Sentencing Guidelines (Pre-sentence Reports) Bill

Debate between Diane Abbott and Jeremy Wright

Committee of the whole House & Report stage
Wednesday 30th April 2025 Commons Chamber

[Sir Jeremy Wright]

My hon. Friend makes a fair point in relation to offenders who hover on the border between community sentences and custodial sentences, but he will know that, in the Crown court at least, the majority of such offenders already have a pre-sentence report. Of course, there are also offenders who come before the courts for sentencing and it is blindingly obvious either that a custodial sentence will follow, or that neither a community sentence nor a custodial sentence is realistically in prospect, so I do not think it right to say that we should have a pre-sentence report in every case, but there is already in law a presumption that pre-sentence reports should be ordered unless it is unnecessary to do so. What we are seeking to do here is respond to a very specific set of circumstances that have arisen as a result of a Sentencing Council decision. As he may have heard me say on Second Reading, I do not think that the Sentencing Council handled this well, and as a result we are having to do something that we would otherwise not have to do.

Sentencing offenders is, in all circumstances, a difficult business. The fact that different offenders receive different sentences, even for the same offence, is not necessarily evidence of a defect in sentencing practice as a result of guidelines or otherwise, but is more likely a reflection of the reality that every case and every offender is different. We should not, I suggest, try to stop judges reaching the appropriate conclusion, assisted by Sentencing Council guidelines, in each case before them.

[Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)]

Nobody is trying to stop judges sentencing in individual cases. All the Sentencing Council was seeking to do was ensure that judges and magistrates had the maximum amount of information before coming to a decision on the sentence.

[Sir Jeremy Wright]

Yes, I think the right hon. Lady is right that that is what the sentencing guidelines were aiming at, but I am afraid that the way in which they were phrased rather missed the mark, in my view. It is perfectly true to say that it is a good thing in most sentencing cases to get as much information as possible, but the sentencing guidelines have, as she will appreciate, particular influence on sentencers, who are obliged to follow them unless doing so is not in the interests of justice. The tone that is set by the Sentencing Council in the guidelines that it drafts gives a good indication to sentencers about the sorts of things that they ought to take into account in sentencing. As she heard me say—I think this is an important point to make—we are talking about the ordering of pre-sentence reports and not about sentencing itself.