Criminal Justice Reform

Debate between Jonathan Brash and Alex Norris

Tuesday 1st September 2026 Commons Chamber

[Alex Norris]

Tagging is exceptionally important. The technology is improving, as is compliance with the contract. Similarly, we are making changes as part of this process. The presumption of tagging eliminates a point of failure, and tagging in prisons—a pilot that is developing—also reduces failure at that point. However, I appreciate the substance of the right hon. Lady’s point: we have to demonstrate to those who are interested in this space that this big commitment will be impactful. That is why I have made the commitment to do challenge work with those who care about this issue to demonstrate what we are doing.

[Mr Jonathan Brash (Hartlepool) (Lab)]

My constituent Terry Rowley received an IPP sentence on 8 February 2008 with a minimum tariff of one year and 126 days. That was 6,780 days ago—more than 18 and a half years—and yet he remains in prison. The Government have rightly committed to ending this injustice. Will the Justice Secretary ensure that as we do so, people like Terry will have a fair, transparent and genuinely rehabilitative route to release, while the public continue to be protected?

[Alex Norris]

I totally agree. It is worth pausing and reflecting on what my hon. Friend has just said: someone who went to prison for a one-and-a-half-year sentence is still there 18 and a half years later. All of us should feel discomfort about that. It is right that we put the best possible support in place for those who are on that journey and passing Parole Board processes in order to attain their release from prison. For those who are not, we have to look at a way to bring IPP to a close. I am committed to working with colleagues to do so.

Rochdale Grooming Gang: Offender Deportation

Debate between Jonathan Brash and Alex Norris

Monday 6th July 2026 Commons Chamber

[Alex Norris]

Fundamentally, when it comes to options that we take forward, it will be for the public to assess whether or not they think we are doing the right thing and for us to demonstrate that we are. On that specific case, as I think the hon. Gentleman would understand, there are important safeguards around the information that we would share, particularly around victims first, but we can, with constituency MP and victim consent, share some of that information. Let me pursue that with the hon. Gentleman outside these proceedings, because I want him to have the fullest information impossible so he can see, as would be my contention to all colleagues, just how vigorously we pursue removals of foreign criminals.

[Mr Jonathan Brash (Hartlepool) (Lab)]

Some crimes are so despicable and some individuals so evil that they forfeit their rights and their protections, and we must change the law to ensure that they are never afforded them. Is not the law change required here to ensure that no individual can ever again be released unless the very next day they are being deported from this country?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Jonathan Brash and Alex Norris

Monday 17th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[Alex Norris]

All local authorities get an extra payment of £1,200 when someone in the supported estate ends up in their local authority, so I cannot quite understand that characterisation. If I have understood wrongly, I would be keen to meet the hon. Gentleman to understand his point, because we appreciate that there is an impact on local communities. We want to make sure that things go as smoothly as possible for the people who live in them, and we want to get this right.

[Mr Jonathan Brash (Hartlepool) (Lab)]

Hartlepool police do a magnificent job, but like police in the rest of the Cleveland force area, they are hamstrung by a funding formula that is broken. The victims core grant works out at £7 a crime in my constituency. Down the road in North Yorkshire, the figure is £19 a crime. That is unfair and unjust. Can the Minister please commit to fixing this fundamental unfairness?

Community Engagement Principles and Extremism Definition

Debate between Jonathan Brash and Alex Norris

Tuesday 21st January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Alex Norris]

I agree with a lot of what the hon. Lady’s says about earlier interventions and tackling isolation at its root. As she says, local authorities are really important partners in that endeavour. That is why we will ensure that whatever comes out of our communities and recovery steering group leans into the partnership with local authorities and local law enforcement, where possible, to ensure that the right resources and support are in place.

The hon. Lady asks about engagement and ensuring that we have a contribution from those affected across our faith communities. My noble Friend from the other place, Lord Khan, the Faith Minister, has met representatives of all faiths and will continue to do so. The Government will keep having that important dialogue with different faith groups to ensure that the ideas that we bring forward will be effective and are rooted in real life, but we will also promote inter-faith work, which she mentioned. I know from my own community that when we have had challenges, the best thing we have had to lean on to tackle hate, wherever it might emerge, is the inter-faith relationship.

[Mr Jonathan Brash (Hartlepool) (Lab)]

There is real division in our communities, and extremism is changing at great speed. Although the vast majority of Members in this House treat such division as a tragedy and as something that needs to be solved calmly, there are some, sadly, who appear to view it as a political opportunity. Does the Minister agree that Members need to be calm in their dialogue on this issue, and that when they are not, they should be called out by all political parties?

[Alex Norris]

I have always felt that there were two types of politician. There are those who seek to move things forward politically by bringing people together, and those who seek to exploit division. It is up to individual hon. and right hon. Members to decide which is their personal approach. When there is divisive—or bordering on hateful—language in political parties, we would expect them to resolve that in their normal ways. With regard to leadership in this country, we are certainly the luckiest people in the country. We get to come here every day and tackle these issues head-on in the interests of our communities and our country. Almost exclusively, Members use that platform for good. We have important distinctions and differences, and that is great in a democracy, but we want to bring the country together and move it forward together. That is certainly the approach that I will be using.