Prison Services: Insourcing
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames Excerpts(5 days, 4 hours ago)
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Lord Timpson (Lab)
The noble Baroness will be pleased to know that the prison industry actually grows £1.7 million in value of our own vegetables and fruit. We also do laundry services for all prisons, as we do for immigration removal centres and the police service. We also make everything there is in a prison cell apart from TVs, which we fix, mattresses, which we are working on, and kettles and pillows—but we are working on how to do that ourselves. We are trying to do an awful lot in-house, but there is more to be done.
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)
My Lords, does the noble Lord agree that there are two particular areas that might benefit from insourcing when the review is undertaken? One area is tagging: this could easily be undertaken within prisons by prison staff. Numbers of prisoners have been released untagged into the community, causing risk to the public and potentially leading to unnecessary recalls when appointments are subsequently missed. The other area is prisoner transport to courts, where frequent failures have led to multiple court delays and increased backlogs. Could this too be better organised within the prison system?
Lord Timpson (Lab)
The noble Lord raises two important points, which I have been very focused on since I took on this role. I am a commercial person, so I have been interested in getting into the detail on this. On PECS—the prisoner transport contracts—the performance levels are exceptionally high but, when things go wrong, often it is not down to the PECS providers; it is down to our own self-inflicted problems at the prison. With regard to electronic monitoring, we inherited a problematic contract and, although it is performing much better now, there is still some way to go. Serco’s leadership team has been in my office a number of times and we are working really well together. I recently visited its Warrington office and saw its performance, which really is improving. What we need to do is get to a point where the service that it delivers is excellent.
Adult Prison Estate: Support for Young People
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames Excerpts(1 week ago)
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Lord Timpson (Lab)
As someone who did a little bit of the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award scheme many years ago, and not very well, I would say that it is great to see it working well in prisons. It has been going for some time in the youth estate, but it never followed through into the adult estate. However, since 2020 it has expanded to the estate for those under 25 and is now operating in 38 adult establishments. It improves young people’s confidence and teamwork and their relationships with fellow prisoners and the adults who take them on. The volunteers who work on the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award are fantastic. If noble Lords go to Wetherby, they may well see young offenders working at local food banks, litter picking and at the Boston Spa church, all under the Duke of Edinburgh scheme.
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)
My Lords, since the 2022 policy framework, decisions on the actual age for transition from the youth estate to adult prisons appear to have been made largely on grounds of prison capacity rather than individual need. Should not transition planning be based largely on the need for continuity of courses and vocational training? Can the noble Lord say what plans there may be to ensure flexibility in the age of transition and the timing of transfers, to meet young people’s individual needs for training and programmes?
Lord Timpson (Lab)
The noble Lord raises a very important question, because the transition from the youth estate to the adult estate can be a point of great concern, both for those who work within the secure establishment and for young people themselves. We have a complex case panel, which works on the best solution for that individual, including how we manage the risks and the opportunities for them. Sometimes, children stay beyond 18 for a few months, if they need to finish off various courses or if probation officers feel it is the right thing for them to do. But another important thing is that we have enough capacity in the adult estate to ensure that, when it is appropriate that they move into the adult estate, we have a suitable prison for them to go to.
Prisoner Release Checks
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames Excerpts(1 week, 5 days ago)
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Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
My Lords, I begin by thanking the Metropolitan Police, Essex Police and the British Transport Police for their prompt work in returning Mr Kebatu to custody. I am also grateful to the Home Office for eventually finalising Mr Kebatu’s departure and deportation last night. Most importantly, my thoughts and deepest sympathies remain with the 14 year-old victim and her family. I cannot imagine the anxiety and distress that engulfed their home last weekend.
Three points arise out of this sorry tale. First, it is a scathing indictment of this Government’s competence—or, I should say, incompetence—that it took a national outcry before they finally managed to deport Mr Kebatu, perhaps the only small-boat migrant who actually wanted to be deported. He returned to Chelmsford prison five times, asking to be taken home, and was turned away on every occasion. Only after his mistaken release and the public scrutiny that followed did the Government at last do what should have been done months ago. It has now emerged that the Home Office authorised a discretionary payment of £500 to Mr Kebatu as part of his removal, reportedly to discourage him from claiming asylum. The briefing has been put out that this was nothing to do with Ministers; officials used their own cashcards, we are told, to take the money out.
This is remarkable. I remember that under Prime Minister Blair the proposal was that criminals were to be made to pay their debt to society before they might be deported. The public officials would be marching the criminals to the ATMs. Under Prime Minister Starmer, we have the farce that offenders liable for deportation are forcing public officials to come with them to the cashpoint to take out cash in an attempt to prevent their causing more problems prior to deportation. This is a reversal of justice. It is hard to find words adequate to reflect this breakdown in basic operational competence.
There is a serious point here. I do not know whether the Attorney-General, who, I am afraid, is not in his place, has sanctioned this payment of public funds to Mr Kebatu in the hope that it would encourage him not to mount a legal challenge. If he has not, I would be interested to know whether the Attorney-General supports the use of public funds to encourage people not to make legal points in court. That seems to be a matter not only of a misuse of public finances but a real problem for the rule of law.
It is rather odd: we have the farce of a Government paying foreign offenders to leave our territory, and the same Government paying foreign states to take our territory. At the same time, in a few weeks that Government will be taxing everybody to pay for all these costs.
This failure appears in the context of the Government’s general failings to deport asylum seekers. The flaws of the one in, one out scheme have been exposed; the migrants sent to France returned to our shores within weeks on another small boat; and the flagship plan to smash the gangs was undone as soon as it started. It is little wonder that over 50,000 people have arrived on small boats this year, the highest number ever recorded. Only time will tell whether Mr Kebatu will soon be among them. If Mr Kebatu comes back, will the Government commit to sending him back again to Ethiopia, or will he be another litigant who relies on the ever-expanding jurisprudence of the ECHR? The public, and Parliament, deserve an honest answer.
The second point is the ineffectual release scheme. The Kebatu incident is not merely one man wrongly released but is symptomatic of profound problems in the prison system. The Government released at least 262 prisoners early, more than double the number the year before, and are yet to clarify how many remain unaccounted for. Will we get that figure this evening? We have not had it yet.
Only this summer, HMP Pentonville released 10 prisoners early in error, while 130 inmates, around 20% of those eligible for release, were held beyond their sentence because staff failed to calculate release dates correctly. It is simply not good enough to put it down again and again to human error. It is only now, when we have a public outcry, that the CEO of HM Prison and Probation Service is going to conduct a review on release checks. Why was that not done after the Pentonville fiasco earlier this year? The Chief Inspector of Prisons served an urgent notification on Pentonville for its inability to calculate release dates, but no action was taken. There has been no inquiry into the 262 mistaken releases, and, as a result, another sex offender was allowed to roam our streets. This belated review comes far too late. No amount of promises of future action should disguise the scale of the failure of this Government or absolve them of responsibility for the chaos that they have created.
The third point is in the context of the Sentencing Bill, which the Government are now going to present to this House, assuming that it gets through the other House. It is telling that the Government, and the Lord Chancellor in particular, have repeatedly expressed remorse at Mr Kebatu’s release, saying that every effort was taken to locate him. We are told that Mr Lammy was livid—that was the word used—when he was told of Mr Kebatu’s release from custody, and the Home Secretary referred to him as a “vile child sex offender”. She is right about that. But this Mr Lammy, who was livid about Mr Kebatu being released, is the same Mr Lammy under whose upcoming Sentencing Bill Mr Kebatu would probably never have gone to prison in the first instance because he was given a sentence of only 12 months. Under the new Sentencing Bill, if you get a sentence of only up to 12 months, you are presumed to serve a suspended sentence, which would have exposed him to the public rather than to a prison cell.
What is the Secretary of State’s position with regard to people like Mr Kebatu? Is the Secretary of State “livid” when they are not held in custody, or does he support his own Sentencing Bill, under which people such as Mr Kebatu would never have gone into custody in the first place? He cannot have it both ways. The truth is that the Sentencing Bill is not the silver bullet that will fix this Government’s mismanagement of prisons.
The Minister will no doubt say, as he often does, that they inherited a crisis. But when will the Government take responsibility for their own record? Since they came to power, the number of prisoners incorrectly released has doubled. How can those failures be anything but the responsibility of this Government? Just over a year into office, they have slashed prison education budgets by an average of 20% and sometimes by as much as 60%, which undermines rehabilitation, fuels reoffending and places further strain on a broken system. I know that the Minister, who I respect personally immensely, knows this, and I am sure that he is fighting the good fight within government. However, on the facts as we see them, I am afraid that he is losing that fight, and losing it badly.
The early release of Mr Kebatu should never have happened. The Government were given warnings and they were ignored. We deserve a Government who can keep order in our prisons and who will maintain integrity in our justice system. Until the Government accept responsibility and take decisive action, we cannot have confidence that those who commit crimes will be properly punished or that the rule of law will be upheld.
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)
My Lords, I echo the thanks of the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, to the authorities that finally apprehended and deported Mr Kebatu, and, indeed, the sympathy that he expressed to the young victim of Mr Kebatu’s offending.
The Secretary of State’s Statement was made on Monday 27 October, following Mr Kebatu’s mistaken release into the community on Friday 24 October. I fully understand the Secretary of State’s inability on Monday to give full details of what happened, but, with two further days, I ask how much more the Minister can say about how this mistaken release actually happened.
As we have heard, the Secretary of State apparently said that he was livid and he described the release as a blunder—and we accept entirely that he was right in both those things—but saying so solves nothing. At least there is now to be an inquiry into how Mr Kebatu came to be released and what the failures were, to be chaired by Dame Lynne Owens, former Deputy Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police and Director-General of the National Crime Agency. But setting up an inquiry does not solve the problem, nor does it answer the central questions that Parliament and the public are entitled to have fully answered now. First, what is the system and what are the safeguards currently in place for ensuring that only prisoners intended for release are in fact released? Secondly, what is the system and what are the safeguards for ensuring that prisoners destined for deportation are in fact deported and not released into the community?
As the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, said, the issue of mistaken releases is serious—and it is as serious as it is absurd. The number of mistaken releases has risen sharply: between April 2024—I remind the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, that that was before the general election—and March 2025, it rose to 262 in a year, up from 115 the previous year, an increase of well over double. But this is a problem that simply should not exist at all. We are now told that a new checklist has been introduced for prison staff to follow before a prisoner is released. How can there not have been a satisfactory checklist system in place before this occurred?
Certainly, morale and the ability of the Prison Service to cope have fallen to an abysmal level, but that is not entirely the fault of this Government—it has happened over years under the previous Conservative Government. But this case and these figures demonstrate the scale of the challenges that the service and the Government face if we are even to approach getting these things right, and the resources and willpower required to repair our collapsed penal system, which are far greater than ever we envisaged.
There is the further issue of the £500. We now hear from the BBC that Mr Kebatu was paid £500 apparently for not making trouble and not disrupting his deportation to Ethiopia after he had threatened to do so. We are told that the payment was made by the removal team as an alternative to a slower and more expensive process that would have meant the cancellation of his flight and the arrangement of a new one. That is according to a spokesperson for the Prime Minister.
Apparently, a parallel was drawn by No. 10 with the so-called facilitated return scheme, whereby a foreign national who agrees to leave the UK voluntarily can be paid £1,500 so to do. That is an entirely false parallel that was drawn. Apparently, Mr Kebatu had attempted to apply for the facilitated return scheme but was not permitted to do so. No doubt that was because he was liable to be immediately deported anyway, quite apart from the embarrassment that all this caused. I ask the Minister to confirm that and to answer questions about that payment.
How did that payment to Mr Kebatu come to be made, since it was not under the facilitated return scheme? Is there some kind of what can only be described as a slush fund that can be used to buy people’s compliance with their deportation? If so, on whose authority is it expended? One can understand that it might cost a great deal more than £500 if a flight has to be cancelled and a potential deportee cannot therefore be deported, but surely Downing Street can see that paying off one deportee for not making trouble will lead to a whole number of others taking the same course.
Who makes the decisions in any particular case? What controls are there over such payments? How is this not rewarding troublemaking? Who decides in any given case the amount that is to be paid out, if not £1,500? Is it discretionary? Can it be more? Must it be less? These are serious questions about what I am afraid has the smell of being an arbitrary, uncontrolled, unprofessional and unacceptable system. Will the Minister please explain?
The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Lord Timpson) (Lab)
I thank the noble Lords, Lord Wolfson and Lord Marks, for their contributions on these incredibly important issues. I will of course respond to as many of the points raised as possible.
I begin by thanking the Metropolitan, Essex and British Transport Police for their swift response in apprehending Mr Kebatu. My particular thanks go to Essex Police for the support they have offered to the victims, all of whom were contacted following the release in error. I can tell noble Lords that Mr Kebatu has now been deported and arrived back in Ethiopia this morning; nevertheless, his victims are, rightly, outraged and the Government regret the hurt and anguish this incident will have caused them. They deserve better, the public deserve better, and, as the Deputy Prime Minister and Justice Secretary said in the other place on Monday, Ministers expect better from a public service which plays a huge role in the first duty of any Government, to keep the public safe.
We are clear that any release in error is one too many. Immediate changes have been made to the release process so that there is more senior accountability, including a new checklist for duty governors to complete the night before releases happen. Noble Lords who have concerns about the arrangements currently in place should be in no doubt that these are the strongest release checks the Prison Service has ever had. This incident will throw releases in error into stark relief, but the reality is that they have been rising year on year since 2021. In 2023, there were around nine per month, but by the period January to June 2024, that had increased to 17 per month. This is clearly too high and we have work to do.
While I appreciate that noble Lords will be concerned that more focus is needed to address the issues, we have now commenced an independent investigation. It will be led by Dame Lynne Owens, with her years of experience as a former deputy commissioner of the Met and director-general of the National Crime Agency. Dame Lynne will establish the facts in this case, and the Government have been clear that there must be accountability for what happened. What I will say is that prison staff work incredibly hard, often in difficult circumstances, so we will of course take account of the training and technology available to support the release process when the incident took place. What is important now is that due process is allowed to happen. In addition, Dame Lynne will make recommendations to support the Prison Service to avoid such errors in the future. I look forward to receiving her report so that the Government can agree changes as soon as possible with HMPPS’s senior leadership.
When it comes to foreign national offenders, this Government stand on our record. In the year to July, we sent 5,179 FNOs back to their countries of origin, which represents a 14% increase on the previous 12-month period. This is no small feat. In July, I visited HMP Huntercombe to see for myself the operational challenges around foreign national offenders, the deportation delays and the ongoing issue of space inside prisons. As I have set out to noble Lords many times, our prisons continue to operate close to their maximum capacity. This puts us at risk of a total collapse of the criminal justice system, in which victims and the public would pay the price. With the prison system in its current state, it is, sadly, no surprise that releases in error such as that of Mr Kebatu can happen.
This Government have been clear about the changes needed to create a better, more sustainable prison system. The Sentencing Bill that is currently making its way through the other place and will soon come to your Lordships’ House will ensure that we never run out of prison places again. It will incentivise offenders to behave in prison to avoid longer spells in custody and put a greater emphasis on robust community sentencing which addresses the causes of crime. The Bill will deliver punishment that works to cut crime and keep the public safe. To those noble Lords who are concerned that Mr Kebatu would never have gone to prison under the Bill and would therefore have remained in the community, I gently point out that they may wish to examine Clause 42 of the legislation, which will extend the automatic deportation rules to include any FNO who gets a suspended sentence of at least 12 months.
On a few points that were raised by both noble Lords, the £500 that was paid was an operational decision to get Kebatu on a plane without any delays. It was far cheaper than booking more flights, and far cheaper than him being in a cell for another year, which would cost £54,000. I also think that it was a sensible decision by civil servants: to use a golfing analogy, if someone wants to give you a putt, you take it. He needed to get on a plane and get back to Ethiopia. As for Mr Kebatu returning to the prison five times, this will be part of Dame Lynne Owens’ investigation into what exactly happened.
The reference by the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, to Pentonville is quite right. Immediately after the notification, I visited the prison and there were 10 releases that were incorrect: all of them had remained in prison for too long. There are problems at that prison, which we are addressing, and I am working on an action plan with colleagues, but it is clear that this is symptomatic of a prison system that is under a huge amount of pressure. I reiterate that prison education budgets are actually up by 3%, but the amount of education we can deliver has gone down because of the increased cost of delivering that service. As the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, will know, I cannot pre-empt the annual publication of these statistics. We are a lot more transparent than the previous Government, especially on the early release scheme, where 10,000 offenders were released in a cloak and dagger way. With the SDS40 scheme that we took on, we very much told everybody what was going on.
I reiterate to the noble Lord, Lord Marks, that the extra checks that I insisted on will make sure that release processes are far more robust. Far from being soft on crime, this Government are taking the robust decisions needed to protect the justice system. Prisons are and have been in crisis for far too long, but we are putting in the work to build stability. Victims are and always will be our paramount concern when it comes to an issue such as this, and this Government stand on our record of deporting increasing numbers of foreign national offenders, as the public expect.
Again, I thank the two noble Lords for their contributions today and I will continue to engage with them and colleagues more broadly on this important issue as the Government address releases in error so that we can continue to uphold our first duty, to keep the public safe from harm.
Interpreting Services in the Courts (Public Services Committee Report)
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Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)
My Lords, at the end of a debate of very high quality, I join with others in commending this report, and the work of the committee, so ably chaired by the noble Baroness, Lady Morris of Yardley. I thank her for her opening: I hope I will not repeat any of it, but I was heartened to hear that, frankly, she did not mince her words. It is also my great pleasure to welcome the noble Baroness, Lady Levitt, with her wealth of experience, to her place on the Front Bench for her first debate. We look forward to many further discussions in the future.
I would not want to let this occasion pass without praising the work, over many years, of the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, both in opposition and recently in government. He is not a lawyer by profession but he is bolstered by extensive practical experience of the justice system as a magistrate in criminal and family cases. His contributions to justice debates in the House have always been measured, courteous, knowledgeable and helpful.
The committee’s report was thorough and made a number of carefully considered and well-evidenced criticisms of court interpretation services, drawn from the wealth of experience of the witnesses it heard from: experienced court service users, as the noble Baroness, Lady Yardley said, the Bar Council, barristers, judges, the Law Society and others.
This debate has, frankly, reinforced an impression that many speakers have clearly had, that the Government’s published response has smacked of complacency. The noble Lord, Lord Carter of Coles, used the word “smug” and I believe he may have been justified. It is to be hoped that the response from the noble Baroness, Lady Levitt, will depart from that complacency, will be more thorough and will give better credence to some of the criticisms made by the committee.
In particular, the Government rejected a central conclusion of the committee, outlined in paragraphs 53 and 54 of the report. Paragraph 54 states that the current provision of interpreting services in the courts is
“not acceptable and presents a significant risk to the administration of justice”.
The committee also recommended the collection of much more detailed and consistent data-gathering. It is plain that the failures of the services, and the distinction between the committee’s findings and the Government’s response, have largely stemmed from the failure of detailed data-gathering.
The Government’s response was:
“The MoJ is confident in the quality of its published data, which has been externally reviewed recently … and found to be of good quality”.
In response to paragraph 54, they state that
“the MoJ disagrees with the Committee’s conclusion that the provision of interpreting services in the courts is not acceptable and presents a significant risk to the administration of justice”.
Importantly, they add:
“The quality metrics for the service are good (96% success rate in Q4 2024) and the number of trials that are delayed due to lack of interpreters is very low (0.7% of ineffective trials in 2024)”.
However, the reality—as shown by the evidence taken by the committee and from speakers today—is that the system’s weaknesses, in practice, simply do not show up either in the quality metrics or in the number of trials that were ineffective for lack of interpreters. Frankly, I wonder how far the Government have taken into account the difficulties of gathering data and making complaints when the primary sources are the primary users, whose difficulty with using the English language is the very factor that gives rise to their need of the service in the first place.
Striking points were made by witnesses to the committee about interpreters turning up to hearings without the time to attend pre-hearing conferences with counsel, because they were not paid to appear before the start time of the hearing. Then there were the dialect difficulties. One witness gave striking evidence of a GMC hearing, where the complainant witness spoke a particular Afghani dialect of Pashto, rather than a Pakistani dialect familiar to the booked interpreters, and so the witness could not communicate with the arranged interpreters. The committee reported on a clear conflict between the MoJ’s data and the lived experience of witnesses, a point powerfully made by the noble Lord, Lord Carter of Haslemere; however, the MoJ’s response relied on the same data, despite its flaws.
On training, the committee was very clear that the standard of the qualifications of court interpreters has been insufficiently high and that a level 6 qualification ought to be required. One can see that this may, in some cases, present difficulties with rare languages or dialects. However, on a careful reading of the Government’s response, it appears that there has not been an insistence on a level 6 qualification and one is not proposed at present. The Government’s current stated position is that a level 6 qualification should be the default level for full trials—which they call professional-level assignments—but that there is to be no insistence on that. Similarly, there is to be no insistence on a level 3 qualification as the minimum for lower-level bookings—non-evidential hearings and telephone interpreting. It is unclear from Government’s response how far they will insist on contractual minimum standards for the new contracts when they are let, a point that the noble Baroness, Lady Warwick, also explored.
I will make a further point on qualifications. Skill in interpreting is not limited to the ability to translate faithfully the questions put to a witness and the evidence given in the witness’s answers. That is a vital part of it and should be the aim of every interpreter. However, it is also important to stress the need for interpreters to avoid the weakness, which we frequently experience in the courts, when a less qualified interpreter gets into a discussion with a witness about both the questions put and the answers to be given. When that happens, it obscures the evidence the witness gives, reduces its credibility and, in bad cases, can seriously mislead the court.
On interpreters’ conditions, pay, hours, travel expenses and the like, considerable criticisms were made by the committee and speakers today. The committee called for minimum pay rates, subject to regular review, improved cancellation arrangements and payment for travel time and expenses, on which the noble Baroness, Lady Yardley, my noble friend Lord Shipley and a number of other speakers made similar points.
In addition, the committee commented on the widespread feeling that interpreters were inadequately recognised and valued within the existing court system, and the example of the lack of passes was given and had great deal of weight. They are treated with much less respect than their status as court professionals merits. The noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, made these points on conditions and on valuing, on which she has campaigned for years. The MoJ in its response disagreed with the committee’s recommendations on conditions, maintaining broadly that the rate paid to interpreters is competitive. The MoJ also disagreed with the recommendation for an independent register, without any convincing argument for that disagreement. However, there is evidence that the present system encourages interpreters to seek off-contract bookings, rather than bookings through the MoJ’s contracted suppliers. Of course, the ministry has an obligation to secure the best value for money for the taxpayer, but it is unclear that the present structure is achieving that—a point made by my noble friend Lord Willis.
I turn to whether the tender process designed to replace the present contract with TBW, which expires next year, ought to be paused and reviewed. The difficulty is that we are approaching the end of the TBW contract. However, the last point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Morris of Yardley, was that the new contract has not been signed and needs to be thoroughly reconsidered. That seems a thoroughly defensible position.
Finally, the committee was of the view, though not expressed in great detail, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Burnett, said, that the court should go much further down the road towards incorporating more translation technology into the interpretation services, with more remote interpreting and greater use of AI, as new technology advances. The Government’s response went into painfully little detail in this area while paying lip service to improving technology. I should be grateful, as would the Committee, if, when she responds to this debate, the Minister could respond to the points made by the noble and learned Lord, the noble Lords, Lord Carter of Coles and Lord Mott, my noble friend Lord Willis and a number of others, subject, of course, to the caveats expressed by the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins on the present limitations of AI translation for some languages. But the Minister should give us greater detail on how the Government propose that interpretation services could benefit from a fast-improving technology and a massively increasing use of AI—all that without compromising the service provided to litigants who need it in this vital area.
Sentencing Act 2020 (Amendment of Schedule 21) Regulations 2025
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Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)
My Lords, in considering this instrument, I once again express our gratitude to the Minister for the way in which he set out the justification for the instrument and its background, particularly the fact that the Law Commission review will take some time to happen. I thank the noble and learned Lord, Lord Phillips, for the careful consideration that he has given to this and for his expression of concern at the effect that adding these two aggravating factors could have on sentencing.
It has been explained that the instrument adds two statutory aggravating factors to Schedule 21 for judges to consider when imposing a minimum term for murder. The first is when the murder is connected with either the actual or intended end of an intimate relationship, while the second is when the murder involves strangulation, suffocation or asphyxiation. As the Explanatory Memorandum points out, judges will of course be entitled to consider all factors and take all factors into account when sentencing for murder. Those will include anyway the fact that a relationship is coercive or controlling and the degree to which the murder reflects the coercion or control—in this case, generally by a man over a woman.
I know that we all welcome the further Law Commission review that is promised, but it is a fact that these reviews take a considerable amount of time; that is inevitably the result of the care that the Law Commission gives to such considerations.
In one sense, this instrument does very little. I note the noble and learned Lord’s concern that the changes will lead to significantly increased sentences. One can see that a statutory aggravating factor does have that effect—and that is the intended effect. However, how far sentences would be increased is not capable of assessment; neither is there any clear evidence of how far such sentences will be increased because of an aggravating factor.
The facts are that the social background against which this instrument is presented is that coercive control is now recognised far more widely than it used to be; and that the effects of factors such as those mentioned in this instrument are more widely recognised and taken more seriously. So I hope that the noble and learned Lord’s concern that the changes will lead to significantly increased sentences proves unfounded, not in the sense that there should not be a recognition of aggravating factors but in the sense that such aggravating factors are increasingly recognised by judges in any event.
The two factors added by this instrument around coercive relationships were particularly important, as has been said, in influencing the 2023 review of domestic homicide sentencing by Clare Wade KC and in framing her recommendations. In the domestic abuse context, which is the context we are considering, they are particularly significant. They are also significant in the light of the Government’s stated determination, on which they are plainly acting, to halve violence against women and girls, which is a major ambition.
The first change recognises that actual or threatened relationship breakdown can, and often does, play a role in promoting extreme domestic violence. I accept that the extent of deterrence that follows from that is uncertain, but it sends an important signal to the potential perpetrators of domestic violence about the effect of coercive control.
The second change recognises the particular significance of strangulation, suffocation or asphyxiation in domestic violence, particularly by men on women. We recognised that during the passage of what is now the Domestic Abuse Act 2021, when I, along with the Government, signed a cross-party amendment to introduce the new offence of non-fatal strangulation. In the debates on the then Bill, we took account of a great deal of evidence of the high incidence of strangulation in domestic violence cases, as well as of the distressing fact that so many cases where non-fatal strangulation occurs ultimately lead to the perpetrator escalating that violence to, ultimately, fatal violence and murder.
The fact is, therefore, that judges will continue to weigh up all relevant factors in assessing minimum terms of imprisonment to be served by those sentenced to life for murder. There is merit in highlighting these two factors because they can only send an important signal to the actual and potential perpetrators of domestic violence—and, indeed, to the victims of such domestic violence because, of course, victims are often frightened out of reporting domestic violence even when it is an attempt at strangulation. The evidence that that can escalate to murder in due course is important; it is important that potential victims, as well as potential perpetrators, should know of that signal. In my view, that is a powerful reason for supporting this instrument.
Lord Sandhurst (Con)
My Lords, this statutory instrument amends Schedule 21 to the Sentencing Act 2020. These regulations implement key recommendations from the Domestic Homicide Sentencing Review led by Clare Wade KC and mark an important step forward in how our legal system treats cases of murder that involve domestic abuse. They are welcome, and I say that notwithstanding the concern that they may add to the prison population, as explained by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Phillips.
The instrument introduces two new statutory aggravating features in determining the minimum term for murder: first, where the offender is engaged in controlling or coercive behaviour towards the victim; and, secondly, where the murder has involved sustained and excessive violence, sometimes referred to, in depressing jargon, as “overkill”. By contrast, importantly, it conversely explains a new mitigating factor, putting it on a statutory basis. It recognises that an offender’s culpability may be reduced where the victim has engaged in controlling or coercive behaviour towards the offender.
These additions reflect a long-overdue evolution in the way the criminal courts have recognised domestic abuse. The Domestic Abuse Act 2021 broadened our understanding of harm so that it embraced emotional, psychological and economic abuse, but, until now, the sentencing framework for murder has not fully reflected the complex dynamics that can exist in abusive relationships, whether in the context of the abuse suffered by victims before their death or the potential impact of long-term abuse on an offender’s culpability.
We on this side welcome the Government’s decision to bring forward these changes promptly—that is, ahead of the Law Commission’s broader review of homicide. These changes send a clear message: domestic murders are not isolated or inexplicable acts but, often, the tragic endpoint of long-standing abuse.
However, I note the concerns raised by the Sentencing Council, particularly around the interaction between new statutory factors and the existing, established judicial discretion to take such behaviour into account. The council has rightly warned that codifying these factors may risk creating ambiguity or inconsistency in sentencing, particularly if guidance in respect of it is not clear. There is also a risk that difficult evidential issues—in determining, for example, whether a relationship was “intimate” or whether coercive control occurred—could inadvertently complicate proceedings or place additional burdens on the families of victims or on prosecutors.
To mitigate this, we urge the Government to ensure that clear and robust sentencing guidelines are published alongside, and at the same time as, these changes; that the Government provide training for judges and practitioners to apply the new factors consistently; and that there is a commitment to monitor the impact of these amendments, particularly on the outcomes of trials and sentence lengths in domestic homicide cases.
To conclude, subject to those caveats, these regulations are positive, necessary and a welcome reform. They better align our sentencing framework with the reality of domestic abuse and send a strong signal that such crimes will be treated with the seriousness they deserve. I commend the regulations to the Committee.
Criminal Justice Act 2003 (Removal of Prisoners for Deportation) Order 2025
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames Excerpts(2 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Lord Timpson) (Lab)
As noble Lords will know, when this Government came to power, we inherited a prison system in crisis. From January 2023 to September 2024, the adult male prison estate routinely operated at over 99% of capacity. Had we exceeded maximum capacity, the consequences would have been unthinkable: with nowhere to put new prisoners, the police would have stopped making arrests and courts would have suspended trials. It could have led to the total breakdown of law and order, with criminals running amok on our streets.
This Government carried out a series of emergency release schemes to prevent that disaster. At the same time, we launched the independent sentencing review, with one clear goal: to make sure we never run out of prison places. The highly regarded former Lord Chancellor, David Gauke, and his expert panel published their recommendations on 22 May, and the Government accepted the majority of them in principle.
One of the specific areas we asked the review to look at was how we tackle the number of foreign national offenders in our prisons. They currently account for around 12% of our prison population—that is 10,772 foreign national offenders as of June this year—and cost British taxpayers millions of pounds every year.
The Government have made it very clear that foreign nationals should be in no doubt that the law will be enforced, and, where appropriate, we will work with the Home Office to pursue their removal. I am pleased to say that in our first year of government, we have removed 14% more foreign national offenders than in any year that the previous Government were in office. But we must go further and faster, in removing individuals who have broken our laws and who have no right to be here.
The draft instrument before the Committee today implements the sentencing review’s recommendation to reduce the minimum period that foreign national offenders have to spend in prison from 50% to 30% of the custodial term, and to increase the window in which they can be removed.
I thank the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee for its consideration of this instrument and its report.
As noble Lords will know, the Secretary of State has a power to remove eligible foreign national offenders—those serving a determinate sentence who are liable to be removed from the UK—from prison for the sole purpose of immediate deportation. This is referred to as the early removal scheme. Foreign national offenders serving indeterminate sentences, life and sentences of imprisonment for public protection are outside the scope of the scheme. Prisoners serving a sentence for a terrorism-related offence set out in Schedule 19ZA to the Criminal Justice Act 2003 are also excluded.
The power to remove a foreign national offender under this scheme is discretionary, and prison governors can refuse to remove individuals where it would undermine public confidence in the criminal justice system—for example, where there is clear evidence that the prisoner is planning further crime, including plans to evade immigration control and return to the UK or dealing in class A drugs in custody—or, finally, where there are serious public safety concerns regarding early removal.
Under the current rules, eligible offenders can be removed up to 18 months before the earliest release point of the sentence, provided they have served one-half of the requisite custodial period. This SI amends the Criminal Justice Act 2003 to allow foreign national offenders to be removed up to four years before the earliest release point of their sentence, subject to having served 30% of the requisite custodial period. This means eligible offenders can be removed from prison earlier.
At current removal rates, we expect this change to free up to approximately 500 prison spaces a year. Not only will it help us to safeguard prisons from collapse, with all the risks that poses to the public, it will also prevent taxpayers’ money being spent to keep foreign nationals in this country any longer than necessary.
Noble Lords will also know that the Government are seeking to go further still in the Sentencing Bill, which was introduced on 2 September, by removing any minimum custodial requirement, so foreign national offenders can be removed from prison immediately after they are sentenced. In line with the existing early removal scheme, this further change will apply to all foreign criminals serving a determinate sentence, except terrorists and prisoners serving indeterminate sentences, such as life, who will be excluded.
Until this change takes effect, this SI will ensure that foreign offenders with no right to be here can still be removed from prison for the purpose of deportation earlier. This will protect victims by ensuring that those individuals can never offend in this country again, and if they return in breach of a deportation order, they will be liable to serve the rest of their sentence.
Indeed, concern for the protection of victims is driving the changes we are making through the sentencing review and now the Bill as a whole. By ensuring that we never again risk running out of prison places, we will ensure that our criminal justice system can function effectively and sustainably, keeping us all safe.
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)
My Lords, I am very grateful to the Minister for his helpful and brief introduction to what is, in effect, a relatively simple instrument. It comes against a background, as he explained, of the appalling shortage of prison places that the Government inherited and that has only got worse, inevitably, during this Government. The overcrowding that has been the result of that shortage and the crisis that has given rise to the early release scheme have to be ended as quickly as possible; for example, the use of police cells where there has been simply no space for custody within our prisons is unacceptable, and there has been an unholy scramble for places for prisoners wherever they might be found across the estate. That is the inevitable result of a prison system running at 99% of capacity.
The consequences of the prison shortage have been outlined by the Minister, and the clear goal of the Government has been to reduce prison numbers over time, although they rightly accept that that will take a great deal of time. I know the Minister is concerned to concentrate on shorter sentences and rehabilitation, but I am grateful to him for putting the numbers on this instrument—that it is expected to save 500 prison places a year, which is a significant number.
However, in one sense, this instrument is directed at an easy target, because the deportation of convicted foreign offenders, who are liable to be deported anyway, is generally justified in principle for all the reasons the Minister gave and is widely supported. It may also be said that our national Government have little interest in what happens to deported prisoners after they are deported, so that if they leave our prisons earlier than envisaged at the time of sentence, that does little harm, but the instrument rightly excludes some serious offenders from the ambit of the reduction.
However, I note the regret of the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee at the lack of review of the need for changes in this early removal scheme. The committee was concerned at the lack of information given to Parliament as to both the number of foreign national offenders likely to be affected by these changes and the treatment that such deported offenders would be likely to receive in their home countries following deportation. The committee reported that
“it would have been helpful for the EM to include background information … on FNO sentences and the treatment of deported prisoners in their home countries”.
It helpfully dug out a considerable quantity of additional information that was within the public domain that it found helpful, and it reported on that.
As a general point, the interest that the United Kingdom Government have in foreign national offenders should not cease altogether when such offenders are deported. At whatever stage, the Government and Parliament have an interest in considering the fate of deportees after they left this country and any continuing risk that they might present if they should return to the United Kingdom—or to United Kingdom citizens abroad, of course. Hence, the overall conclusion of the committee was that, while it recognised the urgency of the need to reduce the pressure on prison capacity, as we all do,
“the information provided with such instruments should … facilitate full scrutiny by Parliament. This means there should be a discussion of the risks as well as the benefits of the measures and adequate background information to understand the full effects; preferably, supported by an analysis of … similar changes”.
It is clearly the committee’s view that Parliament had not had that kind of information to the level of detail that we should have done.
I endorse that conclusion. However, subject to those caveats, I broadly support the measure to enable deportation at an earlier stage of prisoner sentences following sentence.
Lord Sandhurst (Con)
My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for introducing this statutory instrument today. I begin by affirming that we on this side strongly support the principle that foreign nationals who break the law in our country also break the trust that we accord them and that they have no right to remain here. This order is therefore a welcome step which builds upon reforms that the Conservative Government made in January 2024 to advance the point at which foreign nationals could be removed from prison and deported from 12 months to 18 months before the end of their custodial sentence. The instrument before us today expands on this, increasing the maximum removal period for foreign offenders to the later of either 30% of their custodial term or four years before their earliest release date. This is estimated to result in some foreign prisoners serving only 10% of their sentences before being deported, down from the current 25%. That, as I have said, is a welcome step, but it is not enough.
By the Government’s own admission, this reform will free up, at most, just 500 places. The taxpayer currently spends upwards of £500 million annually just on housing and feeding imprisoned individuals who neither need nor deserve to be here. Five hundred fewer places in our prisons accounts for just 5% of that total cost. That is before we consider the forecast growth in the prison population. Does the Minister really believe that these numbers reflect effective policy? Perhaps what is more worrying is that since this measure has been introduced, the Government have changed their tune. On 10 August this year, the Secretary of State announced the Government’s revised position that foreign offenders should be deported immediately after receiving a custodial sentence. Earlier in the year, we tabled an amendment to the Government’s Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill which called for the automatic removal of any foreign national convicted of an offence. While it is always gratifying to see the Government following our lead, their slowness to adopt this belated measure will have real-life impacts for the law-abiding people of this country. It will take time to implement and require more time-consuming legislation. In the meantime, more offenders are charged without the prospect of immediate deportation. The taxpayer will pay for the privilege, so I ask the Minister to lay out a timetable towards immediate deportations of convicted foreign nationals.
Similarly, there is nothing preventing the continuation of the endless cycle of appeals and repeals that cause delay. It seems as if every week a foreign criminal has his deportation order blocked under the doubtful guise of human rights. In the long term, without protections against human rights manipulation, this statutory instrument could end up seeing the same number of offenders removed each year as under current policy, just a little bit earlier. That is not effective policy. Can the Minister outline how this will be avoided?
That is why the Conservatives would disapply the Human Rights Act in all immigration-related cases. No delays or obstructions in legislation would be used for means for which they were not designed. Swift, effective removal is what we require.
To sum up, we believe that this statutory instrument is a first step, albeit a small one, towards the shared goal of the removal and deportation of foreign offenders.
European Convention on Human Rights
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames Excerpts(3 months, 3 weeks ago)
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Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)
As the noble Lord rightly points out, there has been an immigration White Paper. In it, we have said that we will look to deliver a new framework to consider Article 8—the right to family life—and will bring forward legislation to clarify Article 8 rules so that fewer cases are treated as exceptional. This is a modification that we have committed to taking forth within our own domestic legislation. However, the more general point that the noble Lord makes is fundamentally misguided. We have hugely benefited from the ECHR in the 75 years of its existence. It needs to evolve. Of course, there are issues, which we acknowledge, but one point that many European and domestic judges have made to me is that the margin of appreciation, the latitude that individual states have within the existing rules, is wider than many of the states acknowledge themselves.
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)
My Lords, in our view, trying to change the ECHR, which would require unanimity, would be as futile as it would be undesirable. However, on the Government’s immigration White Paper, particularly the Article 8 right to respect for private and family life, the margin of appreciation does, as the Minister mentioned, enable states to differ in how they implement the convention. Will the Minister confirm that UK legislation will seek to curtail reliance on exceptional circumstances only for legitimate and recognised convention aims such as national security, crime prevention, economic and social interests or protecting democracy?
Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)
Yes, I can give the confirmation that the noble Lord seeks. He sets out the case, as I think I did in answer to the noble Lord, Lord Lilley, but the reality is that this is just one aspect—it is the relationship with the ECHR that we are talking about—but there need to be a number of ways of tackling irregular immigration, which is a profound and difficult issue. We are doing that in parallel, as well as addressing the Article 8 issue.
Prisons: Early Release
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames Excerpts(4 months ago)
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Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)
My Lords, the Question from the noble Lord, Lord Murray, referred to “public confidence”. On the basis that the Government are right that early release schemes have been essential to save our prison system from collapse, would that not be the ultimate disaster for public confidence? As well as working on their response to the Leveson report, will the Government now urgently implement David Gauke’s proposals for a presumption against short prison sentences, for more community sentences and for more early release on licence? Should the Government not also encourage a review of the sentencing guidelines with a view to bringing prison sentences here down to the level of those imposed elsewhere in Europe?
Lord Timpson (Lab)
The review that David Gauke and his panel undertook will form a very important part of the reform of the criminal justice system that we need. We need a sustainable criminal justice system, and that includes the review that Sir Brian Leveson has published today. On short sentences, it is important that the judiciary still has the power in exceptional circumstances to send people to prison for short sentences. Victims must come first, and the worst thing for victims would be for us to allow prisons to run out of places. We cannot run out of prison places, and the action that we are taking will ensure that we have a sustainable prison system.
Prisons: Mothers and Babies
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames Excerpts(4 months ago)
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Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)
My Lords, the six mother and baby units are successful. However, 17,000 children a year are separated from their mothers by imprisonment, harming both children and mothers. The impact of domestic abuse and drug addiction is overwhelming. Last Monday ITV News ran an article in which the noble Lord was interviewed and rightly described prison for many women as a “disaster”. So how quickly can we cut the use of prison for mothers of young children to a minimum and provide women offenders with the therapeutic environments they so badly need?
Lord Timpson (Lab)
I thank the noble Lord for his question. He is exactly right: we need to do more and do it faster. That is why the Women’s Justice Board is acting very quickly and coming up with its answers in the next few months. For me, what is really important is the intensive supervision court model, which we are very enthusiastic about, especially the one in Birmingham that is just for female offenders. Instead of them going to prison, we offer the wraparound support services so that they can stay out of prison and stay in the community. This comes back to a subject that I am very passionate about, attachment. It is really important for mothers to be with their children so that they can gain the attachment that, if not secured in their early years, can cause significant problems later on. As someone who was brought up with hundreds of foster children in my life, I am well aware of the issues around attachment in young children.
Sentencing Guidelines (Pre-sentence Reports) Bill
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames ExcerptsTuesday 10th June 2025
(5 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Lord Timpson) (Lab)
My Lords, I start by paying tribute to the chairman of the Sentencing Council, Lord Justice Bill Davis, after the sad news that he passed away at the weekend. He made a significant contribution to criminal justice and I particularly recognise his work serving on the Sentencing Council, first as a judicial member between 2012 and 2015 and then as its chairman since 2022. The Lady Chief Justice recalled him yesterday as one of the very best criminal judges of his generation. I am conscious that many noble and noble and learned Lords will have known and worked closely with him. I take this opportunity, on behalf of the House, to extend our deep condolences to Lady Davis and his children and to all those who knew him.
I take this opportunity to extend my thanks to the many noble Lords who have contributed to debates on the Bill in this House. Despite its short length, it has prompted careful and detailed consideration from Members of this House, and I am grateful to noble Lords who have, throughout its passage, provided constructive challenge. I am grateful to the officials who have been involved in its preparation and passage. The Opposition Front Bench, in particular the noble Lords, Lord Sandhurst and Lord Wolfson, have engaged constructively on the Bill, for which I am grateful. I pay particular thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Marks, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Burnett, the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Gloucester, who have all been generous with their time in both their scrutiny of the Bill and their engagement with me. Finally, I thank the team who have supported me on this Bill, in particular Katherine, James and Jack, to whom I am very grateful. I beg to move.
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)
My Lords, I add my note of sadness at the news of the death of Lord Justice William Davis recently and add my condolences to those of the Minister to his family upon his passing. He was a judge of great distinction. He led the Sentencing Council, which is the subject of this Bill, with very great distinction as well. He will be greatly missed.
Turning to the Bill, we made it clear that we did not agree with the Bill: we did not agree with the principle or that the proposed guidelines of the Sentencing Council threatened the notion of equality before the law. We believed, as is clear, that this was not a sensible use of emergency legislation and that the disagreement between the Sentencing Council and the Lord Chancellor should have been resolved without the need for legislation. We were concerned that the Bill had the potential to damage the Sentencing Council. In the event, we did not succeed in securing the withdrawal of the Bill, or in amending the Bill, which had Conservative support, so it will now become the law.
However, we can take two strong positives from the debate around this Bill. The first is the Government’s commitment to the Probation Service and to the importance of pre-sentencing reports in giving guidance to judges and providing consistency in sentencing. The commitment has been to having more reports of higher quality, backed up by increased resources. I thank the Minister for his kind words to me and others in opening this short debate; I say from these Benches what a credit he has been to his department and to this House in coming fresh to the House with his very strong commitment to the sentencing system and the Probation Service. His presence on the Front Bench has been a breath of fresh air for us all, and we are very grateful to him.
The second positive has been the recognition around this House of the enormous value of the Sentencing Council in giving independent, well-researched advice on sentencing to judges, with a view to promoting consistency not just in sentencing but in the approach to the factors that judges need to take into account in sentencing. I add my gratitude to Members around the House—both those with experience of acting in criminal cases and those with no experience of the criminal law or of law at all—who have stressed the importance of these issues to the development of the law and our criminal justice system, and, perhaps more importantly, to the maintenance of confidence in the criminal justice system in future.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
My Lords, I pay tribute to the late Lord Justice William Davis. We learned of his death over the weekend with deep sadness. His integrity, clarity of thought and unwavering commitment to fairness made him a towering figure in the field of criminal justice. His loss will be felt across the entire legal and judicial community, although most immediately by his family, to whom we send sincere condolences.
From these Benches, I express our thanks to all those who contributed to this Bill in Committee and on Report. The quality of that debate, if I may respectfully say so, was exemplary, echoing and always meeting the high standards that this House sets when dealing in particular with matters of criminal justice, with the expertise we have on all sides of the Chamber.
These Benches offer our support for the principles underpinning this legislation. The more effective use of pre-sentence reports will encourage informed and consistent judicial discretion and lead to better sentencing outcomes, reducing reoffending, encouraging rehabilitation and serving the interests of public safety. While this Bill is therefore a very good first step, we look forward, together with other noble Lords around the Chamber, to other initiatives in this area. Sentencing remains a complex and sensitive area of the law because it touches individual lives and the life of the community. We believe that this Bill provides a strong foundation and are confident that it will be implemented to good effect. We therefore support the Bill and look forward to it being implemented as part of a justice system that is fairer, more consistent and more effective.
Finally, on a more personal note, the Minister noted that this was the first Bill which he has taken through the House. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames, that we may disagree politically but these Benches recognise that the Minister not only shares a commitment to a fair and modern criminal justice system but has practical experience in this area. Where possible, we will of course work constructively together, as we did on this Bill.