Independent Sentencing Review

Lord Macdonald of River Glaven Excerpts

Monday 2nd June 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Timpson (Lab)]

I thank my noble friend for his comments. It has been the biggest privilege of my life to be given this role, and to be in your Lordships’ House to debate these crucial reforms to sentencing. I have been involved in and around the sector for most of my working life, and I have seen too many great ideas get ignored, too many wither on the vine and too many go unfunded.

I counted up the number of Prison Ministers I had met before being handed the keys to what was once their office, and it was 14, over just 20 years. I am not sure whether that happened because they enjoyed the role so much that they wanted to move on to another one or because it was too challenging and they wanted to find an easier role elsewhere, but, for me, this is the job that I have come in to do, and I am absolutely delighted that David Gauke and the panel have come up with the ideas that they have.

My noble friend is 100% right about the Probation Service. That is where the heavy lifting is done, and it is at the heart of the system. If you do not get probation funded and operating properly, the rest does not work either. I have met so many amazing probation staff who know exactly what they need to do but feel that they have not been supported enough over the years and that they spend too much time on administration and not enough time face to face with offenders, helping them turn their lives around—and that is the job that they signed up to do.

[Lord Macdonald of River Glaven (CB)]

My Lords, I very strongly agree with what the Minister has just said, and I declare an interest in that a close relative of mine works in the Probation Service. It is demoralised, underfunded and depressed, and that will have to change urgently, although, of course, getting probation officers into positions of experience takes time.

I strongly welcome this report and its findings. Does the Minister agree that of all the statistics bandied around on the topic of reoffending, perhaps the most striking is that no less than 39.3% of inmates reoffend within 12 months of their release from custody? That is the point at which the intensive provision part of the three-stage system will kick in. The period when those prisoners who are most at risk of reoffending are being engaged with by the Probation Service and by rehabilitation services will be key to this working, and if that is not got right, the reform will not be got right. As the Minister says, the Probation Service is central to this. Is he confident that he is going to be able to secure sufficient funds to create the sort of transformation that will be required for this scheme to work?

[Lord Timpson (Lab)]

I am learning how this business works, and when you go to the Treasury, you ask for what you want and then, in our case, we are happy with what we need to do the job. The £700 million is significant and will make a difference, but on top of that, we need to recruit more probation staff, which we are doing. We need to train them really well, and we are doing a review into training. We also need to support them, because the noble Lord is right: 39% of people reoffending is far too high and means more victims as well.

One of the things I learned is that employment makes a huge difference to people when they leave prison. One of the things I tried to do was to interview people when they were in prison, so they started working for me the next day. When I started employment advisory boards, 14% of prisoners had a job after six months. With the work of so many local business leaders and the third sector, that figure is now well over 30%. Those people in a job are far less likely to reoffend.