Sentencing Council Guidelines

Lewis Cocking Excerpts

Monday 17th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Sir Nicholas Dakin]

Policy decisions should always be made by this House; the hon. Member is absolutely correct about that. The background to where we are today is that the Sentencing Council consulted the Government of the day, members of whom are now on the Opposition Benches. The members of that Government were asleep at the wheel. Now it is down to this Government, yet again, to pick up the pieces they left for us and sort out their mess.

[Lewis Cocking (Broxbourne) (Con)]

My constituents are confused about the Justice Secretary’s position. She says she believes that these sentencing guidelines are wrong in principle, and that they amount to differential treatment before the law, but she is in government; she has the power and the tools at her disposal to stop this and change it. Why has she not done so?

[Sir Nicholas Dakin]

I have tried to explain this, and I will explain it once more. The Justice Secretary, the Lord Chancellor, has been extremely clear that she believes in equality before the law, and she is not happy with the guidelines. That is why she wrote as soon as they were published, unlike Conservative Members, who had sight of them earlier in the consultation. They went further than ignoring them; they responded to them in a very positive way.

Oral Answers to Questions

Lewis Cocking Excerpts

Tuesday 11th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Alex Davies-Jones)]

I thank my hon. Friend for that very important question. As part of our manifesto, we committed to fast-tracking rape cases through the system. We are carefully considering the best way to do so, and we will be able to say more about our plans shortly. We are also creating independent legal advisers for adult rape victims, who will be able to access that support at any point from report to trial, so that they know their rights and their rights are protected.

[Lewis Cocking (Broxbourne) (Con)]

T7.   The Government say that foreign national offenders make up 12% of the prison population. Can the Secretary of State tell me when that number will be zero?

[Shabana Mahmood]

What I can tell the hon. Gentleman is that this Government have made faster progress than the previous Government on the deportation of foreign national offenders from our prisons, with numbers that are over 20% higher than the same time last year, and we will keep moving forward.

Drones: High-security Prisons

Lewis Cocking Excerpts

Tuesday 14th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Sir Nicholas Dakin]

As I have already said, it is very important that we tackle drug dependency in prisons. The fact that we now have a little bit more space in prisons allows more work to go on there to tackle drug dependency. We know that education and employment also help to reduce reoffending, which is why we have committed to improving prisoners’ access to not only drug support programmes, but purposeful activity and employment.

[Lewis Cocking (Broxbourne) (Con)]

The Government have said time and again that they want to smash the criminal gangs that illegally smuggle illegal migrants into the UK, yet the Government cannot even smash the gangs that smuggle drugs and phones into our prisons. How can my residents trust the Government to smash these gangs?

[Sir Nicholas Dakin]

The residents of Broxbourne will be well aware that for 14 years, the Government that the hon. Gentleman supported failed to tackle this problem. This Government are rolling up our sleeves and getting on with it.