Oral Answers to Questions

Steve Reed Excerpts

Tuesday 16th May 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Secretary of State.

[Steve Reed (Croydon North) (Lab/Co-op)]

I am delighted to welcome the Secretary of State to his place for the second day running. I have been reading his speeches with interest. He once said the Conservatives should

“do away with the argument that…we are somehow soft on crime.”—[Official Report, 2 July 2018; Vol. 644, c. 90.]

Is it not “soft” to tell judges that they cannot lock up dangerous criminals?

[Alex Chalk]

Let us just get a few things absolutely clear. We believe in criminals spending longer in custody. It is strange that when there was the opportunity to vote for rapists and serious violent criminals to spend two thirds of their sentence in custody, the hon. Gentleman voted against that. Indeed, I happen to remember, from when I was at the Bar, that his party did exactly the same in the Criminal Justice Act 2003. Whereas previously, people serving sentences over four years would serve two thirds of their sentence in custody, they cut it to half: soft on crime, soft on the causes of crime.

[Steve Reed]

I am wondering whether the Secretary of State’s handover was a little rushed, because his predecessor wrote to judges and told them not to lock up dangerous criminals, because the Government have run out of prison places. That sounds soft to me, because it tells criminals they can get away with crime. Will he withdraw the letter and tell judges to lock up criminals who deserve to be behind bars?

[Alex Chalk]

Well, criminals do deserve to be behind bars, which is why I am proud of the fact that when it comes to rape, which is an appalling crime that robs innocence and destroys lives, we have ensured that criminals convicted of that offence get prison sentences a third longer than they did in 2010. I am pleased to be able to record that the numbers convicted of that appalling offence, in the last 12 months for which figures are available, are 10% higher than under the Labour Government.