Criminal Law

Desmond Swayne Excerpts

Tuesday 28th January 2020 Commons Chamber

[Chris Philp]

It has been 47 days since the general election, and these measures deliver on a crucial manifesto commitment. Taken together, they will ensure that the most serious violent and sexual offenders spend two thirds of their sentence in jail, rather than half their sentence, as is currently the case. By making this change, we both protect the public and ensure that justice is better done. We protect the public because while someone is in prison they cannot commit any further offences, and we will be increasing the length of time they spend in prison. Secondly, this change will build public confidence in the justice system in general and the sentencing regime in particular.

[Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)]

Would the public’s confidence not be served if prisoners served the sentence that was delivered in court, rather than this fabrication whereby the sentence is announced and everybody works out on the back of a fag packet what it actually in means for the sentence that will be served? Why go for two thirds, up from a half—why not have the sentence that was delivered in court by a judge served?

[Chris Philp]

There are provisions, which I shall explain in a moment, to make sure that many of the most dangerous offenders serve all of their sentence in jail, but for many offenders the sentence has two parts: the part served in jail and the part supervised on licence following their release from jail. Together, those two parts make up the sentence. Moving the release point to two thirds for the category of offences we are talking about will make sure that more of an offender’s sentence is served in jail and less of it is supervised under licence. For certain categories of serious offender, as my right hon. Friend mentions, there is a legitimate public expectation that more than half the sentence will be served in prison, rather than automatic release happening at the halfway point. As the Minister responsible for sentencing, I get quite a lot of correspondence from the public and from victims of crime asking why some very serious violent and sexual offenders are released at the halfway point, which is what currently happens.

Let me be clear what this debate will not cover. The regulations do not cover serious terrorist offenders, who will be dealt with separately in a piece of primary legislation that we intend to bring forward shortly to honour a manifesto commitment. Nor will we cover the wider issues to do with sentencing, which we will consider via a sentencing White Paper and sentencing Bill later this year.