Prison Education

3. What assessment he has made of the potential merits of bringing the delivery of all prison education into the public sector.

Improving education in prisons is a top priority. The public sector, the independent sector and the voluntary sector all have an important part to play in that. Indeed, three of the four contracted core education providers currently are classified as public sector bodies.

We spend more than £150 million a year on a prison education system that is unfit for purpose, and much of that is extracted as profit for failing outsourced companies. Does the Minister think that is good value for money?

That is a mischaracterisation of how the education service runs in prison. There are an extraordinary number of very dedicated people working in that service, and three of the four providers, as I say, are essentially further education college providers. We can and must do better, because we know that education and the acquisition of skills help to keep people out of trouble and from returning to jail once they get out.