Terrorist Offenders (Restriction of Early Release) Bill

Debate between Nick Thomas-Symonds and Desmond Swayne

Committee stage & 3rd reading: House of Commons & Committee: 1st sitting: House of Commons & 3rd reading & Committee: 1st sitting
Wednesday 12th February 2020 Commons Chamber

[Nick Thomas-Symonds]

I know the hon. Gentleman nods his head, but I am not comfortable with that position.

The second point is that I firmly believe we can tackle this issue of terrorism and remain signatories to the European convention on human rights. That is essentially the Government’s position here today, and I really do not think that we need to get into this debate because the Government have clearly stated that the Act—or the Bill, as it currently is—is compliant with article 7. If people wish to challenge that in the courts, that is a matter for them, but the Government must be confident in their legal position.

Under the Human Rights Act, each Bill that comes before the House contains a sentence on its front page to show that Ministers have considered whether it is compatible with that Act. If they had wished, the Government could have stated in the Bill that they did not think it compatible with the Human Rights Act, but they wanted us to proceed regardless. They did not do that, however, and they clearly state on the Bill their belief that it is compatible with the Act. We have heard a case law of history from the hon. Member for Stone (Sir William Cash), and others, but that is the Government’s position, and for those reasons I cannot support the amendment. I understand that he will not push it to a vote, and the debate will continue in the other place, but this is not an amendment that would have found favour on the Labour Benches.

Let me return to new clause 1. I will not push the idea of an independent reviewer to the vote—I will not frustrate the passage of the Bill in that way. However, it would assist the Committee if the Minister set out how Members will be able to scrutinise the programme of de-radicalisation over the next few years, and how we can have the information before us—whether from the Ministry of Justice directly or in another way—to assess how it is working.

The former Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), intervened on the Justice Secretary during his opening speech, and said that she felt there had been a lack of success in the de-radicalisation programmes. She is right, and we need to see some success in the years ahead. I will not push new clause 1 to the vote, but I hope the Minister will provide some assurances about how such scrutiny could take place.

[Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)]

I do not intend to detain the Committee long, Dame Eleanor, and the Minister should consider this not so much a probing amendment as a prodding amendment—it is my intention to prod the Minister.

The purpose of my amendments is stunningly obvious. At lines 34 and 37 I wish to remove “two-thirds”, and insert the words “nine-tenths”. In reality, many sentences, even for acts of terrorism such as the possession of terrorist promotional material with intent, give rise to a surprisingly short sentence, such as four years. In such a case, the difference between half the sentence, as currently served, and two-thirds, is a mere six months. Admittedly, extending that to nine-tenths of the sentence does not address the nature of the problem—that is why this is a prodding amendment—but the fact is that sentences are too short.

There is a general problem of honesty in sentencing. When a judge hands down a sentence in court, all those in the know work out on the back of a fag packet what it means in terms of imprisonment, but the public, who are generally not in the know, do not understand that the sentence is not that at all. They would be scandalised if they knew.

Terrorist Offenders (Restriction of Early Release) Bill

Debate between Nick Thomas-Symonds and Desmond Swayne

2nd reading & 2nd reading: House of Commons
Wednesday 12th February 2020 Commons Chamber

[Nick Thomas-Symonds (Torfaen) (Lab)]

I am grateful to the Justice Secretary for his briefing last week and for his opening remarks, and to the Under-Secretary of State for Justice, the hon. Member for Croydon South (Chris Philp), who has been keeping me updated in recent days.

This Bill follows the awful terrorist atrocities first at Fishmongers’ Hall on 30 November and more recently in Streatham. My thoughts, and I am sure those of all Members across the House, go out to the victims of these terrible attacks and to their families and friends, and we thank the emergency services who responded so quickly.

Labour Members support the Parole Board’s involvement in release decisions. If this Bill is not passed and rushed through its stages over the next couple of weeks, terrorist prisoners will be on our streets, without any assessment of risk or dangerousness by the Parole Board. That does not leave the House in the easiest of positions, but it is the reality of the situation before us. For the Bill to be durable and workable, it must not simply amount to a delay in confronting the problem; it will also require a relentless focus on, and investment in, the most effective de-radicalisation programmes in our prisons.

[Sir Desmond Swayne]

One of the most effective de-radicalisation programmes is that run by the Saudis, but it takes a long time. Is the hon. Gentleman satisfied that sentences are long enough to accommodate a successful programme?

[Nick Thomas-Symonds]

I took part in a long debate on sentencing in the last Parliament with the then Minister of State for Security and Economic Crime, now the Secretary of State for Defence, and a number of sentences were increased. In her intervention on the Justice Secretary, the former Prime Minister pointed out —very fairly, I thought—that there has been an issue with the success of de-radicalisation programmes in recent years. Length of a sentence is one matter, but, whatever the length, the programme must be targeted and effective—I will come on to that point in a moment.

We are here to discuss emergency legislation, but there is also an emergency in resources. The Leader of the House indicated yesterday that the Treasury has approved additional resources for the extra time that prisoners will spend in custody as a consequence of the Bill, as well as for the Parole Board. Clearly, however, there must also be a specific and dramatic increase in resources to tackle extremism in our prisons.

But this is not just about resources—my hon. Friend the Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green) made a point about process and expertise, and she is absolutely right—and a strategic approach from the top will be required.

The Justice Secretary made it clear that there is no need for derogation from the European convention on human rights, and he set out the Government’s legal position on article 7. Labour Members firmly believe that we can tackle terrorism and proudly remain signatories to the European convention on human rights. In our view, to leave that convention and join Belarus as the only European non-signatory would send a terrible signal to the rest of the world. We should never sacrifice the values that we are defending in the fight against terrorism and hatred.

Those who perpetrate hatred and violence are responsible for their actions, but it is for the Government to do everything they can to keep our streets safe and minimise the risk of something like this ever happening again. The House is therefore entitled to ask why we have ended up requiring this Bill to be passed via emergency legislation. Automatic early release is hardly new. It has been part of our system for many years, and could already have been dealt with by a Government who took a more strategic approach.

There have been a number of warning signals over the past decade. In his opening remarks, the Justice Secretary mentioned Ian Acheson, a former prison governor who led a review of Islamist extremism in our prisons, probation and youth justice system, which was published in August 2016. Mr Acheson said:

“What we found was so shockingly bad that I had to agree to the language in the original report being toned down…There were serious deficiencies in almost every aspect of the management of terrorist offenders through the system…It was a shambles.”

Mr Acheson proposed 69 recommendations that, according to the Justice Secretary when speaking to the media over the weekend, have been consolidated into a total of 11, eight of which are being implemented. However, in a newspaper article last Thursday Mr Acheson said:

“As part of my review of prison extremism, I made a great number of recommendations that specifically related to a tactical response to a terrorist incident in prison where staff were targeted. I have no way of knowing if or how many were implemented as none made it into the response published by the Ministry of Justice.”

That was only days ago. I do not know whether the Justice Secretary has met Mr Acheson since last Thursday—[Interruption.] I am happy for him to intervene.