Recalled Offenders: Sentencing Limits
Debate between Nicholas Dakin and Ben Maguire(4 days ago)
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Ben Maguire (North Cornwall) (LD)
There is no doubt that the Conservatives plunged our prisons into crisis. [Interruption.] They chunter from a sedentary position, but what else would they call it? It is clear that the Government have failed to step up and tackle the sheer scale of the problem. Across the country, victims and survivors are worried about what this will mean for them. If there were a specific domestic abuse offence, dangerous offenders could be excluded from early release, but the Government have taken no action at all since the Liberal Democrats raised that solution with them last autumn. Will the Minister finally commit to giving victims and survivors the protections that they deserve by creating new domestic abuse aggravated offences, and will he go further to protect our communities by introducing a clear plan to reduce reoffending, which is the only way to solve prison crowding once and for all? If the Minister will not listen to me, will he listen to the Domestic Abuse Commissioner, who has just warned that lives are now at risk?
Sir Nicholas Dakin
The hon. Member will know that his colleague, the hon. Member for Chichester (Jess Brown-Fuller), is working closely with the Under-Secretary of State for Justice, my hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones), on getting things right for victims. That is something we take very seriously, and it needs to be done properly, with victims, in order to get it right. I hope that the independent sentencing review report will contain things that give us confidence about moving forward and about the way we work with victims.