Separation Centres: Terrorist Offenders

Debate between Lord Timpson and Baroness Butler-Sloss

Tuesday 25th November 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Timpson (Lab)]

My noble friend is right to raise this question. One of the things that surprises me going round prisons now compared with 25 years ago is how much more violence there is on our wings. That is probably due to a combination of the amount of drugs in our prisons and the number of people with severe mental health issues, but also people serving very long sentences.

We are investing in protecting our staff. As my noble friend said, our staff do an amazing job, often in very difficult and dangerous situations. That is why we have invested £15 million in 10,000 personal body armour jackets and suits. We are also training 500 staff in how to use Tasers. Every other week, I speak to prison leaders. Last week, I spoke to the governors of the long-term high-security estate, who told me how much reassurance the staff have had from the fact they are now getting investment in this extra protection.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

Does the Prison Service have sufficient resources for the mental health issues it has to deal with?

[Lord Timpson (Lab)]

I am not an expert in healthcare, but I am an expert in prisons. I see prisoners getting incredible levels of support, often in regimes that are running hot. My personal assessment is that prisoners are getting very good care within a system that is struggling, so we need to make sure that we have a much more stable prison environment. That is why it is very difficult to run everything, to get people out of their cells and to give people the support that they need when we literally have no space left.

It is also important to have the right facilities. The medical facilities in some of the new prisons we have built that I have seen are excellent and appropriate. We are dealing with people who are often very ill. The life expectancy of someone in a prison is much lower on average than someone who has not been to prison. We need to do all we can to support people with their mental health and other health issues.

Recalled Offenders: Sentencing Limits

Debate between Lord Timpson and Baroness Butler-Sloss

Monday 19th May 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Timpson (Lab)]

The noble Lord is part of the IPP team, and we have a meeting later this week where we will be able to discuss things in detail with a number of noble Lords from across the House. One topic that is very dear to my heart is IPP prisoners. Whenever I go to a prison, I always seek out an IPP prisoner; I sit in their cell, and I ask them why they are there, what they are doing to get out and what we can do to support them to get out. But their risk is often far more complex. The reasons why they went to prison in the first place, while it may have been far too long ago, often mean that we need to manage them very safely in the community too. It is something of which I am well aware, and I look forward to further conversations with the noble Lord.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

My Lords, as a result of the right reverend Prelate’s question, can I ask the Minister to what extent probation officers are trained to understand the distinction between minor matters that may not need recall and those that do?

[Lord Timpson (Lab)]

The noble and learned Baroness asks a very good question because, in my view, probation officers do the heavy lifting in the justice system. For too long, they have had too much work in their case loads. Some of that is to do with training and some with introducing technology to ensure that they have more time face to face with offenders. I have an internal review on training going on at the moment, similar to that which I did on prisons before I came into the House, and I assure all noble Lords that, if we are going to fix the problem in our prisons, we need to support our probation staff to do the job that they signed up to do when they joined the service.

Mental Health Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Timpson and Baroness Butler-Sloss

Committee stage
Monday 27th January 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Timpson (Lab)]

I will very happily meet as soon as possible and well before the next stage.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

I appreciate that this is this Minister’s first time, but I would like to speak to his team in the department through him. I find it very difficult to understand why the Minister’s team thinks it is necessary or, indeed, appropriate to invite my noble friend Lady Murphy for a “teach-in”. Does the Minister really mean that? It seems to me utterly inappropriate, and my noble friend could not say it.

[Lord Timpson (Lab)]

I thank the noble and learned Baroness for her comments. I hope the noble Baroness accepts my apology for the way it was phrased. As this is my first Committee, I have been getting a number of messages from officials, and I was trying to work out what I said at which point. I apologise. I will very happily meet the noble Baroness.

Sentencing Review and Prison Capacity

Debate between Lord Timpson and Baroness Butler-Sloss

Wednesday 23rd October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Timpson (Lab)]

I thank the noble Lord for the question. While the review will evaluate the sentencing framework and examine the experiences of all offenders, it will be guided by the evidence of what works to keep the public safe and to rehabilitate offenders. I am focused on the evidence of what works both here and abroad. Currently, judges and sentences already take into account the individual circumstances of each case to account for the culpability of the offender, male or female, and the harm they caused, or intended to cause and any aggravating or mitigating factors.

There are three facts that I am sue the noble Lord will know: female offenders make up only 4% of the prison population; over two-thirds of them are in prison for a non-violent offence; and 55% of women in prison have dependent children. What noble Lords may not know is that the average life expectancy for someone who is not in prison in this country is 82; if you are a man in prison, it is 56; if you are a woman in prison, it is 47. So, we clearly have a lot of work to do to support these very vulnerable and often ill people.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

My Lords, since so many repeat prisoners have drink and drug addictions, are the Government looking at residential establishments outside prison with a probation order, where, if they do not obey at the residential place, they would then go to prison?

[Lord Timpson (Lab)]

The noble and learned Baroness is correct that drugs and alcohol is a massive problem for people in prison and leaving prison. With 49% of prisoners having drug misuse problems, it is not surprising that in prisons there is a demand for drugs. But when people are out, we need to do all we can to help them overcome their addiction problems because otherwise they are far more likely to be recalled and to offend again. So, I am fan of drug-free wings in prisons and of all the excellent support mechanisms already out there. Residential support centres for women are of far more interest for me in the future, and there are a couple of examples that are already starting to work very well.

Prison Capacity

Debate between Lord Timpson and Baroness Butler-Sloss

Wednesday 24th July 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Timpson (Lab)]

I thank my noble friend for the question. It is crucial that people leaving prison have somewhere to live. Having been in this space for a number of years, I have met too many people who have left prison—I have seen them outside the gate—and there is no one to meet them, they have nowhere to live and nowhere to stay that night. It is not surprising that the revolving door often means they come back in. I will take my noble friend’s questions away and get back to him. I know we are meeting very soon.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

I also welcome the noble Lord to his post. He said that the Probation Service is overworked, so what will the Government do to help it immediately to deal with the 40% situation coming in September?

[Lord Timpson (Lab)]

Recruiting 1,000 extra probation officers will take time. From conversations with the probation officers that I have recently met, I know that we are asking a lot of them, but they are confident that they can manage the influx of offenders in September and October safely. In the longer term, they need the extra colleagues and a system that is more stable.