Cutting Crime (Justice Reinvestment)

Helen Goodman Excerpts

Thursday 21st October 2010 Westminster Hall

[Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mrs Main.

I am pleased to have this opportunity to welcome the Justice Committee’s report. I congratulate Committee members on producing what all hon. and right hon. Members have agreed is a thoughtful, considered study. In the 19th century, the Quakers were in the lead on penal reform, but it seems that the Methodists are in the lead in the 21st century.

The criminal justice system has several distinct objectives: to protect the public, to deter crime, to punish offenders, and to reform and rehabilitate them. All those objectives must be taken into account in the criminal justice system. At times they may be supportive, and at other times, they may seem to conflict, but I do not believe that any should be pursued to the exclusion of others. That is what makes the task of running the criminal justice system so complex and difficult.

The Committee’s report concentrates on the importance of diverting people from entering the judicial system, and improving support and guidance offered to those who commit custodial offences to prevent reoffending. The report argues that two key challenges—prehabilitation and rehabilitation—need greater attention, and it is clear that greater success in those areas would have a major impact on cutting crime and improving our judicial system.

I welcome the report’s emphasis on providing community-based solutions and improving the interconnections between local services. I agree that, wherever possible, prisoners should be detained in and remain in prisons near their family and local community, because clearly that can help offenders after release.

I am glad that the report emphasises the need to reduce young adult offending, and to divert more young people from the prison system. I first worked on that issue about 10 years ago when I was at the Children’s Society, and I am particularly pleased that the Committee took evidence from the society in its project with young people.

I also believe that justice mapping is an approach with great potential, because when thinking about how different parts of the criminal justice system inter-relate, it is important to remember that some communities, notably poorer communities, tend to suffer most from crime and its consequences. The criminal justice system must work in those communities, which must have confidence in it.

Before I comment further on the report’s specific recommendations, I want briefly to address the wider issue of prison numbers, which has received considerable attention this afternoon, and in recent days and weeks. Everyone would like there to be fewer crimes, fewer criminals in our communities, and fewer people residing at Her Majesty’s pleasure and at taxpayers’ expense, but it would be wrong to set an arbitrary ceiling on prison numbers, or to identify an optimal size for the prison population. Yet that is precisely what the report does by suggesting that the prison population should be capped, and then reduced to two thirds of its current size.

The comprehensive spending review statement yesterday made it clear that the Government are planning to cut the prison population by 3,000 over the next four years. Given that that includes offenders on short sentences, will the Minister tell us how many people will not now go to prison who otherwise might have done? Is the figure about 6,000 a year, or is it higher? Plans to put back the prison-building programme will result in 10,000 fewer places in the estate than under previous plans. That suggests an even greater reduction in numbers. I have several questions, and if the Minister cannot answer them this afternoon, I shall be pleased if he will write to me and other Committee members.

The plans reveal that what may seem to some Committee members to be a small reduction would in fact have a radical influence on how the criminal justice system is run. How will the reduction be achieved? The Times today seems to be considerably better informed than Parliament was yesterday, and listed the following options: those pleading guilty early on, those on indefinite sentences, some remand prisoners, a lower level of recall, drug addicts and foreign prisoners. Can the Minister disaggregate reductions into those categories? Perhaps most important, does he believe that the reduction in the prison population will take place against a background of rising or falling crime rates? Given that, is he confident that he can guarantee public safety?

[Sir Alan Beith]

The context is of falling crime rates with an 8% fall in recorded crime and a 4% reduction according to the British crime survey. That is the current decline in crime rates.

[Helen Goodman]

Of course. I shall come to that in a moment.

The overriding point is that we are not convinced that it is for politicians, civil servants or committees—even the Justice Committee—to decide what the prison population should be. It is for the Government of the day to provide prison places in line with need because the justice system is at heart a process. If justice is to be done and seen to be done, people must be confident that it is not subject to artificial constraints. I am worried that setting a target for prison numbers and then adjusting sentencing policy and conviction rates accordingly is putting the cart before the horse, and may do nothing for public confidence in the judicial system,

[Dr Huppert]

There seems to be an implicit assumption in what the hon. Lady is saying that sending people to jail is a good way of reducing crime. I am worried about that. She is also talking about setting conviction rates to suit, and I do not where she got that from. I am not aware of any suggestions that people would be found guilty or not guilty based on prison availability.

[Helen Goodman]

My overriding point is about a target for the prison population irrespective of what is happening to crime rates. I agree that crime rates have fallen, and they did so in large measure because of the Labour Government’s excellent policies over the past 13 years. The hon. Gentleman is laughing, but the truth of the matter is that if policy has an impact on behaviour, that is as true of the policies that have been pursued over the past 12 years as it is of any that may be in his mind.

[Alun Michael]

We are in danger of losing track of the key point because of the slightly partisan approach. Surely, as my hon. Friend says, setting arbitrary numbers is not what will bring success in reducing offending or prison numbers. Doing the right things will reduce offending and reoffending. I suggest that that is the key point of the report.

[Helen Goodman]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right, and I am grateful to him for digging me out of that hole.

What is really valuable in the report is the clear emphasis on reducing reoffending, improving rehabilitation services for people with drug and alcohol problems and mental illnesses, and the demonstration that alternatives to custody can be cost effective. Without lower reoffending rates, it will be difficult to make progress in reducing prison numbers, and I would like to echo the Committee's contention that it should be a guiding principle of the judicial system that each offender should be less likely to reoffend after they complete their sentence than they were before. There is likely to be strong agreement on that point on both sides of the House, and I am pleased that polling shows that 72% of the public also believe that more should be done to rehabilitate offenders. Providing appropriate training and education and alcohol, drug and mental health support are all absolutely central to cutting reoffending rates. Although one would not know it from the crude depiction by the Justice Secretary and other hon. Members of the prison system under the previous Government, Labour made real progress, and the report acknowledges that.

I remind hon. Members that today’s crime statistics show an 8% fall over the past year, as well as rising confidence in the criminal justice system. Reoffending rates have fallen by 16% since 2000, and overall crime fell by more than one third over the lifetime of the Labour Government. During that time, funding for drug treatment programmes saw a fifteenfold increase, and there was a 26% rise in the number of offenders who successfully completed rehabilitation courses. We trebled spending on prisoner education programmes, and our response to the Bradley and Corston reports showed our commitment to improving mental health treatment for prisoners and the position of women offenders.

Given yesterday’s statement by the Chancellor and the savage cuts to the Department’s budget, will the Minister assure us that funding for those programmes will not now be cut? I echo the points raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull East (Karl Turner) and the hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Mr Llwyd). If cuts are to be made, will that not undo our good work and make serious problems even worse?

We know that the number of front-line staff will be cut by 11,000. That will mean 15% fewer prison staff and probation officers, although the number of prisoners is projected to fall by 4%. Will it be possible to do more work with offenders and cut reoffending rates? The documents published yesterday said that people with mental health problems will be diverted at an earlier stage, and many hon. Members said that that would be a positive development. It will be a positive development if people in the Ministry of Justice have agreed it with their colleagues, and if the NHS has made provision for the additional resources needed. That is another point on which I would like to hear what the Minister has to say, either today or later in writing.

The report also warns that the Government should not move away from contracting probation and rehabilitation services to small organisations with a strong track record. Will the coalition’s plans for payment by results not have precisely that impact, with larger groups with good cash flows being better positioned to win contracts and squeeze out smaller competitors? The Government will not be able to make a success of their policy to reduce numbers in prison if they do not redirect resources into tackling the social exclusion that lies at the root of much criminal activity. They must provide the rehabilitative services that offenders need, particularly at a time when we can expect unemployment, and consequently acquisitive crime, to rise.

Much of that spend is outside the Ministry of Justice, but cuts to housing and youth services are likely to be a particular problem. Ministers are clearly using the well-intentioned and prudent proposal to reorientate spending as a smokescreen for cuts in spending on prison places, while failing to invest in the support services that are desperately needed if a more community-orientated approach is to prove effective.

The policy outlined by the Government of cutting spending on probation, rehabilitation and preventive services at the same time as there are significant funding cuts for prison places, is not coherent. As the Committee warns in its report, front-line spending cuts for prisons and probation would

“undermine the progress in performance of both services.”

In short, it would simply exacerbate the problems that the report seeks to remedy.

We need coherent, joined-up responses to the proposals that will allocate resources for our prison population and support the investment in prehabilitation and rehabilitation services that we need in order to reduce long-term offending and reoffending rates.