2 Improving the efficiency of catering
10. It is important for rehabilitation that prisoners
have the opportunity to learn skills and gain qualifications that
will help them to find work on their release from prison. Catering
is one area where ex-prisoners may be able to find work. Kitchens
provided a cost effective method of training prisoners and helping
them to gain qualifications in a useful transferable skill, whilst
providing meals for the population of the prison. Just over half
of prisons had kitchens that could offer prisoners the chance
to gain National Vocational Qualifications in catering.[12]
11. The cost of food per prisoner per day, the daily
food allowance, varied by over 180% between different prisons
in 2004-05. Some variation was to be expected due to the different
requirements of different categories of establishment. There were
also considerable differences in daily food allowance, however,
between prisons of the same category (Figure 2), there
was a variation of 95% at male Young Offenders Institutions. These
differences in cost were likely to reflect different qualities
of ingredients and differences in the menus of individual prisons.
The Prison Service had worked to reduce the daily food allowance
at Feltham Young Offenders Institution, which had the highest
daily food allowance in 2004-05, from £3.41 to £2.80
in 2005-06. It has also budgeted to bring the daily food allowance
at Huntercombe Young Offenders Institution, which was £3.46
in 2005-06, below £3.[13]
Figure 2:
The cost of food per prisoner per day varied considerably between
prisons of the same type
figure 2
Source: National Audit Office analysis of Prison
Service figures for 2004-05
12. The Prison Service did not compare the costs
of its catering operation against other similar organisations.
It spent on average 30 pence more per day per prisoner on food
than the Scottish Prison Service, and the Ministry of Defence
fed the armed forces for a relatively low cost. The Prison Service
did not have an organised system of comparing the cost effectiveness
of its catering between public organisations, sharing good practice
or purchasing food jointly with other public bodies.[14]
12 Q 16 Back
13
C&AG's Report, para 2.31-2.33 and Figure 7; Qq 14, 128-131 Back
14
C&AG's Report, para 2.34-2.36 and Figure 8; Q 14 Back
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