Drugging and Sexual Assault of Women

Lord Davies of Gower Excerpts

Tuesday 7th July 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

The individual concerned committed horrendous crimes. I give the noble Baroness an assurance, and I hope she can understand what I say, that the nature of the offending in this case means that we take this matter very seriously and we are exploring all options now to ensure that we can examine how we respond to that particular case.

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, it is welcome that the National Crime Agency has investigated these appalling events, and I hope the perpetrators face the full force of the law. However, does the Minister accept that the NCA’s job of investigating and preventing organised sexual crime is going to be made significantly harder when the Government release thousands of rapists and child groomers from prison? Of course, the Government promised to build new prisons, but we are two years in with no sign of them yet.

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

There are some times when my gob is smacked, and this is one of those occasions. The Conservative Government caused the backlog in prisoners and the failure of prisons being built, which has led to the backlog that we currently have in our prison system. I say to the noble Lord that we are ensuring that we put public safety at the heart of our reforms and that prisoners judged the most dangerous by the courts are excluded from early release. Offenders of the particular type he mentioned will not be early-released in that way; he should have known that when he asked that question.