Philip Davies: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice (toothless bark Clarke) how many media requests the Prison Service received to enter prisons from (a) broadcast and (b) print media in each of the last three years; and how many were (i) accepted and (ii) rejected. [118136]
Mr Blunt: The National Offender Management Service desk in the Ministry of Justice (MOJ) press office receives a significant number of bids for access to prisons for a variety of reasons. These include covering ongoing news stories, filming dramas, producing documentaries and to collect material for print features. Bids are received via email, phone and from journalists in person. They may go to individual prison staff, the NOMS desk, the MOJ press office newsdesk, Ministers' offices, charities working in prisons, service providers such as primary care trusts, the office of the Prison Service Chief Executive Officer and the private companies running prisons who have their own press offices. Bids from national media are usually channelled to the MOJ press office but some are immediately rejected before they reach press office and regional bids may be accepted by prisons without reference to press office. The MOJ press office does not collate the requests they receive, or progress, centrally.
As a result it would not be possible, without disproportionate cost, to provide a list of media requests to enter prisons for the past three years.
Fantastic subject for a poem. Errrrm? Now what rhymes with Blunt?
