July 15, 2004: New Prison Service Annual Report Out Today

The Prison Service Annual Report has been published today. The report outlines performance in public sector prisons over the past year, and notes that HM Prison Service met nine of its fourteen Key Performance Indicators (KPIs):

• There were 15 escapes from prisons and prison escorts, and no Category A escapes
• There was only one escape from escort per 39,377 prisoners
• Average staff sickness rate was 13.3 days
• The rate for timely delivery of prisoners to court was 82%
• Resettlement: 32,592 prisoners had a job, education or training within a month of release
• 5.5% of staff were from a minority ethnic group
• Education targets were significantly exceeded in most areas, including Work Skills awards and Basic Skills awards
• 9,169 offending behaviour programmes were completed (though the target of 1168 sex offender treatment programme completions was not met)

The Service failed to meet five key performance targets:

• The rate of positive mandatory drug tests was 12.3% against the target of 10%
• The rate of self-inflicted deaths was 135.9 per 100,000 prisoners against a target of 112.8 (a small improvement on the 2002/3 rate)
• The provision of purposeful activity was an average 23.2 hours per week against a target of 24 hours
• The average rate of doubling, or the no. of prisoners held two to a cell designed for one, was 21.7% against a target of 18%
• The rate of serious assaults was 1.54% against a target of 1.20%