Victims and Prisoners Bill

Debate between Lord Bishop of Southwell and Nottingham and Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames

Report stage
Tuesday 21st May 2024 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Bishop of Southwell and Nottingham]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow noble Lords—and noble and learned Lords—and to benefit from their considerable wisdom on the matter at hand. I do not wish to repeat all that has already been said, but my right reverend friend the Bishop of Gloucester has added her name to several amendments in this group. She is sadly unable to be here today, but I know that, like many other noble Lords, she is dedicated to seeing the reform of the criminal justice system, particularly in respect of our prisons, for which she is the lead bishop for the Church of England.

I will reflect briefly on Amendment 140. As has already been said, we know that many IPP prisoners are stuck in the system, and appropriate psychiatric care in the community is not in place to manage their high-support needs. It is clear to anyone who visits prisons and meets IPP prisoners that they suffer great mental distress, reportedly more so than the wider prison population. This sentence—arguably more than any other— disrupts relationships and leads to hopelessness, anxiety and alienation, as we have heard so much about. In many cases, it can be said that the sentence itself is the very cause of that mental distress, as is reported by many chaplains in our prisons.

The changes proposed through this Bill are welcome and, as we have heard, much progress has been made; but, for the sake of both the prisoners in question and the wider community, I submit that the extended aftercare arrangements proposed in Amendment 140 are needed. Like other noble Lords, I ask the Minister to think again on this important matter.

[Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)]

My Lords, it has long seemed strange that, having abolished IPP sentences during the coalition in the LASPO Act, we still have nearly 3,000 prisoners, many of whom had relatively short-term tariffs, in custody or recalled to custody many years after their tariffs have expired.

In this House and elsewhere, there is unanimity that IPPs have been and remain a stain on our justice system, and that they are an inhumane mechanism, unjustly withholding from prisoners a date of release, routinely depriving them of any hope of freedom and causing them serious mental health problems. This is a fact highlighted by the noble and learned Lords, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, Lord Hope of Craighead and Lord Garnier. The IPPs were frequently in the wake of offences that were not of themselves the most serious.

This is all against a background of a Government taking strange measures, almost impossible to justify, to keep down the prison population. As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, pointed out, we have prisoners on determinate sentences being released up to 93 days early, for no good reason apart from that there is no space for them. With Operation Early Dawn, we have hearings of criminal cases being delayed to avoid using up prison space by convicting and sentencing offenders expeditiously. We have a prison building programme that even on the most sanguine projections for planning and construction cannot possibly keep pace with predicted increases in prisoner numbers.

Yet we have a Government who have already been the cause of increasing prisoner numbers—with longer prescribed sentences and legislation increasing times in custody—setting their face against doing more to relieve a significant part of the pressure by releasing IPP prisoners faster and more humanely. Certainly, they have moved some way, and I join my noble friend Lady Burt in welcoming the Government’s movement and in her call in Amendment 140, supported by the noble Baroness, Lady Fox of Buckley, and the right reverend Prelate, for much more and far better aftercare and support for these damaged prisoners who have suffered so much from IPPs. The action plan, so far as it goes, is welcome, as are the other government amendments, in which the Government have accepted the spirit of amendments moved by others throughout the passage of this Bill. I join those others, notably the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, who has been mentioned and who has spoken, in appreciating the discussion and co-operation that we have all had with the Minister. However, one suspects that it has been despite the Minister’s best efforts that the Government have not moved far enough.

Amendment 149A, tabled by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, and noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, and powerfully supported today by the noble Lords, Lord Moylan, Lord Carter, and others, with its requirement for an approach that embodies proportionality, is a modest amendment. Why the Government cannot accept it I cannot imagine. The noble and learned Lord’s amendment is designed to give IPP prisoners the hope that they need. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier, expressed powerfully the effects of the loss of hope for IPP prisoners in the context of this amendment. If the noble and learned Lord does test the opinion of the House, we will support his amendment. I hope only that a good number of Labour Peers and Conservative Peers, in the cross-party spirit shown by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier, will do the same. It would be very welcome if the Government would heed his plea to have one more think.