On 16 October Justice Secretary Alex Chalk made a speech to Parliament setting out the government’s programme for prison sentencing in the coming period. This was echoed on 3 November in the King’s Speech, which included plans for a new Sentencing Bill. Chalk took over the post in April from the universally loathed Dominic Raab. Like all his predecessors over the past three decades, Chalk’s main remit is to show how ‘tough on crime’ his party is, by introducing measures to make prison sentences for the most serious crimes yet longer and harsher. However, at the same time, he faces the contradictory task of dealing with a prison system which is bursting at the seams, and therefore has to find ways to slow down the spiralling growth of the prison population. Nicki Jameson reports.
The main proposals for harsher sentencing involve removing the faint possibility of good prison behaviour and rehabilitation leading to slightly earlier release from custody for various groups of prisoners. Further categories of murder will be added to the list of those punished by a mandatory Whole Life Order, while people sentenced to Extended Determinate Sentences for serious sex offences will serve their entire custodial period without the possibility of parole. Previously the chance of early release on parole licence has been dangled as a carrot to make such prisoners comply with the prison regime and with attendance at ‘offending behaviour’ courses such as the ‘sex offenders’ treatment programme’.
At the other end of the scale, in an attempt to slightly alleviate overcrowding without providing too much fuel to the right-wing media and Labour Party opposition, who will jump on any reduction in oppression as ‘soft on crime’, the Sentencing Bill will include a presumption that any sentence of less than 12 months will be suspended. There will also be a change to the eligibility criteria for Home Detention Curfew (early release on electronic tag) extending the scheme from prisoners serving under four years to some with longer terms.
Without waiting for this primary legislation to pass through the parliamentary process, Chalk announced two immediate measures. Firstly, using existing law, a number of prisoners, whose release date falls between 16 October and 12 December are being released 18 days early. The Blair Labour government used a similar mechanism in 2007. Secondly, from January 2024, the government plans to extend from 12 to 18 months the period of time prior to their release date that a foreign national prisoner who is not contesting their removal can be deported. These measures are sticking plasters on a gaping wound and will do little to alleviate the extreme prison overcrowding.
In his speech, Chalk correctly identified that one of the reasons the prison population is so unwieldy is that, in addition to sentenced prisoners, there are huge numbers either held on remand or following recall to prison. However, rather than announce steps to address this by greater use of bail and a reduction in recalls of people who have committed no further crime, his response is to repeat the pledges of his predecessors to build yet more prisons.
For anyone hoping that these new prisons will replace the decaying ancient ones, there is no respite. Prisoners will continue to be crowded into cells with inadequate space and in urgent need of repair, in prisons such as HMP Bedford, where three people have died so far this year, the most recent on 21 November.. On 17 November this prison was condemned by the Chief Inspector of Prisons as a place where: ‘Three-quarters of the prisoners lived in overcrowded conditions. Most spent more than 22 hours a day locked in their cells. The wings were dirty and there was a widespread infestation of rats and cockroaches. Some cells had broken windows and black mould on the walls.’ Rather than downplay this obscenely degrading treatment, Chalk openly boasted that by ‘doubling up cells where it is safe to do so… and delaying non-essential maintenance projects to bring cells back into use, we have freed up an extra 2,600 places since September last year alone’.
As ever, the Labour Party have nothing different to offer. Having declared themselves ‘the party of law and order’ Keir Starmer and co are not prepared to embrace even the most timid reductions in prison sentencing. Shadow Justice Minister Shabana Mahmood replied to Chalk’s announcements with a predictable litany of complaints that, despite its promises, the government was not locking up enough people, for long enough, building enough new prison places or deporting foreign nationals quickly enough.
FIGHT RACISM! FIGHT IMPERIALISM! 297 December 2023/January 2024
