Shabana Mahmood MP: speeches 2024

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Speeches

10 Sept 2024 · Topical Questions · Hansard source
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I suspect that that may be a matter for my colleagues in the Home Office, but I will happily liaise with the relevant Minister and ensure that the hon. Lady receives a response.
10 Sept 2024 · Topical Questions · Hansard source
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My hon. Friend is absolutely right that it is a significant departure from the approach of the previous Government, who introduced an early release scheme—the end of custody supervised licence scheme—that operated under a veil of secrecy, with no data ever published on the numbers released. It took our Government to publish the data showing that more than 10,000 offenders were released under that scheme. I am pleased to say today that we have ended that scheme.
10 Sept 2024 · Topical Questions · Hansard source
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I have authorised probation directors in areas to make appropriate provision, if that proves to be needed—at this point, it is not definite that it will be required—to ensure that there is no gap in provision for offenders being released under the SDS40 scheme.
10 Sept 2024 · Topical Questions · Hansard source
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We have taken every measure available to us and pulled every lever we could to ensure that offences connected to domestic abuse are excluded and that the probation service has had time to prepare. We will work with it in the coming weeks and months to ensure that release plans are in place and victims are notified in the usual way.
10 Sept 2024 · Topical Questions · Hansard source
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I have committed to the review, because that is the appropriate way, and I will not make early promises that might not be kept. I have committed to both transparency and a review. We will publish all the data on a quarterly basis and I will return to the House with the results of the review and the approach that we will take at that point.
10 Sept 2024 · Prison Capacity · Hansard source
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They are being deported, and they will continue to be deported. Nothing will change as far as the deportation of foreign national offenders is concerned, but the inheritance we received from the previous Government meant we had to take additional measures. The answer will not come from the deportation of foreign national offenders alone, but it is very much part of the picture.
10 Sept 2024 · Prison Capacity · Hansard source
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With respect to the shadow Lord Chancellor, what will ring hollow to members of the public is the Tory party’s new-found commitment to exclusions for domestic abuse, and the sheer hypocrisy of talking about exclusions to this policy when he was a Minister in the previous Government who brought in the end of custody supervised licence scheme, which had no exclusions relating to domestic abuse whatsoever— [ Interruption. ] He talks about the governor lock from a sedentary position, but he knows full well that that was an attempt to shift the blame away from ministerial decision making and to place it on governors—something I am not sure was much appreciated by those who run our prisons. We have taken every step and every mechanism available to us to exclude offences connected to domestic abuse and, crucially, to give the probation service time to prepare—something the previous Government never did.
10 Sept 2024 · Prison Capacity · Hansard source
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Today is the day that those on the Opposition Benches always knew was coming. The legacy of the previous Government was a prison system on the brink of collapse, which left us with no choice. Today, around 1,700 offenders have had to be released a few weeks or months early by changing their automatic release point from 50% to 40% of their sentence. Had we not done so, we faced courts unable to hold trials, police unable to make arrests and a total breakdown of law and order. This is not the long-term solution—there is more that we must do—but it was the necessary first step that we had to take following the disgraceful dereliction of duty of the previous Government.
10 Sept 2024 · Prison Capacity · Hansard source
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The right hon. Lady will know that I have committed to publishing a 10-year capacity strategy. There are also live discussions as part of the Budget and spending review process. We have committed to delivering the shortfall of 14,000 places in our prison system, which the previous Government failed to do. That is a commitment that we have given. Those conversations are live conversations and I will report to the House in due course, but we will publish that 10-year capacity strategy before the end of the year.
10 Sept 2024 · Prison Capacity · Hansard source
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We have taken every measure available to us to exclude offences from this measure. Serious violence, sexual violence and offences connected to domestic abuse have all been excluded, as have terror offences and so on—the hon. Gentleman will know the list of exclusions. We will work with our probation service, which has done a heroic amount of work over the summer to deliver this policy, in the coming months. We will also work very closely with criminal justice system partners to make sure that the roll-out of the scheme is as safe as possible. We have taken every measure, we will continue to keep matters under review and I will keep the House updated in due course.
10 Sept 2024 · Prison Capacity · Hansard source
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The shadow Lord Chancellor will know that we have made important exclusions in the design of the policy and that all those who have committed serious offences and have been sentenced to four years or more will be excluded from it. I will not be able to give details on the specific mix of offences per offender, but those offences that would otherwise be included, but that relate to serious violence or sexual offences, have been excluded from the policy.
10 Sept 2024 · Prison Capacity · Hansard source
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I thank my hon. Friend for his question. He is right: good quality work on rehabilitation to reduce reoffending and deal with drug and alcohol issues is critical to dealing with not just the rehabilitation of offenders, but the prison system. He will know that nearly 80% of offending is reoffending, which is far too high. The situation at the moment is that it is impossible to do good-quality, rehabilitative work in prisons that are more than 99% full, with prisoners locked up for 23 hours a day, so the first step is to address capacity. Once we have done so, we will be able to build on recommendations made by experts in this area to make sure that we do everything we can to reduce reoffending.
10 Sept 2024 · Prison Capacity · Hansard source
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We are working closely with colleagues from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government to understand the impact on the housing sector, but, as is the case any time a prisoner is released, probation staff are working hard to prepare release plans, including permanent and temporary accommodation. If an offender is at risk of homelessness on release, they will be housed in community accommodation. We expect to provide housing for the majority of offenders using existing provision, but, should there not be enough, I have authorised probation directors to make use of alternative arrangements, including budget hotels, as a temporary measure for the cases that we will see in the next few weeks.
25 Jul 2024 · Criminal Law · Hansard source
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That is precisely why we have ensured that we have an implementation period for this policy change. That work will continue at pace over the summer, so that the Probation Service has the time to prepare proper release plans for offenders who will be released as a result of the changes and to ensure that all our obligations to victims and the wider public are fulfilled. Let me also be clear that this change is not permanent. We will review this measure within 18 months of implementation—at the very latest, in March 2026. At that point, we believe that the situation in our prisons will have stabilised and that we will be able to reverse the measure, returning the automatic point of release to 50% of a sentence. I want to directly address a question raised during the oral statement in the House last week. We have not included a specific sunset clause within the legislation that would end it automatically. We have pledged to be honest about the challenges in our prisons and the changes that we put in place to rise to them; that is a marked difference from the previous Administration’s approach. Given the scale of the crisis that we have inherited, placing an artificial time limit on this measure would be nothing more than an irresponsible gimmick. We have taken the very deliberate decision not to reverse this measure until we are certain that prison capacity has stabilised. The last Government allowed our prisons to fall into crisis. We will not introduce legislation that could force us back there again. Finally, we will introduce a new, higher standard of transparency. Every quarter, we will publish data on the number of offenders released, and we will make it a statutory requirement for a prison capacity statement to be published annually, introducing that legislation as soon as parliamentary time allows. We are clear that this is the only safe way forward. The House does not have to take my word for it: we have heard senior figures in the police, prisons and probation all warning of what will happen if these measures are not taken. We have even heard my predecessor as Lord Chancellor come out in support of this measure. Thanks to the action—or rather, inaction—of the last Prime Minister, our predecessors ran the prison estate to within days of disaster. As a result, they were forced to introduce a series of emergency measures, such as Operation Safeguard, which turned police cells into prison overflow, and Operation Early Dawn, a daily triage system that managed the flow of prisoners from police cells to the courts. They even came perilously close to triggering Operation Brinker, which is effectively a one-in, one-out measure in our prisons. It is the very last, desperate act available to forestall, by a matter of days, the total collapse of law and order in this country. The last Government also introduced the flawed end of custody supervised licence scheme. When this new legislation takes effect, it will be my pleasure to end ECSL. With next to no implementation period, ECSL released offenders with only a few days of warning, and sometimes none at all. That gave the Probation Service no time to assess the risk of offenders, and next to no time to plan how they would be managed safely in the community. This new legislation, with its longer, eight-week implementation period, gives the Probation Service the time that it needs to prepare. The last Government’s early release scheme did not have the same exclusions that this new legislation has. Most notably, it provided no exclusions for offences linked to domestic abuse. That meant no exclusions for stalking, for strangulation, for controlling or coercive behaviour, or for breaches of restraining orders, non-molestation orders and domestic abuse orders, all of which are excluded in the legislation presented to the House today. Perhaps worst of all, this quick fix was carried out under a veil of secrecy. A number of extensions were made to the scheme, which first released offenders up to 18 days early, then 35 to 60 days early, and finally up to 70 days early. That last extension was implemented without any announcement at all. Throughout, no data was ever published by the previous Government on the numbers released; it fell to this Administration to reveal the true scale of the ECSL scheme. Only now do we know that more than 10,000 offenders were rushed out under that veil of secrecy by the previous Administration. Our approach will be different. Unlike under the previous Government, those sitting on the Opposition Benches will never have to chase me around this building to get hold of the numbers. The numbers will be put in the public domain for all to see and scrutinise, as they should have been all along. ECSL was one of a series of decisions that this Government believe must be examined more fully. That is why I have announced a review into how this capacity crisis was allowed to happen, which will look at why the necessary decisions were not taken at critical moments. We will shortly be appointing an independent chair for the review, which will conclude by the end of this year. Let me be clear: the crisis in our prisons is not over. The prison population remains within a few hundred places of collapse. Last week, we temporarily closed HMP Dartmoor, taking around 200 places out of the prison estate. Although we were able to withstand that loss of capacity, any further changes—be they a further loss of supply or an unexpected increase in demand—could tip us into crisis. The measures that I have set out will take effect in September, giving probation officers the precious time they need to prepare. During that time, we will continue to monitor the prison population closely and we will be ready to introduce further emergency measures such as Operation Early Dawn or Operation Safeguard if required.
25 Jul 2024 · Criminal Law · Hansard source
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I will happily return or write to the right hon. Lady in respect of specific local authorities. The impact of prison capacity is uneven, but it is also in flux on a daily basis. On money and the long-term supply of prison places, we will be publishing a 10-year prison capacity strategy, which will deal with the long-term plans that our Government have to increase supply of prison places.
25 Jul 2024 · Criminal Law · Hansard source
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Let me be clear to the hon. Gentleman and the House. The Government will ensure that we have the prison places that we need so that we can protect the public and deal with the supply-side issues we have inherited from the previous Tory Government, who did not build the 20,000 places that they said would be ready by next year; they delivered only 6,000. In addition to providing the prison places that the country needs, we will deal with the problem of reoffending, because we are determined to ensure that we do not keep creating more and more victims. That is a strategy for cutting crime and for putting victims first. The Government have taken action where before us came inaction. Once this action takes effect from September, we will be able to end the immediate crisis in our prisons, giving us time to introduce desperately needed long-term measures. This has been welcomed by voices from across the criminal justice system, from senior police officers to my predecessor in this role. It is the only safe option available to us, and to choose to act otherwise would leave our country in a state of unconscionable risk; one that I am not willing to take. For that reason, I commend the draft instrument to the House. Question put.
25 Jul 2024 · Criminal Law · Hansard source
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The public made the decision for the previous Administration by voting them out of office in such a stunning manner. We do have to win votes—it is a democracy, at the end of the day—but we must also govern the country in a way that does not risk the total collapse of the criminal justice system. It is a sign of the Tory party’s collective nervous breakdown in government that the risk of running the criminal justice system into the ground, with the total collapse of law and order in this country, was allowed to happen in the first place. This new Administration will never take such a risk, and we are taking these measures today to start putting things right and clean up the mess that we have inherited from the Tory party. The last occupants of 10 Downing Street left our prisons in crisis. They left our criminal justice system at the point of collapse. They were the guilty men; I know the historical weight of those words, but they are apt. The last Government placed the country in unconscionable peril. This Government’s legacy will be different: a prison system brought under control, a Probation Service that keeps the public safe, enough prison places to meet our needs, and prisons, probation and other services working together to break the cycle of reoffending. Today’s measure is not the long-term solution—I am not pretending that it is; there is a hard road ahead of us—but it is the necessary first step.
25 Jul 2024 · Criminal Law · Hansard source
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The point about homelessness, and what it means for recall into prison, is incredibly important. The implementation period allows probation time to prepare plans for every offender who will be released. That is different from the previous Government’s ECSL scheme, which gave no time at all. Some of these issues will be mitigated by that implementation period. Offenders leaving prison can access transitional accommodation for up to 84 nights if they are at risk of being homeless. Those provisions will continue as this scheme is rolled out.
25 Jul 2024 · Criminal Law · Hansard source
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I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. If we do not act today, we face a total collapse of law and order in this country. If we are forced to enact Operation Brinker, it will be a one-in, one-out system and we are then days away from the total collapse of the criminal justice system. It is a shocking state of affairs that the previous Government are entirely responsible for, and it has fallen to our Administration to start to put these matters right with the decisive action we are taking. This is the only option on the table. I remind the House again that we have no choice other than to pass this measure to deal with the crisis we have inherited. Even once we have passed the measure, we will not yet be out of the woods. Our prisons are still in crisis. The last Government ran the prisons system on the basis of luck. They hung on by their fingernails until they could hang on no longer, and then they called an election. This Government will never run that risk. We will always take the necessary action.
25 Jul 2024 · Criminal Law · Hansard source
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With the leave of the House, I will respond to the debate, but let me begin by saying what a pleasure it has been to do my first piece of legislation in this House under your chairmanship, Madam Deputy Speaker. You are a fellow Small Heathan Brummie, and it is no doubt a great first for the community from which we both come. I was astonished by the shadow Minister’s remarks. He said that he was deeply troubled by the measure, but he and his party, who formed the previous Government, were not troubled enough to prevent the crisis from occurring in the first place. He knows full well that they have left no other option on the table but that which we are taking, and anyone with access to a newspaper can tell that, until about three weeks ago, this was their own plan. I am afraid to say that that is the modern-day Tory party: opportunistic, cynical and unfit to govern. The shadow Minister asked a number of questions, most of which I had addressed in my opening remarks. Let me remind him—he should know—that our prisons are at over 99% capacity. The exact number will fluctuate on a daily basis, but everyone who works in criminal justice knows that our prisons will overflow by September unless we pass this measure. On the sunset clause and exclusions for domestic violence-linked offences, I will take no lessons from the Tory party. It brought forward the end-of-custody supervised licence scheme, and that had no exclusions for domestic abuse. I raised that issue many times when I was sitting on the Opposition Benches, and the then Tory Government simply stonewalled and did not give any answers whatsoever. I am pleased to see that Opposition Members have finally discovered that we should treat victims of domestic abuse differently from how we have previously, but they should have applied that to the measure that was their Government’s policy until just three weeks ago. I will also take no lessons from the Tory party on the sunset clause. I remind them that the end-of-custody supervised licence scheme not only did not have a sunset clause but was in fact extended by the previous Tory Government from 18 days to 35 days and then to 60 days. We then had the ignominy of the increase to 70 days that came without any announcement whatsoever. So when I say that the Government will be different from the last one, I mean it. We have already been far more transparent than the previous Government ever were or could have dreamed of being, and that is the vein in which we will continue. I was pleased that my hon. Friend the Member for Southgate and Wood Green (Bambos Charalambous) raised reoffending, which was also brought up by the Liberal Democrat spokesperson, the hon. Member for North East Fife (Wendy Chamberlain), as well. It is critical that we get the rates of reoffending down. Let me turn to the right hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Sir John Hayes). I am slightly perturbed that I found myself in agreement with his first point—I agree that prisons are about punishment—but when 80% of offenders are reoffenders, something is going horribly wrong within our prisons. Every time we have somebody coming out of our prison estate who is a better criminal than they were when they went in, that creates more victims, and we are letting our public down if we do not get the rates of reoffending down. Cutting reoffending is a strategy for putting victims first and cutting crime as much as it is about helping those prisoners become better citizens. I hope that he will take my comments in the spirit in which they are intended, which is a good-faith response to his remarks, and reflect on the necessity of the country finally getting its shocking rates of reoffending down and putting the public first. I return to the points made by my hon. Friend the Member for Southgate and Wood Green. IPP prisoners are not included within this measure. I know that he and others in the House have supported the possibility of a resentencing exercise, which we did not support in opposition. That is not the Government’s policy, because while I do want to make progress on IPP prisoners, we cannot take any steps that would put public protection at risk. It is a delicate balancing act, but we will start with the measures passed by the previous Government in the Victims and Prisoners Act 2024 on the changes to the licence period and the action plan, which we will publish as soon as possible. Where possible, I want to make progress where IPP prisoners are concerned. My hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith and Chiswick (Andy Slaughter) made a really important point on the costs. There is a cost to the action that we are taking today, but there would be a much bigger cost to inaction. If we fail to take this measure today, we will face the total collapse of the criminal justice system. That catastrophic disaster has to be averted at all costs. Let me turn to the comments of the right hon. Member for Witham (Priti Patel). I am pleased about how she has approached the debate. Let me assure her, particularly on matters of national security such as they touch on my responsibilities as Lord Chancellor, that we will always take a cross-party approach and look to work together in the national interest. The right hon. Lady raised important points about the join-up between different service providers, whether that is police, local authorities or others. I have already chaired a criminal justice board and we already have an implementation taskforce that will work over the summer to ensure that all the different agencies are working together so that the roll-out in September is successful. My Ministers will be working with Ministers in the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government to ensure that join-up occurs. That is an important point, and I will be taking a close personal interest in the implementation.
25 Jul 2024 · Criminal Law · Hansard source
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I beg to move, That the draft Criminal Justice Act 2003 (Requisite and Minimum Custodial Periods) Order 2024, which was laid before this House on 17 July, be approved. Following my announcement on Friday 12 July and an oral statement to the House last Thursday, Members will know that our prisons are in crisis. The male prison estate has been running at around 99% capacity for 18 months. We now know that my predecessor warned 10 Downing Street of the perils of inaction, but rather than addressing the crisis, the former Prime Minister called an election and left us a time bomb, ticking away. If we do not act now, and that bomb goes off, our prisons will reach full capacity and the justice system will grind to a halt. The courts would have to stop holding trials and the police would be unable to make arrests. With criminals free to act without consequence, the public would be put at risk. If we do not act now, this nightmare will become reality by September. We have explored all the options available to us. In the precious little time we have, we cannot build more prisons or add more prison blocks, and we cannot fit out an existing site to make it secure enough to hold offenders. Although we are deporting foreign national offenders as fast as legally possible, we cannot do so quickly enough to address the crisis. Although we must make progress on the remand population—those who are in prison while they await trial—such measures take time we do not have. That has left us with only one option to avert disaster. The statutory instrument that we are considering today will change the law so that prisoners serving eligible standard determinate sentences will have their automatic release point adjusted to 40% rather than 50% of their sentence. That will mean that around 5,500 offenders will be released, in two tranches, in September and October. They will leave prison a few weeks or months early, to serve the rest of their sentence under strict licence conditions in the community. Thereafter, all qualifying sentences will continue to be subject to the new 40% release point. Let me turn now to the detail of this legislation, the sentences that qualify for this measure, and those that do not. First, this change applies to both male and female offenders. This is a legal necessity and addresses the pressure in both the male and female prison estate. Although this measure does not apply to those serving in the youth estate, where capacity pressures are less acute, it does apply to a few individuals serving sentences under section 250 of the Sentencing Act 2020. Most of those serving these sentences are serving long terms that are excluded from the measure, as I will go on to explain. However, a few are in scope, and are included because they are likely to end their term in the adult estate. The provision also includes those on a detention in a young offenders institution, and 18 to 20 year-olds who are held in adult prisons. As such, both contribute to the capacity crisis. As the measure must balance addressing the crisis in our prisons alongside the need to protect the public, certain sentences will be excluded. The worst violent and sexual crimes, which are subject to a 67% release, will not be eligible. Neither will violent offences subject to a sentence of four years or more under part 1 of schedule 15 to the Criminal Justice Act 2003. Sexual offences will be excluded, including offences related to child sexual abuse and grooming. We will exclude a series of offences linked to domestic abuse, including stalking, controlling or coercive behaviour and non-fatal strangulation. National security offences under the Official Secrets Acts and National Security Act 2023, and offences determined to have been carried out for a foreign power, will also be excluded, as will serious terrorism offences and terrorism-connected offences, which remain subject to a 67% release at the Parole Board’s discretion. So too will terrorism offences, which are currently subject to a 50% release.
25 Jul 2024 · Criminal Law · Hansard source
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I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. He raises an incredibly important matter. I have had the feelings of victims very much in my mind as I have been forced to make this decision. Nothing in relation to the victim notification scheme or the victim contact scheme will change as a result of these measures. All the usual arrangements will apply and I shall detail some of those a little later in my speech. Returning to the offences that are excluded, in each case we have excluded specific offences, rather than cohorts of offenders. That is a legal necessity. It is only possible to make this change in law, with reference to qualifying sentences. In addition to these exclusions, there will be stringent protections in place around any early release. This change to the law will not take effect until September, which gives our hard-working Probation Service a crucial six-week implementation period. Probation officers will therefore have the time they need to assess the risk of each offender and prepare a plan to manage them safely in the community. All offenders released under this policy will be subject to stringent licence conditions. Where necessary, multi-agency public protection arrangements will be put in place to protect the public, as will multi-agency risk assessment conferences, which ensure that victims can be protected. Victims eligible for the victim contact scheme or the victim notification scheme will be notified about releases and developments in their cases. Offenders will be ordered to wear electronic tags where required. Exclusion zones and curfews will be imposed where appropriate. Crucially, if an offender breaks any of the conditions imposed on them, they can be returned to prison immediately.
25 Jul 2024 · Criminal Law · Hansard source
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My hon. Friend is right that, ultimately, one of the long-term solutions to the capacity crisis must be to reduce reoffending; I am just coming on to that point in my speech. I will happily arrange for her to meet the Prisons Minister and I will take a close interest in what is happening in Milton Keynes. Let us be under no illusion. The measure I have set out today is not a silver bullet. It does not end the prisons crisis. It is not the long-term solution. Instead, it buys us the time we need to take further measures that can address the prisons crisis not just now, but in the future. Later this year, we will publish a 10-year capacity strategy, which will outline the steps that the Government will take to acquire land for new prison sites and will ensure that building prisons—infrastructure that we deem to be of national importance—is a decision placed in a Minister’s hands. We must also drive down reoffending. Currently, all too often our prisons create better criminals, not better citizens. Nearly 80% of offenders are reoffenders. A stronger Probation Service will be crucial to driving down reoffending, and we will start by recruiting at least 1,000 new trainee probation officers by the end of March 2025, bringing forward an existing commitment to address the immediate challenges we face today. We will also work with prisons to ensure that offenders can get the skills they need to contribute to society on release, as well as bringing together prison governors, local employers and the voluntary sector to help them into work, because we know that having a job makes offenders less likely to reoffend. The last occupants of 10 Downing Street left our prisons in crisis.
18 Jul 2024 · Prison Capacity · Hansard source
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I thank my hon. Friend for that question. The situation with IPP prisoners is of great concern, and I know that huge numbers of Members on both sides of this House care about it deeply. I share that concern. IPP prisoners are not caught in the changes that we are putting forward; those are indeterminate sentences, not standard determinate sentences. We supported the previous Government in what we thought were sensible changes to the licence period and the action plan, and we will continue that work. However, any changes made have to account for public protection risks, first and foremost. We want to make progress with that cohort of prisoners, but not in a way that impacts public protection.
18 Jul 2024 · Prison Capacity · Hansard source
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I welcome my hon. Friend back to her place. I am well aware of the issues around indeterminate sentences for public protection. I know that matter is of great interest to Members, as it was to me as a constituency Member of Parliament. I know this territory well. It would not be appropriate to make changes in relation to IPP prisoners, because there is a different order of public protection risk. I am determined to make more progress on IPP prisoners. As I say, we will build on the work done by the previous Government. We worked constructively with the previous Administration on sensible changes that could be made in the safest possible way for the public. Those changes were on the licence period and the action plan, which we will crack on with as a new Government. Any changes that we make to the regime for that type of sentence, which has been rightly abolished, must be done while balancing the public protection risk, which we would never take lightly.

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