Life Sentences: Public Understanding

Mark Hendrick Excerpts

Tuesday 30th April 2024 Westminster Hall

[Sir Mark Hendrick (in the Chair)]

I call Dr Kieran Mullan to move the motion and will then call the Minister to respond. As is the convention for 30-minute debates, there will not be an opportunity for the member in charge to wind up.

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered public understanding of life sentences.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Mark. I welcome this opportunity to discuss crime and justice, one of the topics that motivated me to enter politics and that I have focused on in my time as an MP. As the son of a policeman, and having spent time volunteering as a special constable, I am acutely aware of the way that crime can destroy families and upend the lives of decent, law-abiding people. Wanting the victims of crime and their families to benefit from a more just justice system is something that I feel passionately about. I always aim to contribute to the debate and to edge the system in a direction that I think better delivers the justice that it should be set up to deliver. I have spoken before in this place about my concern that all too often the victims of the most serious crimes and their families do not see justice done.

Before I speak about the use of the term “life sentences” specifically, I will set out the background. My time campaigning in this area has taught me that there is what I have described previously as “intellectual snobbery” about people who think that our justice system is at times insufficiently punitive. There are well-meaning and in many respects important groups that lobby hard to make the system less punitive, and nothing that I believe invalidates their arguments or counteracts efforts to deliver reform and rehabilitation of offenders. If such efforts work and overall there are fewer victims of crime, that will be a good thing, but as a Conservative, I believe that we should keep one eye on reality as well as one eye on the ideal future. Criminal behaviour is not going anywhere any time soon, and even the best rehabilitative systems see recalcitrant and very serious offenders.

Also, we have to recognise that, in and of itself, punishing offenders is a public good; in fact, it is recognised in the law as one of the purposes of sentencing. Whether we like to admit it or not, it helps victims and their family and friends to feel that justice has been done, and in the aftermath of a serious crime, whatever comfort we can bring to victims’ families is incredibly important. I would argue that punishment is fundamental to our system. It tells victims and their families that they should not take matters into their own hands, because the justice system will deal with things fairly.

Of course, there are no black-and-white answers stating what that will mean in every case, but almost nobody who argues for less punitive measures would suggest, for example, that a murderer—even one who we could guarantee would not offend again—should spend just four weeks in prison. Nearly everyone accepts that punishment is necessary, and it is easy to suggest outcomes that 99% of people would agree instinctively are too lenient. In the most serious cases, there is in my view a huge—indeed yawning—gap between what most fair-minded people would think constitutes justice and what actually happens.

I am also concerned that the Department itself—the Ministry of Justice—does not sufficiently engage with this issue. That engagement is sometimes missing from impact assessments and policy changes, and perhaps even more worrying is its absence from the MOJ’s own annual report. The focus is on victims’ experiences of the processes of the justice system, which is of course important and to be welcomed, but I think that what most victims and their families want most of all is for justice to be done, and the MOJ has little to say on whether or not the justice system as it stands is actually delivering that. I have suggested before that we could start by at least asking people what they think about this issue, but there has been little appetite for that.

I will never forget what the father of Sarah Everard said when the murderer of his child was sentenced to a whole-life order—a very rare thing in our justice system. He said that it was the only thing that brought him any comfort. I do not think that he would have felt any different if the perpetrator had not been a policeman, even though it was only because the perpetrator was a policeman that a whole-life order was given. I believe that the view that father expressed is common among the families of murder victims.

Because this is a subjective issue, I think that the views of victims’ families and the public at large should act as a powerful and important standard against which we hold ourselves, albeit it should not be the only consideration. I remember discussing this question with Elsie Urry, a lady whose three children were brutally murdered in 1973 by a man who she thought was then sent to prison for the rest of his life, only for him to be released in 2019 when he was considered to be no longer a danger to others.

That brings me on to the use of the term “life sentence”. The first thing we need is transparency about what our justice system is actually delivering. Without it, the public do not necessarily know what is happening, and if they do not know what is happening, politicians will not be held to account properly, which is very unfortunate in a democracy. The focus of my debate is to highlight the fact that, in the current system, what is happening is frequently misreported and misunderstood, giving the impression that our justice system is more punitive than it is, particularly when it comes to the most serious offences.

What is called a life sentence is in fact, in sentencing practice—a sentence of a minimum term of imprisonment, after which there is an opportunity for release with the remainder of the offender’s life spent on licence. But what is actually reported? What do the public get told? I was pleased to be able to explore this issue in more depth in the Justice Committee’s report, “Public opinion and understanding of sentencing”, which states:

“The use by major news outlets of the phrase “jailed for life” when they are not referring to a whole life order is an example of how media coverage risks perpetuating misunderstandings of the law on life sentences among the public. Reporting of sentencing that potentially inflates expectations of how long a person will serve in prison risks damaging public confidence.”

A whole-life order is a term of lifelong imprisonment; it is different from a life sentence.

Since late last year, my office has regularly monitored this issue, and I am afraid that it is not just the media that spreads this misunderstanding. Even more concerning is the fact that police forces and, on one occasion, the Crown Prosecution Service have incorrectly used the phrase “jailed for life” to describe a life sentence. Just today, Nottinghamshire police force released a statement with a headline saying that two murderers had been “jailed for life”. That is simply not true. The two individuals had received life sentences with minimum terms of 16 and 19 years. That is very different from being jailed for life, as we can reasonably expect both of them to be released.

Since October 2023, we have had to contact eight police forces for using the phrase “jailed for life” in their headlines about 13 cases. On six occasions, the police forces in their opening paragraphs failed even to explain the minimum tariff set by the courts, and once a police force failed entirely to mention that there was a minimum tariff. I am pleased to say that three police forces admitted their mistake and subsequently changed their statements after we contacted them, but the majority have not. That matters. People do not always read all the details of a news article, let alone of an official press release from a police force. Every time “jailed for life” is used of someone subject to a life sentence, people get a false impression of what is happening.

I do not want to diminish the many positive things that this Government have done to introduce what I think are fairer punitive elements into the system, not least the big step change away from Labour’s halfway early release to a two-thirds release for the worst offenders, and the introduction of a whole-life order for premeditated child murder. I welcome the planned introduction of whole-life orders when there is a single victim whose murder involved sexual or sadistic conduct, instead of the existing requirement for two victims.

There is much for me to welcome, but I am clear that we must go further on child murder. I think the requirement for significant premeditation is too high a burden, as it excludes, for example, a parent battering their own child to death in a rage. In addition, where multiple offences are involved, our system is too quick to have sentences served concurrently. We have seen this in cases of historical child sex abuse, where there are sometimes dozens of victims and hundreds of offences. Measures need to be in place to impose whole-life orders in some cases of that type.

Such changes are difficult to make. They are expensive changes for the Government, and there is always pressure on prison places. We can hope for success only if people understand how rarely whole-life orders are used, and that life sentences are not in any way comparable, especially given the usual minimum terms. If most people serving a life sentence did in fact spend most or all of the rest of their life in prison, this would be less pressing, but they do not. On average, they serve 20 years.

Some people will argue that the term “life sentence” is accurate because it describes the rest of an offender’s life being served on licence. When we make that argument, however, we risk offending the victims and their families. Families of victims of murder are really serving a life sentence of grief, trauma, and terrible memories of what happened to their loved one. Someone serving their sentence on licence out in the community is basically just being asked to do what all of us are asked to do, which is to not offend. That is a burden that we all face, and I do not see it as in any way equivalent to spending time in prison. None of this is an issue for those familiar with legal jargon, but when a member of the public who is less well informed of what the terminology means reads “jailed for life”, they are being misled.

I am aware of an almost diametrically opposed view of the public understanding of sentencing, though. A commonly made argument is that, broadly, away from the issue of what a life sentence means, the public underestimate sentencing lengths and think we are less punitive than we are. That is undoubtedly driven by media reporting, where journalists, who have a good innate sense of what the public will think is reasonable, are quick to report cases where they sense that that has not happened. Often, however, an unjustified logical step is made by advocates of less punitive approaches: that because of that, we do not need to make the system more punitive. That approach forgets that two things can be true at the same time: people can think our system is less punitive than it is, but they can also think, even when presented with the reality, that it is not punitive enough.

There is another argument based on research in which the public are asked to go through more detailed theoretical cases and sentencing exercises. Studies suggest that people agree with the sentences normally given when they have the full picture. However, almost universally, these exercises look at less serious offending and cases that are full of mitigating circumstances. My focus has always been on the worst and most serious offending. I do not think I have ever seen one of these exercises take someone through the case, for example, of a serial rapist in and out of prison who refuses to engage in behavioural change programs, or of a parent who batters, tortures, neglects and then murders their own child. That leaves me still firmly of the view that, in the most serious cases, the problem of misreporting remains important.

There are things we can do about this. First, as part of the Justice Committee’s inquiry into the public understanding of sentencing, the Committee travelled to Finland and the Netherlands to speak to officials and stakeholders about how they approached reporting sentencing to the public, including the role of media or press judges engaging with the media on reports. The press judges undertake their media duties in addition to their role as a judge, so that when a sentence is handed down, communication with the media is managed by a press judge rather than the sentencing judge. I was not able to be there, but I know the Committee heard that press judges actively engage with the media on public interest cases in particular, even participating in interviews. Committee members also visited the Helsinki District Court, where judges were encouraged to write their own press notices following the passing of a sentence, in order to take the news into their own hands. As a result, early reports on a sentence were often based upon the judge’s press notice, ensuring greater accuracy in initial media accounts of the sentencing decision. That is something we could consider.

Ultimately, we have to accept that the term “life sentence” is at the root of the problem. It is too easily misunderstood and therefore too easily misreported. If terminology is causing a problem, we should change it. We just do not need the term. The judiciary can describe and report what they are doing: passing a minimum term with an opportunity for future release, followed by continuous monitoring on licence. I do not expect extinguishing the term to cause an overnight change. The media and public bodies are used to using it and “jailed for life” is a catchy headline, but over time we could see a change and have a more honest understanding of our judicial system.

It may be that I and those who share my views have no more success in making the case for changes on the matter of substance—the sentences actually being served—but at least we will be making that case in a more honest environment. I am arguing for transparency in sentencing, because I know that that is important to victims of crime and their families, and to the public. I hope the Minister sees the value in that, and will reflect on what I have said and try to find a positive way forward.

Oral Answers to Questions

Mark Hendrick Excerpts

Tuesday 16th May 2023 Commons Chamber

The Secretary of State was asked—

[Sir Mark Hendrick (Preston) (Lab/Co-op)]

1. What recent estimate he has made of the size of the backlog of criminal court cases in Preston constituency.

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

11. What steps he is taking to tackle court backlogs.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mike Freer)]

The outstanding case load at Preston Crown court stood at 1,454 cases at the end of December 2022. We are taking action across the criminal justice system to bring the caseload down and improve waiting times for those who use our courts. We have ramped up the additional capacity, we have recently announced the continued use of 24 Nightingale courtrooms in this financial year, and we are investing a significant amount of funding in the criminal justice system.

[Sir Mark Hendrick]

The backlog of court cases means that victims of rape, sexual abuse and violent crime face years of delay in their fight for justice. The emotional burden of the trial and delays have led to victims dropping out of the process and feeling that they would be unwilling to engage again in future. That has happened to a Preston constituent of mine who, after five years, is still waiting for her court case. Does the Secretary of State believe that that is an acceptable state for the British justice system to be in?

[Mike Freer]

I appreciate, and I know that colleagues in the judiciary appreciate, the sensitivities around such cases. They will always do their best to bring vulnerable cases forward so that victims are seen as fast as possible. There can be a variety of reasons why cases are delayed. If the hon. Gentleman wishes to write to me with the specifics of the case, I can try to find out exactly what caused the delays.

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Mark Hendrick Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Monday 11th September 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Mark Hendrick (Preston) (Lab/Co-op)]

I accept the result of the referendum even though, as a committed European, I fought vehemently on the remain side. Even though I believe that the leave campaign told a pack of lies, I still think that I am obliged to support the outcome of the referendum, which the leave side won by 52% to 48%—very close to the 53% to 47% result in my constituency. I did not like the result, but I respect it, so afterwards I voted for article 50. I have no regrets because, although I deplore the result, I accept it.

We need all these laws transposed into UK law en masse. I have no problem with that. The 12,000 regulations amassed over 44 years need to be in place so that the UK can continue to function normally. The hon. Member for South Dorset (Richard Drax) mentioned unelected officials making these decisions, and many other Members have talked about faceless bureaucrats, but as a former MEP who used to spend hours sitting on—in many cases extremely boring—committees, often late and into the morning, I can say that there has been a great deal of democratically elected input into many of those directives. When I was a member of the European Scrutiny Committee, I fully understood the toils of many elected politicians and what they would have been through when the directives finally arrived in this House for scrutiny. It seems a shame that a former member of the European Scrutiny Committee did not appreciate how those directives and regulations were made.

The sweeping and draconian powers introduced by the Bill are an affront to this Parliament and to democracy, with the Henry VIII powers and the Government’s taking control of powers that should be devolved to the devolved regions and Scotland. Many leavers talked about taking back control; this does not bring back control to the democratic Parliament, but gives it to a cobbled-together minority Government who thought that they would have a huge majority but have not. That minority Government seek overwhelming power when they are struggling in Brexit negotiations and want to make big changes to European laws that they have been complaining about for decades.

The scenario looks likely to be as follows. In 2019, the Government will either get no trade deal, a very bad one involving tariffs, or something akin to a WTO trade deal. The deal will be put to Parliament and the people, and people the length and breadth of the country will see that that deal is bad. I believe that the mood in this country will change from being 52% in favour of leaving to quite the reverse. A deal with the US, China and/or India will be embryonic, if not very distant, on the day before Brexit. EU law will then become UK law. The day after that, the Government will start doing what they have been threatening to do for generations—they will set about health and safety regulations, employment regulations, consumer law that protects citizens, and environmental regulations.

The scene is set for the UK to go backwards, with a hard Brexit meaning a huge problem with trade and prosperity. We will see a diminution of the rules, regulations and protections that the EU has brought to workers and consumers in this country. At the same time, business and trade will be hard hit. This is a recipe for disaster and an attack on workers, consumers and businesses up and down the country that deserve better.

This Government will go down in history as one who failed to deliver a successful Brexit, failed to compensate for what was lost through the trade and business they promised with other parts of the world, failed to protect our workers and consumers, and failed to protect the businesses that depend on them. I do not think that the public will forgive the Government; history certainly will not. I shall oppose the Bill.

--- Later in debate ---

[Victoria Atkins (Louth and Horncastle) (Con)]

I will endeavour to follow the plea of the hon. Member for Bishop Auckland (Helen Goodman) and deliver what I hope will be a thoughtful speech. She may not agree with every point, but I promise her that I have been thinking about it a great deal as I have sat through the debate not just today, but on Thursday. That has given me quite a lot of time to do so.

I have approached this debate as I would have done if I had been instructed in a case in my previous career. We have the end point, whereby the United Kingdom is leaving Europe. Can we achieve that end in a smooth way that provides as much certainty around the norm as possible? Indeed, I believe that the Government must achieve that in the smoothest way possible for all our constituents and all the businesses upon which our economy relies. Ensuring a smooth exit is the right thing to do legally, morally and economically. There has been talk in the Chamber today about the impact on business, and we know that having successful businesses and a growing economy are the things that create jobs and help to pay for the services we care about, such as the national health service. It is in the interests of each and every one of us for the Government to achieve the smoothest possible transition out of the EU.

How do we achieve that? The Bill starts from the premise that EU law will be transferred into British law. At this stage, there are no changes; there is purely a replication across from EU law into the British legal system. Let us not forget that that is quite a lot of law—40 years’ worth of law making—and it is an enormous task. What measures can the Government realistically take to achieve it? I have listened with great care to Members on both sides of the House, but particularly Opposition Members, who plan to vote against the Bill tonight. I have listened to what they have said about the process, and there are indeed some points on which areas of agreement can be found across the House, but I have not yet heard anyone come up with a different way of doing this in the very short timeframe we have. It seems to me that we have to work on the basis that the wholesale adoption of EU law is the way to go, and I foresee in the years to come that this Parliament will play a very active role in deciding which laws it likes and which it does not.

I want to inject just a touch of realpolitik. After two days of debating the power grab, as it is called by some, by the Executive, I suspect that any Minister seeking to exercise the powers under clauses 7, 9 and 17 will be very careful in so exercising them, because they know that many eagle-eyed people on both sides of the House will ensure that they behave properly and within the spirit of the law.

[Mr Hendrick]

Many of us have a beef not with the way in which the laws will be transferred from Europe to the UK, but with the way in which the laws will be treated afterwards. The sweeping powers that the Bill provides will make it possible for Ministers to abuse powers that they have not been given by the electorate. This House should have control of that, not Ministers by their gerrymandering in this Bill.

[Victoria Atkins]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that intervention because it gives me the opportunity to mention the sunset clauses in relation to both clauses 7 and 9. I will not make Ministers’ lives easy, because I note that there is no corresponding sunset clause in relation to clause 17, but it may well be possible to discuss that in Committee. We have the comfort of knowing, however, that clause 9 will stop once exit day has happened and that clause 7 will operate for two years thereafter.

As I have said, I have had the pleasure of listening to two days of debate on this Bill, and the quality of debate has been excellent. There have been some very thoughtful suggestions about how the Bill can be perfected, and I have been emailed, as have many colleagues, by constituents with their thoughts on the Bill. In particular, I note the concerns about triaging SIs. I also note the contribution of my right hon. Friend the Member for Newbury (Richard Benyon) about infractions, and those of my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) and my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill) about the Francovich rulings. I am sure that Ministers have listened to those points and will bear them in mind on this—let us face it—unprecedented legal course that we are taking. It is a very exciting time: it is not what I voted for, but we are in it and we have to make the best of it now. We must ensure the smoothest possible exit from the EU to our new place in the world.

I will end with this point: in 2015, I stood on a manifesto commitment that I would support the Conservative Government in holding a referendum and then in honouring its result. Tonight, I will vote to repeal the 1972 Act and to start the smooth process of transition. It is a promise made and a promise kept. We in this House are often accused of not keeping our promises, but this is a promise that I feel morally and democratically obliged to keep, and keep it I will.

Human Rights Act 1998 (Repeal and Substitution) Bill

Mark Hendrick Excerpts

Friday 1st March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Damian Green]

I can only say that were I extending debate on the Bill unnecessarily, Mr Deputy Speaker would call me to account. I am dealing with the central issues that the Bill has raised, and I hope I am doing so in appropriate detail, as the measure is so serious and important. However, I take the hon. Gentleman’s point and I shall delay no further.

On the central question of whether there should be a UK Bill of Rights, a majority of the commission concluded that there is a strong argument in favour. That was on the basis that any such Bill would incorporate and build on all the United Kingdom’s existing obligations under the European convention on human rights, and that it would provide no less protection than is contained currently both in the Human Rights Act and in the devolution settlements. This was in line with the Commission’s terms of reference.

The majority saw the current lack of public ownership of the Human Rights Act and the European convention on human rights as the most compelling reason in favour of a new Bill of Rights. Indeed, my hon. Friend the Member for Dover made similar points in his speech. Some of those in the majority who favoured a Bill of Rights felt that any new Bill could usefully define the scope of some rights more clearly and adjust their balance. That is another point on which there is some concurrence between the Commission’s findings and the rationale behind the present Bill.

The two Commissioners in the minority concluded that the Commission’s two consultations and its deliberations had failed to identify any real shortcomings in either the existing Human Rights Act or how it is applied by the domestic courts. Although unable to reach agreement on all its conclusions, the Commission’s report identified issues that would need careful consideration before a Bill of Rights was introduced. Given the ongoing human rights debate, it is no surprise that the Bill also touches on some of these issues, for example, on what scope there is for more clearly incorporating the concept of responsibilities as well as rights in any new legislative framework. The Commission also proposed consideration of whether any new Bill of Rights in the future should include additional rights beyond those contained in the Human Rights Act, and my hon. Friend’s Bill addresses similar issues.

The Commission was also united in urging the Government to continue to pursue reform of the European Court of Human Rights. The Government agree to the importance of maintaining the report’s momentum. My right hon. Friend the Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice recently appeared before the Joint Committee on Human Rights and made it clear that in his view there was a strong case for further reform along the lines that I have expressed today. He is working not just with colleagues in Government here, but in Strasbourg to secure an agreed approach to the longer-term future of the Court.

[Mark Hendrick (Preston) (Lab/Co-op)]

On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. The Minister has now been speaking for 45 minutes. Each Conservative Member who spoke in the debate did so for about an hour. Clearly, this is a tactic to stop us getting to the International Development (Official Development Assistance Target) Bill, which the Government supposedly support. Does using such tactics to stop the Bill being heard today not make a mockery of the Prime Minister’s attempts to try to detoxify the Conservative party?

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

That is not a point of order, but the hon. Gentleman has made his point in a forceful manner. Had I believed there to be a filibuster taking place, I would have intervened and prevented it from doing so. I have not heard a filibuster.

Police

Mark Hendrick Excerpts

Wednesday 8th February 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice (Nick Herbert)]

I beg to move,

That the Police Grant Report (England and Wales) for 2012-13 (HC 1797), which was laid before this House on 31 January, be approved.

This Government inherited the largest budget deficit in our peacetime history. The deficit needs to be reduced, which means less spending across the public sector, and the police service must play its part. The reductions we are making in police funding are not through choice; they are a direct response to the situation in which the country was left. On 8 December, I laid before this House a written ministerial statement, which set out the Government’s proposed allocations of grants to police authorities and, from this November, police and crime commissioners in England and Wales. Following that, the Government held a public consultation on the proposed allocations, to which we received 21 responses.

[Mark Hendrick (Preston) (Lab/Co-op)]

rose—

[Nick Herbert]

I shall give way to the hon. Gentleman—at a very early stage.

[Mark Hendrick]

Will the Minister tell us why the Lancashire constabulary is losing 500 police officers?

[Nick Herbert]

I will come to all those issues in the course of my remarks. Naturally, I intend to address all these issues.