Freedom of Information Request
You asked for the following information from the Ministry of Justice (MoJ):
I write to request under the Freedom of Information Act the following data, which seems not to be extractable from published accounts after 2008-09: For each year from 2008-09 onwards
1. The gross and the net operating costs of the Prison Service (public and private together)
2. Within 1), the cost of contracted out prisons (as a group)
3. The cost of prisoner escort contracts, and whether included in (1) or not
4. The cost of contracts for electronic monitoring of offenders and whether included in (1) or not
5. The number of uniformed and operational staff working in public sector prisons
6. The number of other staff working in public sector prisons
Your request has been handled under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA). The answer has been provided by the National Offender Management Service (NOMS), an Executive Agency of the MoJ, which includes the HM Prison Service.
I can confirm that the Department holds the information that you have asked for.
Please be aware that NOMS became an Executive Agency of MoJ incorporating HMPrison Service, National Probation Services and Private Prisons in 2008 and from 2008-09 produced its own NOMS Annual Report and Accounts,therefore there are no longer published accounts just for the HM Prison Service.However, NOMS does publish annually the Direct cost and Overall cost for each public and private sector prison and in summary format. The totalOverall expenditure approximately equates to the net operating cost of running the prisons. The Direct costs relate to expenditure met directly by each prison’s cost centre, and to this is added an apportionment of expenditure met at regional and national level to give the Overall costs.
In relation to your questions one to four, the table below shows the latest information available and within the table you will find an explanationof what is included in thefigures provided. Figures provided are rounded to the nearest £million.
Column 1 / Column 2 / Column 3 / Column 4 / Column 5FOI questions / Question 1: net expenditure / Income included in Direct costs. / Question: 2 / Question 3 (inc.) / Question 4 (not inc.)
Year / Prisons Total / Private / PECS / EM
2012-13 / £2,959m / -£145m / £472m / £134m / £108m
2011-12 / £2,985m / -£180m / £383m / £146m / £117m
2010-11 / £3,099m / -£141m / £345m / £164m / £102m
2009-10 / £3,186m / -£143m / £328m / £161m / £94m
2008-09 / £3,375m / -£106m / £334m / £157m / £92m
To note within the table:
1. The published Overall net expenditure is reproduced in column 1 of the table.
2. It should be noted thatthe figures in column 1 are gross in respect of income from the YJB, as this income is internal to MOJ andif it was netted off, the cost per place/ prisoner to the MOJ would be understated.
3. It should also be noted thatNOMS does not produce an analysis as in column 1 in respect of gross costs, however, column 2 shows the amount of income which has been netted off inthe Direct prison costs, which form part of the overall expenditure. This is predominantly related to public sector prisons.
4. Due to changes in scope and accounting treatment, figures over a five year period may not all be exactly comparable with each other.
5. Column 3 shows the Overall cost ofprivate sector prisons. These are included in column 1.
6. Column 4 shows the cost of Prisoner Escort Custody Service (PECS) contracts.These are included in column 1.
7. Column 5 shows the cost of Electronic Monitoring (EM) contracts. These arenot included in column 1. It is important to note that the figures in column 5 do not take account of the significant sums that the contractors have repaid on the Electronic Monitoring contracts. In 2013-14 Serco repaid £68.5m and G4S repaid £104.4m to reimburse the government for overpayments made on the Electronic Monitoring contracts over their lifetime. These sums also included the costs to government arising from these issues, including the cost of examining both suppliers’ contracts across government.
In relation to your questions five and six, I am pleased to provide you with the information you have requested. The information on staffing levels in Public Sector establishments is contained in the attached table in an excel format. Please note that the table provides a snapshot of staffing at the end of 31 March for each year 2008-09 to 2012-13, and at the end of each quarter for June 2013 onwards. This reflects the style of reporting in the NOMS Workforce Statistics Bulletin.