Sentencing Bill

Richard Drax Excerpts

Wednesday 6th December 2023 Commons Chamber

[Richard Drax (South Dorset) (Con)]

I will concentrate in my speech on two issues: first, sentencing; and secondly, suggestions to stop reoffending, particularly among the young. This is not a catch-all but just an idea, which could come with other ideas.

I welcome the parts of the Bill that will ensure those who pose the greatest danger to society will be locked up and off our streets. The end of the automatic 50% remission for those who commit heinous crimes is also to be welcomed, but why does this not apply to everyone? If someone is sentenced by a judge to a term, it should be served in full. Surely we want prison to be a deterrent, so letting those convicted of a crime out halfway through their sentence makes no sense, nor is it a deterrent.

We have a crisis in our prisons, exacerbated by the fact that there are not enough prison places, and magistrates and judges have to consider carefully whether to send those who commit lesser crimes—although such crimes are not lesser to those who are affected—to prison or to give them a suspended sentence, a community order, a tag or perhaps all three. As has been said succinctly by at least two colleagues tonight, a repeat shoplifter, for example, cannot go on stealing while they are in prison. I am very concerned about the presumption against prison for those sentenced to less than 12 months for many reasons, not least the pressure on the probation service, which does a wonderful job. Frankly, I do not like statistics, and I guarantee that the victims of crimes, however great or small, will feel differently about that presumption. I recall as journalist covering a story about an old lady who had been robbed. She was aged 80 and had been married for 60 years. Her husband had died, and a burglar took all her belongings out of her house. She died of a broken heart a month later.

Only recently, to much sneering from those on the Opposition Benches, I advocated national service for those who need a hand up. This is an example of where a 50% measure could be used. A young person serving a sentence of, say, three or four years, if behaving properly, could be offered, at the halfway point, two more years in jail or two years in the armed forces. I trained young men myself for two years, and it was surprising how easy it was to turn the often rudderless into fine young soldiers who we were proud to serve with—and, if necessary, die with. In many cases, the family unit is so broken that the state should step in—a move that I, as a Conservative, instinctively disagree with unless the circumstances are exceptional. Nowadays, I feel that they are in some cases. For many of our struggling young, all they need to turn them into law-abiding citizens—I have seen it—is leadership, discipline and a structure to operate in. This is not rocket science.

In 1994, the Airborne Initiative was launched in Lanarkshire, Scotland. For 10 years, specialist social workers and outdoor recreation experts took hundreds of male criminals aged between 18 and 25 and combined outdoor physical activities with counselling for youths who had not responded to conventional punishment and rehabilitation. A former colleague in this place, Sir Jim Spicer, brought the initiative to the former young offenders prison on Portland. I recently opened a new jail museum there, and when I interviewed all the old prison officers, they all said that the borstal system worked. In some cases, it was abused by rotten officers, but, in the most part, it was proven to work. The young people were given the discipline and the structure, and they did not come back.

Sadly, the successful Airborne project—a five-day residential course on Dartmoor—was stopped. I believe that it went to HMP Feltham, where I am not sure if it still runs. That simple initiative worked, and the Government would do well to expand the project, particularly for young people across the prison estate and those who have committed lesser crimes, to give them a chance to learn how to get on with others in challenges and all the other things that outdoor activities provide, just as part of their rehabilitation.

I wish it were not true, but we, the Conservative party, should not be in the position we find ourselves in. If we cannot keep our citizens safe from those who would do us harm, something has gone seriously wrong.