Lord Woodley (Lab)

My Lords, I would like to take this opportunity to apologise for my stumble at the beginning. My inexperience in the process here got in the way. Having listened to all the contributions, some of them were very emotional and some heart-rending, but I am quite certain that did not change the tremendous contribution that each and every noble Lord has made in here this afternoon. I was heartfelt as I sat here, as I know that we have dozens and dozens, if not hundreds, of IPP family members—maybe even some prisoners—watching this today, hoping for maybe more than the Minister has just said. I will come back to that in a moment. Nevertheless, listening to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, and the noble Lords, Lord Moylan and Lord Blunkett—indeed all the other Lords who contributed—I think that the experience was absolutely unbelievable. It is a shame that, while the Minister has listened to them, he has come up with exactly the same answer that I predicted at the very beginning, which is more and more reasons why we cannot do the right thing. There is no doubt at all about that in my mind: there were more excuses for allowing people to suffer in prison and more reasons why we will, unfortunately, see more people take their lives, with no hope, because they are still in prison and serving sentences there. The Minister said that his efforts were to make sure that we protect the public, and I wholeheartedly support that. That is why my amendment for resentencing clearly identifies public safeguards as being at the very forefront of all we want to do. However, it is not too late. I intend to continue to work with all colleagues and comrades in this Chamber to try to convince the Minister to talk with David Lammy and others and do the right thing on behalf of this group. On behalf of those families, prisoners and all the contributors here this afternoon, I implore the Minister to go away and rethink, re-evaluate and reassess, and, I hope, to come back, as this goes along, with a completely different response to that he has given us again today.