Prisoner Release Checks

Liz Saville Roberts Excerpts

Monday 27th October 2025 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lammy]

My hon. Friend is right to mention the end of the early supervised licence scheme that was set up by the last Government and revised four times, and under which 10,000 people were released. It was effectively done on the quiet, in a chaotic way, and that is when we began to see the spike. It is not about making partisan or political points, but the truth is that we all know that the prison system that we inherited was in a dire situation. We now need to get a grip where mistakes are being made, which is why the officer involved has been suspended under investigation, the checks and balances in place are now the toughest we have had, we are asking duty governors to look at cases the night before, particularly in relation to foreign national offenders, and we have Dame Lynne Owens doing a further investigation.

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

I put on the record my role as the co-chair of the justice unions parliamentary group. Everyone here will want to make sure that this kind of outrageous error never happens again. The chief inspector of prisons warned today of a “systematic problem” of increased releases in error, citing “very busy people, often quite inexperienced, with huge caseloads”. He also warned that prisons are dependent on west African officers whom we might now lose thanks to the changes to visa thresholds that are expected to cause “an enormously damaging effect” on some prisons. With that in mind—because the Government have control over it—will the Justice Secretary press the Home Office to look again at how changes to the skilled workers visa are directly causing prison staff shortages and worsening prison performance?

[Mr Lammy]

I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for putting on the record the challenge we have with junior staff. I am very grateful for the work in our prison system of those staff, who are much beloved, who have come from west Africa, largely Nigeria, to support the system for a period of time. I recognise the challenges that the right hon. Lady articulates and, of course, as she would expect, all such matters are under discussion.