Prisons: Overcrowding

Lord Judd Excerpts

Thursday 14th May 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Keen of Elie]

First, we have made provision to ensure that we did not come up to capacity in our prisons, but we did not commit to releasing a set number of prisoners. In the event, given developments in jury trials in Crown Courts and magistrates’ courts, since mid-March we have seen a significant fall in the number of prisoners. As regards the emergency release provisions that were announced and to which the noble Lord referred, the position as at 12 May this year is that 21 pregnant women or mothers have been removed from mother and baby units, five extremely vulnerable prisoners have been released, and 57 prisoners have been released under the end of custody temporary release scheme, giving a total of 83 releases under the scheme.

[Lord Judd (Lab)]

Can the Minister confirm that the central plank of government penal policy is rehabilitation because it makes economic sense, while the cost of not successfully rehabilitating becomes very heavy to society? In that context, will he explain how keeping prisoners in humiliating and degrading conditions can possibly assist in the process of rehabilitation? Is getting these things right not urgent if we are sincere about saving the nation money by not having a high rate of reoffending?

[Lord Keen of Elie]

The noble Lord is quite right: rehabilitation is one of the central pillars of our policy with regard to prisons. That has been made extremely difficult by reason of the Covid pandemic. It has been necessary to limit the movement of prisoners within prisons in order to contain the Covid threat. It has been necessary to curtail rehabilitation schemes and education schemes. That is extremely unfortunate, but we hope that, as soon we are beyond the Covid issue, we will be able to return to the schemes we have in place for rehabilitation.