Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 3:53 pm on 15 January 2025.
Lord Timpson
The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice
3:53,
15 January 2025
The noble Lord is completely right that the prisons I am visiting now are very different from the prisons I visited 15 or 20 years ago. The buildings are often in decrepit states of repair. We have a lot of new staff who are still learning the skills of being a prison officer and we have an awful lot more to do to ensure that people, when they are in prison, spend their days purposefully, not just sitting in their cells.