WIREDGOV

• Full report - National Offender Management Service: Maintenance of the prison estate in England and Wales   

The National Offender Management Service Executive Agency (NOMS) has obtained good value for money from its expenditure on prison maintenance, the National Audit Office has today reported. In spite of an increasing prisoner population – over 73,000 people held in custody in public sector prisons in England & Wales in 2007-08 – spending has been kept at around £320 million in recent years. Nevertheless, the Agency Service could improve its plans for maintaining assets over their economic life and how it manages risks to the effective utilisation of its assets.

The eight prisons visited by the NAO were sufficiently well maintained to preserve physical security, prisoner capacity, and prisoner and staff safety.  The increasing prisoner population, frequent overcrowding and a high turnover of prisoners create substantial pressures on the estate. In its maintenance of the estate, the Agency has introduced procedures aimed at improving the handover of major maintenance projects from external contractors and to assess the future maintenance costs of refurbished or replacement assets.

The Agency has scope to improve the way it plans major prison maintenance. Currently, the Agency defers approved maintenance works if funds are no longer available. Pressures on prisoner population can also delay maintenance work because of the lack of alternative cell spaces.

NOMS needs to analyse the type, number and location of maintenance works it carries out to help control spending on maintenance and plan future works. The Agency should develop long-term plans for maintaining equipment and other assets over their economic life. It could also use more common and standardised parts, materials, fixtures and fittings, to bring cost savings to maintenance works.

Tim Burr, head of the National Audit Office, said today:

“NOMS is maintaining the prison estate well and is obtaining value for money in how it does so. But there are areas to improve: the Agency needs a better understanding of the costs of planned works; it should standardise more spare parts and materials; and understand better the right time to switch from maintaining an old asset to buying new. Once these measures are in place it will help the Agency plan maintenance work, and control finances, more effectively.”

Notes for Editors: 

1. In May 2007, the Government created the Ministry of Justice. A subsequent review resulted in organisational changes effective from 1 April 2008 including the formation of the National Offender Management Service Executive Agency (the Agency). The Agency combined large parts of the former National Offender Management Service headquarters, HM Prison Service and the National Probation Service into one body. It aims to deliver more effective offender management and to strengthen and streamline commissioning of services for offenders from the public, private and third tier sectors, with the goal of improving efficiency and effectiveness.  The Agency, through HM Prison Service (the Prison Service), operates and maintains a large and complex estate of 129 prisons in England and Wales.
   

2. Press notices and reports are available from the date of publication on the NAO website, which is at www.nao.org.uk.  Hard copies can be obtained from The Stationery Office on 0845 702 3474.
   

3. The Comptroller and Auditor General, Tim Burr, is the head of the National Audit Office which employs some 850 staff.  He and the NAO are totally independent of Government.  He certifies the accounts of all Government departments and a wide range of other public sector bodies; and he has statutory authority to report to Parliament on the economy, efficiency and effectiveness with which departments and other bodies have used their resources.