Baroness Burt of Solihull
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IPP Sentences
Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts(3 days, 15 hours ago)
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Lord Timpson (Lab)
I thank the noble Lord for his question and for coming along on Thursday. The Parole Board is the best body to decide who is safe to be released, because public protection is our priority. If we went with the Howard League’s suggestion, it would mean people being released without their risk being assessed, which is not something that we are prepared to do.
Baroness Burt of Solihull (LD)
Sorry—a lot of us are very keen to speak up on this matter.
The six recommendations in the report are a brilliant way to ensure that IPP prisoners can be looked after properly and released safely. One recommendation that particularly struck me was one that I had moved previously: recommendation 4, which recommended that the aftercare duty provided under Section 117 of the Mental Health Act be extended to all ex-IPP prisoners. If someone happens to be sectioned under that section, many safe and timely ways to give additional help to high-needs individuals are available so that they can be released safely and remain in the community. Why not give the rest of them the same multiagency support as they would have received had they been incarcerated in a mental hospital?
Lord Timpson (Lab)
We have 233 IPP prisoners in secure mental health hospitals. From having been to the hospitals and met the individuals, I know that the care that they get from our nursing professionals is exceptional. It is also important that when they come back into the prison system, they have a soft landing and not a hard landing. That is an area that I am working on as we speak. Also important is that when people leave prison, they go to an approved premises. We have a trial going on where we are extending them going there from 12 to 16 weeks but also having a dedicated individual psychologist to support them. That is already having gains now.