Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Simon Hughes and Lord Herbert of South Downs

Tuesday 3rd July 2012 Commons Chamber

[Simon Hughes (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (LD)]

16. What steps his Department is taking to implement the recommendations of the final report of the riots communities and victims panel.

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

The Government welcome the final report from the independent riots communities and victims panel and will publish a formal response in due course.

[Simon Hughes]

This very good report made some very good recommendations to the Ministry of Justice, including for more effective community sentencing—specifically, that communities should choose the projects and that the results, including reoffending rates, should be published. Will Ministers be positive about those recommendations? I am sure it would be appreciated.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Simon Hughes and Lord Herbert of South Downs

Tuesday 29th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Nick Herbert]

As I said, more than 5,000 prisoners have been removed. Of course, the situation will change in December when the EU prisoner transfer agreement comes into force. As a consequence of that, we will be able to remove many more prisoners to serve their sentence in other countries.

[Simon Hughes (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (LD)]

I thank the Minister for his robust answer. Of the nearly 200 countries in the UN whose citizens could potentially be here in prison, do the Government have any targets for the number of additional agreements we expect to implement outside the EU, or in particular to implement with those countries whose citizens constitute the largest number of prisoners in this country when they should be somewhere else?

[Nick Herbert]

We have to negotiate this with individual countries. We cannot simply remove prisoners to countries to serve a sentence there unless those countries accept it, but we can compulsorily remove prisoners if the countries agree. We already have agreements with Uganda, Rwanda and other countries, and an agreement is being negotiated with Nigeria. We would like to negotiate as many more arrangements as we can, but some countries simply disagree.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Simon Hughes and Lord Herbert of South Downs

Tuesday 15th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Nick Herbert)]

May I congratulate my hon. Friend on his election as deputy leader of the Liberal Democrats?

The Government believe that more can be done to cut reoffending by overhauling the system of rehabilitation. We are exploring how sentencing and treatment for drug use can help offenders to come off drugs once and for all. We are also exploring how we can do more with independent providers, including the voluntary sector, to reduce reoffending.

[Simon Hughes]

I welcome the Minister and all his colleagues to the Front Bench to consider such an important subject. May I encourage them, as they work out the plans to deal with reoffending—as has been said, it is a serious issue, which the previous Government did not address adequately—to take the advice of people such as the previous governor of Brixton prison, who were clear that, if secure housing and continuing support to deal with addictions are provided when people are released, the chance of immediate reoffending, which often starts in days, is hugely reduced?

[Nick Herbert]

I could not agree more with my hon. Friend. We must improve the multi-agency approach to tackling reoffending. That means bringing together the police, probation, prisons and local authorities, and ensuring that they work together more effectively. The key is to get offenders off drugs and into work, and, in particular, as he says, into housing. If we can do that, we have a chance of reducing the unacceptably high reoffending rates that we currently experience.