Speeches by Dakin.

“My hon. Friend can write to me with his list of potholes, and we will see what we can do.”

“My hon. Friend highlights another excellent piece of work that is going on, and the difficulties in ensuring that funding is effectively used as we move forward in a difficult situation due to the funding inheritance that we had from the previous Government. If he writes to me about that particular case, I will be very…”

“I am very happy to share good practice across Northern Ireland and other regions of the UK, so that we can all learn from one another, and officials meet in the five nations group, as the hon. Gentleman well knows. He is right to say that we need to ensure that people are supported as they move into the community. That…”

“My hon. Friend is absolutely right that securing employment is known to reduce the risk of reoffending significantly. The Minister for prisons in the other place has led a business with a track record of getting offenders into employment, and I understand that National Highways is starting to build strong partnerships …”

“This Government’s plan to support women is clear and ambitious. The aim is to reduce the number of women going to prison. Our Women’s Justice Board will support that. The independent sentencing review’s recommendations—[Interruption.] I am on the wrong question; apologies. [Interruption.] Well, you got a preview of the…”

“Yes, the Government will look further at those proposals. The Women’s Justice Board has been created to do exactly that sort of work, and we also have an excellent Victims Minister in my hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones).”

“I thank my hon. Friend for highlighting the importance of essential organisations such as Young Gloucestershire and the Nelson Trust. I am grateful for the invitation, and ask him to please write to me about the organisations. We will see what my diary can do.”

“My hon. Friend has had a preview of this answer! This Government’s plan to support women is clear and ambitious. The aim is to reduce the number of women going to prison. Our Women’s Justice Board will support that. The independent sentencing review’s recommendations on short, deferred and suspended sentences for women…”

“It is right and proper that IPP sentences were abolished. Various organisations have considered resentencing. None of them has identified an approach that would not involve releasing offenders whom the Parole Board has determined pose too great a risk to the public. We do not wish to give false hope to those serving th…”

“My hon. Friend highlights yet another piece of excellent work that is going on across our prison estate in partnership with other organisations. Again, if she writes to me, I would be happy to allow my diary manager to see how my diary is performing.”

“I say gently that we have deported more foreign nationals in the first year on our watch than the previous Government did in the years on their watch. He is right that we have to roll up our sleeves and continue to get on with the job.”

“The hon. Gentleman will be aware that the Victims and Courts Bill is about to go through Parliament, and that is the sort of issue that we will look at during the Bill’s passage.”

“We are committed to getting this right. The early release scheme that the previous Government put in place did not have the same exceptions as our early release scheme did for the sort of offenders that the hon. Gentleman draws attention to, but these matters are very difficult. The most important thing is ensuring tha…”

“I hear the right hon. Gentleman’s question, and I will write to him.”

“No, it is not. This is about people who have already served their sentence in prison; they are out in the community. If they breach a condition of their licence, they are returned to prison. The hon. Gentleman might as well ask why the Government he supported did not take any of the measures that he mentions. Our Gover…”

“This is not about releasing people from prison earlier.”

“We speak to the Victims’ Commissioner regularly; the Under-Secretary of State for Justice, my hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones), is speaking to them later today.”

“Victims absolutely need to be kept informed, and we continue to work with victims’ groups and the Victims’ Commissioner to ensure that they are.”

“I have made clear the exceptions that apply to this tight, fixed-term recall alteration. The management of people in the community will be risk-assessed, as always. If the view is that a different approach needs to be taken, it will be taken.”

“The commissioner has been spoken to by the team. To be clear, the impact assessment will be published when we come to consider the statutory instrument.”