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Prisoners: Death

Asked by Kim JohnsonLabourMinistry of JusticeTabled Answered 14 July 2025UIN 65887

The question

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many people serving an Imprisonment for Public Protection sentence have died while housed in approved premises in each of the last 10 years.

Answered by Sir Nicholas Dakin

Deaths in Approved Premises are rare, accounting for less than 1% of deaths of offenders in the community during 2023/24, and the number of deaths annually has been decreasing. Some of the deaths, while resident in Approved Premises, occurred away from the premises.

Five individuals serving an Imprisonment for Public Protection (IPP) sentence died whilst housed in Approved Premises between 2019/20 and 2023/24. The number of deaths can be broken down as follows:

2020/21 - 3

2022/23 - 2

The figure is 0 for all other years since 2019/20.

As per previously published data to date, there have been no deaths of IPP-sentenced individuals under this Government.

Data prior to April 2019 would require a manual matching exercise and could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.

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