Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)

My Lords, not for the first time, I am feeling a bit outclassed and overawed by the legal and judicial expertise in this place that has produced so many excellent speeches. I particularly thank the noble Lord, Lord Farmer, for inviting us to talk about the state of prisons and probation services. However, I want to start by making some broader points about context. During the week, we have had the extraordinary sight of 92% of the citizens of an Oxford village, Piddington, population 358, voting in a symbolic referendum to become independent from the United Kingdom. In interviews with residents, there has been a common theme: the state is exposing them to danger. Housing 1,250 young male asylum seekers in nearby Bicester garrison means: “Our safety, our security and our freedoms will be under threat”. To paraphrase one woman: “If these men need government leaflets to explain that sexually abusing children or raping women is wrong, I’m frightened to go out alone. I will become a prisoner in my own house”. That is my theme, in a way. The sentiment of being a prisoner in your own house is not confined to leafy villages but is felt in towns and cities throughout the country. It is not confined to asylum policies. One key issue that has been a lightning rod for worries that state policies are indifferent to public safety is the early release scheme—for example, those women who now feel frightened in their own homes as victims of domestic abuse, worried that their early released tormentors may show up on the doorstep. Somehow the law-abiding are unfairly becoming the victims of failed state policies. I would normally want to use today’s debate to talk in detail about prison reform, because I am passionate especially about improving educational initiatives in prison and I hate the lack of purposeful activity available that has been so well described by other noble Lords—I thought the noble Lord, Lord Farmer, made a magnificent speech—but it is also true that it has become particularly difficult to convince the public that the MoJ should prioritise improving the treatment of prisoners in jail when so many are being released out of jail before they have served their time. Discussing rehabilitation feels meaningless when the very purposes of prisons—at least in the sense of punishment and deprivation of liberty, not cruelty, or of protecting the public, let alone rehabilitation to reduce reoffending—are made a mockery of by successive Governments’ failure to deliver prison expansion and now the makeshift solutions to deal with the fallout. Early release schemes outsource the problem into our communities, literally dumping it on our streets. The public are rightly furious that criminals will not now serve the sentences that the law, which we make here, thinks is appropriate for their crimes. Recent polling shows that 69% of those questioned are against the early release scheme. More troubling, 68% say they have lost faith in all Governments’ handling of criminal justice per se. At the forthcoming annual Battle of Ideas festival organised by the Academy of Ideas, which I run—I declare an interest—one of the panel debates is entitled: “Letting abusers out early: solving the prisons crisis”. It is proving to be an unexpected festival sell-out hit. When I talk to people, four recurring themes are raised. There is a perception that the early release scheme, alongside the Sentencing Act, has a presumption against prison in favour of community sentences. With the even further reductions in release dates to a third of sentences served, people just feel that sentencing has become a joke and that it is less a pragmatic response to a lack of prison space than an official ideological turn against incarceration as punishment. This is happening without public debate or consent. There is also a worry that the prison crisis is diminishing the diligence of policing in pursuing certain crimes. What is the point of arresting shoplifters or burglars if they cannot be threatened with the prospect of prison? A third concern is that early release is a lazy reaction to the crisis. Why are there no other emergency options—perhaps the prison equivalent of NHS Nightingales? Maybe the thousands of empty prison cells currently out of action could be renovated, or even the shocking facts about those kept on remand, which we heard from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Leveson, in his brilliant maiden speech, could be tackled. It is a disgrace that this is such a large percentage of the prison community. A final concern is in response to the Government’s reassurance that early release prisoners are not being released freely but will be under close supervision. Yet probation services admit that they are not equipped to cope. The whole paraphernalia of control and surveillance in the community—curfews, electronic tags, formal restriction zones, the wearing of high-vis vests—can only result in whole swathes of local areas feeling more like open-air prisons for all, rather than a free society. Possibly the only good thing to have come from the prison crisis is Prime Minister Andy Burnham’s commendable announcement that he will, at last, end the injustice of IPP prisoners. I confess that I got emotional hearing an ex-IPP prisoner, Marc Conway from UNGRIPP, declaring that it was, “a day that thousands of families have spent years fighting for”. He also stressed that implementing the decision needed to be swift and transparent, and that is where the euphoria is dampened. Last week, I received this message from Stacey Clough of the Injustice of IPP campaign. It is worth listening to her words. She said: “I think it’s great what Andy Burnham has said, but he has left IPP prisoners and their families with a different mental torture by not making it clear what it’s going to look like … and they still have no definite date to count down to. My partner said all the IPPs in Wayland have gone downhill, as the hopes were raised by the announcement, but as there’s no time-frame… they’re all worried it’s false hope. What if there’s an election and Labour are voted out—then back to square one. They have now been left with uncertainty. If the Government don’t end it, there is going to be more suicides”. I gulped at that. Stacey continued: “The thing is he could order probation to release the recalled prisoners without any new requirements—and no new legislation is needed because of executive powers created in 2012—powers they’ve never used. They should also be recommending that anyone going up for parole, with no new crimes or charges on a recall, should be granted release and have their licence terminated and give them a supervision order instead”. My advice to the Minister is to recommend to the MoJ that Stacey is given a job, because she has got it all completely right, as far as I am concerned. There are so many inequities in the way in which IPP prisoners continue to be treated. It is not just that we need to have these things happen more quickly. For example, we hear that, even when IPP prisoners are granted parole, they are often kept in prison for months and months, due to a lack of approved accommodation on the outside. There are things that need to be done fast. While the Minister defended the principle of recall at Questions this week, the fact that the number of IPP prisoners recalled without any criminal charge has gone up from 70% in 2023 to 77% in 2025 should worry him. I hope that noble Lords have a good recess, but I will be at No. 10 North on Monday, along with anti-IPP protestors—