Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many prisoners were released early under emergency release schemes in each of the last five years.

This Government inherited prisons days from collapse. We had no choice but to take decisive action to stop our prisons overflowing and keep the public safe.

Without the changes this Government made, courts would have had to halt trials, and the police cancel arrests, undermining public safety and leading to a disastrous impact on public confidence in the Criminal Justice System.

We regularly publish data on releases from prison, including on forms of early release – for example we publish SDS40 data alongside the quarterly Offender Management statistics and, before that, on End of Custody Supervised Licence (the early release scheme ran by the previous Government).

Standard Determinate Sentence (SDS40) release data - GOV.UK

End of Custody Supervised Licence (ECSL) detailed data - GOV.UK

Our landmark Sentencing Act 2026 will now deliver a more sustainable solution to the prison capacity crisis we inherited, ensuring there are always enough places for the courts to be able to send people to custody in order to keep the public safe.