomes are the final outcomes of each review and do not include intermediate decisions that were subsequently remade such as through reconsideration mechanism.

[note 3] Completed cases are cases that resulted in one of release, knockback and open conditions.

[note 4] Offenders not facing a charge of further offence are those who were not facing a charge of further offence at the point of their recall prior to the recall review.

I have heard from victims of domestic abuse and stalking about the harrowing journey they face in rebuilding their lives. For many, the one thing that gives them comfort is the knowledge that their abuser cannot reach them from behind bars, but Government changes to category D prisons can now allow these offenders to be moved to open conditions much earlier than before, despite their crimes being exempt from standard determinate sentence 40—SDS 40—because of their recognised higher risk. Will the Minister meet me to discuss excluding domestic abusers and stalkers from early transfer to open prisons, so that the victims’ peace of mind can be retained?

As I said earlier, all prisoners, including those convicted of domestic violence and stalking offences, will be allowed to move to an open prison only when they have been assessed and risk assessed. I am very happy to organise a meeting between the hon. Gentleman and the relevant Minister to discuss this case.

Whether his Department has a policy on the housing of convicted paedophiles in open prisons.

As I said, each case is considered on its own circumstances, and the risk is assessed by the professionals. I am very happy to look into that case and make sure that the appropriate officials look into it too.

Paedophiles should be behind bars, not roaming our communities. I am afraid that the Minister’s words will ring hollow for my constituent who received a call in January and was told that her abuser, the paedophile, who was only two years into a nine-year sentence, had been moved into an open prison, and now had the right to leave the site freely, and even stay out overnight. Will the Government review these moves? Clearly something is not working. Will the Minister also specifically look into this case, which is utterly unacceptable?

This Government are undertaking the biggest prison building programme since the Victorian era. We will be building 13,000 new places by 2031. We inherited a prison capacity crisis from the Conservatives, so it takes some chutzpah for them to start asking questions about prison building. We are committed to the prison building programme that we announced in 2024, and we are confident that we will match it. We are fixing the mess that they created.

As an MP whose constituency has a category C prison for male sex offenders that is almost at capacity—HMP Littlehey—I welcome the clarity from the Minister regarding paedophiles in the prison estate.

We know that the Minister is on the hook to deliver thousands of new category C and D prison places. I want to ask him about the prison places he has made almost no progress on since the election because the contractor ISG went into administration in September 2024. I first highlighted the failure of that project last year. Can he confirm whether, since then, all those 12 prisons have had new contractors appointed? When will those prison places be delivered?

Prisoners are moved to an open prison as part of the rehabilitation process, but only after they pass a thorough risk assessment. Every prisoner, including those serving a sentence for a sexual offence, is subject to an individual risk assessment. They will not be allowed to move to an open prison unless they are assessed as presenting a low enough risk. A prisoner can be immediately returned from an open prison to closed conditions if their risk increases.

To answer the question would incur disproportionate cost as it would require a search of individual prisoner records. Centrally-collated data on prisoner transfers cover transfers between a predominant function closed prison and a predominant function open prison but does not distinguish instances of prisoner movements between a ‘closed’ wing and an ‘open’ wing where a prison has both types of function. Therefore, this would require a search of individual prisoner records.

Public protection remains the priority and prisoners will only be transferred to open conditions if it is assessed that it is safe to do so.