Criminal Law

James Daly Excerpts

Tuesday 28th January 2020 Commons Chamber

[Imran Hussain]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her intervention, but the fact of the matter is that in the last 10 years, this Government have enacted policies that at best ignore the impact on public safety, and at worst actively undermine it. Cuts to the police service have led to frontline police officer numbers being slashed and to forces being under-resourced elsewhere. My police force in West Yorkshire has had its budget cut by £140 million since 2010. We have seen cuts to the Prison Service; prison officer numbers have fallen by a quarter between 2010 and 2015, which has left many of our prisons—including high-security prisons—being staffed by inexperienced officers. We have seen an ill-advised decision to break up the probation service, with catastrophic consequences—something that the whole House now accepts—and just days ago, we were found to be leaving the public less safe as a result of under-staffing and overloading with casework.

Prosecution and conviction rates for serious offences have stalled. That has been driven by these cuts to important services that work to keep reoffending down and the public safe. Most alarmingly, prosecution and conviction rates for the offence of rape have fallen by 32% and 26% respectively in a year, creating a situation that women’s groups say effectively amounts to the decriminalisation of rape. Reoffending rates across the whole range of offences remain stubbornly high, with proven reoffending rates for sexual offences fluctuating at about 14% between 2006-07 and 2016-17. The figures for violence against the person offences have increased from 20% to 26%.

Under this Government, the public are less safe. Faced with such a record, we and the public should rightly be sceptical when the Government talk about cutting crime and keeping the public safe. To try to correct their abysmal record and create an impression that they are tough on crime, the Government have brought forward this order, but even they know that it will not be enough to overturn the problems that they have created. Taken on its own, it will increase neither public confidence nor public safety, and it is far from the silver bullet that the Prime Minister would like to praise it as being.

Throughout this process, the Government have consistently failed to make the case for the order and its implementation. As their own impact assessment and explanatory note point out, judges already have powers akin to the ones set out in this order for dangerous offenders. They have the ability to hand down extended determinate sentences, which not only require an offender to serve longer in custody, but are subject to the double lock of the requirement that the parole board be satisfied the offender is no longer a danger to the public before they are released. Conveniently for the Government, however, Ministers seem to have been remiss in telling the public about that when talking about the action they are taking.

Instead of the Government bringing in such measures without properly making the case for them, and without showing evidence that supports their proposal, they should get serious and tell us how they will reduce the rampant overcrowding and violence in our prisons; how they will increase the quality and availability of real, purposeful activity both in prisons and in the community; how they will deliver an effective probation service that is not hampered by the Government’s failed privatisation agenda, which has proven so disastrous; and for non-violent and non-sexual offenders, how they will deal with the number of ineffective super-short sentences that their own evidence, in the report the Ministry of Justice published last year, shows lead to more people becoming victims of crime than if effective alternatives were used. The Minister accepted that earlier.

[James Daly (Bury North) (Con)]

Does the hon. Member agree that letting violent and sexual offenders back on the streets after they have served just half their sentence is clearly letting victims down?

[Imran Hussain]

Let me remind the hon. Gentleman that I made it absolutely clear at the beginning that we are in full agreement that serious and dangerous offenders who pose a risk to the public must serve sentences that reflect the severity of their crimes and keep the public safe. The point we are making—I will go on to make it, if the hon. Gentleman will allow me—is that this is a missed opportunity. Quite frankly, there are so many underlying issues that are not being addressed, and as I have said, the order will not single-handedly achieve the objectives mentioned.

We are concerned about the additional pressures that the order will place on an already overstretched Prison and Probation Service. That point was made by the hon. Member for Cheltenham (Alex Chalk), who does not appear to be in his place now, but is a learned Member and comes with some experience. The probation service, without sufficient places or staff, will be forced to do the same level of rehabilitative work with offenders after their release, but in the shorter time before the end of their licence period.

The Government have not made the case for this order. To do so, they could have brought forward a comprehensive plan to deal with the additional burden the order will place on our already overstretched Prison and Probation Service—evidence shows that is the most effective way to protect the public—but they did not. We urge the Government to look into and address these issues, and to ensure that prisons have the investment and support they need to meet the needs of their existing population.

The Government must also ensure that the forthcoming changes to the probation service see it better funded and better supported, so it can return to being the award-winning service, protecting the public, that it was before the Conservative party made the disastrous decision to break up and part-privatise probation. The Government must ensure that the Parole Board is sufficiently respected and resourced to deal with release decisions for the most serious offenders and keep the public safe.

This order is ultimately a missed opportunity for the Government. It is a missed opportunity to bring forward a comprehensive and evidence-led sentencing reform package that would make the changes necessary to reduce the number of victims of crime, and to begin to allow the public to regain confidence in our crumbling justice system.

--- Later in debate ---

[James Daly (Bury North) (Con)]

Prior to coming to the House I was a criminal legal aid defence solicitor for 16 years. As my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill) mentioned, this statutory instrument simply takes us back to a position that I recognise from the courts prior to 2003. It is no more than that. Sentencing is a multifaceted matter that covers many issues, but I have yet to hear one positive, coherent argument as to why we should keep automatic release at the halfway stage in sentences for the most dangerous offenders. There is no argument for doing that. I have yet to have a constituent in Bury North knock on my door to say that we must keep that for the public good—there clearly is no public good in it.

We are here to defend the public interest. Why is this statutory instrument in the public interest? It will protect the public, for the reasons articulated by all speakers in this debate. Importantly, it will increase the deterrent impact of long-term sentences. What I take from my experience in the courts is that severe, deterrent sentences have an impact on behaviour, which this debate sometimes seems to ignore.

As other colleagues have said, this measure allows an extra period of rehabilitation for offenders. Valid points have been raised about the nature of the rehabilitation programmes that are available, especially in prisons, because sentencing is worth little if it is not effective. Sadly, despite our having fantastic probation officers and fantastic prison officers, my experience of working in the criminal justice system is that rehabilitative sentences have simply not achieved the expected outcomes, whether in reducing reoffending rates or putting people on to a more positive way of life. I urge my hon. Friend the Minister to look at those sentences, because they are not working. Much work has to be done to address the underlying reasons for offending. Most importantly, victims and their families must be at the centre of our thoughts in any sentencing guidelines and sentencing measures that come through this place. I am sorry for repeating myself, but it is inconceivable that we could say dangerous offenders should automatically be released at the 50% stage—it is as simple as that.

We are dancing on the head of a pin. We can debate other important things, but I would welcome it if any hon. Member could point to a constituent who thinks such automatic release is a good idea.

[Tom Hunt (Ipswich) (Con)]

We recently had a tragic case in Ipswich in which a young man was murdered. The murderers were sentenced to life in prison, and another was sentenced to 14 years for manslaughter. He bragged on Facebook about how easy it is in prison and how he will be let out halfway. As a direct result of that action, would it not be reasonable to eliminate any chance he has of being let out halfway?

[James Daly]

Absolutely. My hon. Friend’s words speak for themselves.

I congratulate the Front-Bench team and my other colleagues. We are acting on a manifesto commitment that is in the public interest and that will have an impact on offending behaviour. We have all talked about other related issues, but this is a good measure that is supported by the public, and I warmly welcome it.