Prisoner Early Release Scheme

Debate between Nick Timothy and Jake Richards

Tuesday 13th October 2026 Commons Chamber

[Nick Timothy (West Suffolk) (Con)]

(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Justice if he will make a statement on the early release scheme.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Jake Richards)]

This Government inherited a prison system on the brink of collapse. In July 2024, men’s prisons were operating at 99% capacity. At one point, fewer than 100 places were available across the male estate. Without intervention, we risked running out of prison places, leaving courts unable to sentence offenders and police unable to make arrests.

This Government have acted to increase capacity and to reform sentencing. We have committed to delivering 14,000 prison places by 2031 and have already delivered 3,200. The last Government added just 500 net places in their time in office. We have also accelerated the removal of foreign national offenders, returning around 11,700 to their countries of origin. It is in that context that we launched the independent sentencing review in October 2024 and subsequently passed the Sentencing Act 2026 earlier this year to place the prison system on a more sustainable footing and ensure that space is always available for the most dangerous offenders. The Act also aimed to avoid the chaotic emergency release schemes carried out with little scrutiny or warning by the Conservatives.

However, we know that aspects of these changes have caused concern, and we are determined to do the right thing for victims. That is why the Government listened to the concerns raised, paused the implementation of the progression model and conducted an urgent review. As the Lord Chancellor confirmed in this House on 1 September, in addition to the 18,000 dangerous offenders already ineligible for the progression model, this Government have excluded rape and serious child sex offences from eligibility for changes to release dates under the Sentencing Act. Unlawful killings, including manslaughter, causing or allowing the death of a child, and death by dangerous driving, are also excluded, as well as indecent assault, ensuring that more historical child sex offences prosecuted under older laws are treated consistently with equivalent offences today. That means that hundreds more dangerous criminals will be staying behind bars for longer, including those who killed PC Andrew Harper in the line of duty.

The first releases on the progression model took place on 1 October, with His Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service working closely with operational partners to ensure that eligible offenders were released safely into the community. As the second tranche of releases begins today, robust arrangements remain in place to manage releases, support probation practitioners and supervising offenders, and ensure that those subject to electronic monitoring requirements are fitted with a tag. As part of the supervision of offenders released into the community, HMPPS will maintain rigorous oversight of those on licence, with measures in place to recall those who are non-compliant.

We recognise the significant effect that release date changes can have on victims. We will ensure that those in the victim contact scheme who are affected by the new exclusions are informed if there are any changes to the release date of the offender in their case. I have also instructed my officials to attempt to contact victims not in that scheme to provide information, should they wish for that to happen. We have launched the victim support offender release helpline, with nearly £19 million of additional funding, to provide victims with emotional support, practical advice such as safety planning, and general information about sentencing changes.

It is important to add that the Minister for Prisons, Probation and Reducing Reoffending is unable to be here today because she is currently speaking with governors about early release and how the implementation of the progression model is going.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Justice Secretary.

[Nick Timothy]

Two weeks ago, 700 prisoners were released from prison across the country, and today a further 650 will be released, most after serving just one third of their sentence. The Justice Secretary told the country that proper safeguards would be put in place, with a presumption that all released prisoners would be tagged. He called it the “toughest” tagging regime in history, but that was nonsense. Four days after the first release, the Justice Secretary admitted that he had no idea how many released prisoners had been tagged, and protested that it was unreasonable to expect him to know how many had been tagged so soon into the scheme. I have some advice for him and his Ministers: it is better to work out how to implement your policy before it starts, not after.

We know that a majority of prisoners are not being tagged before release, and we know that reoffending is already off the charts. The Met says that there have been 100 tag breaches in London each day since Labour’s first early release scheme began, while two or three prisoners released early are being re-arrested every week. I do not want to hear the same old lines from the Minister about prison building, though I note he has changed his tune since the Prime Minister took office in July. Since the election, not a single new prison development has been planned or approved—those were the Minister’s words in a written answer. The only new prison opened was begun under the last Government, and prison places are unused because officer numbers are down under Labour.

Can the Minister tell us very clearly the answers to the following three questions? How many prisoners released so far have and have not been tagged? How many tag breaches by released prisoners have there been? If he does not know the answers to those questions, when will the Justice Secretary and his team find out and tell the House of Commons?

[Jake Richards]

I am grateful for the hon. Member’s questions. I noticed over conference recess that the hon. Member for Harborough, Oadby and Wigston (Neil O’Brien), who I think is the Conservatives’ policy chief, apologised for the lack of investment and action on criminal justice over 14 years of Conservative Governments. It would be welcome to hear that from the Dispatch Box today, but alas, we will still have to wait for that apology.

Turning to the hon. Member’s questions, we have set out the numbers of prisoners who will be released in each tranche—that is publicly available on the Government’s website. We will be setting out data in relation to prisoner releases as we always do, and the next batch of data will be released in January of next year. This is a new sentencing regime, and it is right that we release the data in the appropriate way, as we have always done.

Early Release of Prisoners

Debate between Nick Timothy and Jake Richards

Tuesday 7th July 2026 Commons Chamber

[Jake Richards]

What we will not do is put our head in the sand, which would lead to another prison capacity crisis, which would lead to another urgent, chaotic early release scheme as we saw under the last Conservative Government time and again. I cannot look victims in the eye and tell them that is good for them or for the country, and I will not do so. That is why, when the Home Secretary was Justice Secretary—

[Nick Timothy]

Will the Minister give way?

[Jake Richards]

Let me make some progress first.

The Home Secretary recognised that alongside prison building, there would be a need to reform sentencing, and for that be done above party politics. That is the principal reason why she asked Sir David Gauke, a former Conservative Justice Secretary, to undertake an independent sentencing review.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jake Richards]

Absolutely. The hon. Lady’s call for us all to reflect on that will be taken up. I know that the Justice Secretary and the Victims Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Derby North (Catherine Atkinson), who is sitting next to me, will have heard that. There will be further correspondence; it was not a blanket correspondence by any means. The Government and the Probation Service want to engage with victims as much as possible to ensure that their voices are heard every step of the way. I am grateful for the intervention.

[Nick Timothy]

We have brought this motion to the House. The Labour party has accepted that motion—it will not contest it and the House will not divide. Having accepted what we have put in the motion, will the Minister tell us what the plan is to ensure that rapists and sex offenders will not be released, starting from September? Will the Government bring forward emergency legislation before the summer recess? Will they bring forward new commencement regulations—yes or no? The Minister has our commitment of support if he does that. If he is not in a position to say so, because it is up to the right hon. Member for Makerfield (Andy Burnham) and he does not yet know, the Minister can just say that.

[Jake Richards]

As happened on numerous occasions under Boris Johnson and Theresa May, in Opposition day debates the Government are quite within their rights not to divide on an issue—an Opposition day is an Opposition day.

This Government are dealing with the prison capacity crisis that we inherited. We are facing a situation where, if the Sentencing Act measures are not implemented, in October or November of this year we will be back where we were in July 2024. The Sentencing Act received Royal Assent in January and some of its measures are being implemented from September onwards. The Government will always balance making sure that we have a sustainable prison system and never going back to the crisis that we saw under the Conservatives with public safety and confidence in the system. That will continue under this Prime Minister and under the next Labour Prime Minister.

Prison Capacity: Annual Statement

Debate between Nick Timothy and Jake Richards

Thursday 29th January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Jake Richards]

indicated dissent.

[Nick Timothy]

That is true. But I agree that those numbers remain too low, because we should be deporting all the foreign criminals in our prisons. Can the Minister confirm that that is also his aim, and can he tell us how he will stop the European convention on human rights getting in the way? The Opposition are clear that we will leave the ECHR. Will he condemn the actions of his boss, the Justice Secretary, who in opposition actively campaigned against the deportation of foreign rapists?

Finally, I want to ask the Minister a question of principle. He told a journalist this week:

“a pretty big chunk of the overall population… shouldn’t be in prison”.

His colleague Lord Timpson says that only a third of prisoners should be locked up. These are my most important questions, and the Minister needs to answer them clearly: is it true that only a third of prisoners should definitely be behind bars, and will he say very clearly that he agrees with me that prison works?

[Jake Richards]

I welcome the new shadow Justice Secretary to his place; I hope he can do a better job than his predecessor. Let me deal with his last question first. If he had read what I said in that interview carefully, he would know that I was talking about the Youth Custody Service; I was not talking about the adult estate. I urge him to go back and read that interview and perhaps come to the House to correct the record.

On the issue of whether prison works, prison can work. I was abundantly clear in the statement that at the end of this Parliament, under this Labour Government, there will be more criminals in prison than ever before, so prison can work. But I gently urge the shadow Justice Secretary to delve a little deeper and look at short-term sentences, for example. Is it the Conservatives’ position today, which it was not by the end of their time in government, that short-term sentences should not be reformed at all? It was proposed in legislation put forward by the Conservative Government in their final year in office that never saw the light of day because of the general election to make exactly the same changes we are making now—but now they oppose it. I am afraid that the Conservative position on sentencing is all over the place.

When it comes to prison building, the Conservatives expect to get some praise for panicking in their last year of government, realising that they had not done anything for 13 years, that they had underfunded prisons and that places were not keeping up with demand, so they started doing something about it. But none of those places was delivered under a Conservative Government. Unless I am hallucinating, I have been to these sites— I opened them; I put the shovel in the ground. It is a Labour Government who are delivering where the Tories completely failed.

On foreign national offenders, I do not accept the figures that the hon. Gentleman set out today. Foreign national offender deportations are up under the Labour Government. Through the Sentencing Act 2026, which the Conservatives opposed, we are making it far easier to deport foreign national offenders.

The Conservative Opposition have a real problem. They oppose every single step this Government are taking to solve the crisis they created, and then they step up and moan about it. They should support us. We are getting on with the job—we are reforming sentencing, building prison places and making sure the prison system is fit for the future. They should support us, rather than moaning from the sidelines.