Offenders to be released early to avoid UK prison crisis

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The new Labour government will shorten automatic release for some prisoners from 50% to 40% of their sentences as part of measures to stem a full-blown prison crisis in England and Wales.

Shabana Mahmood, the justice minister, said on Friday that the policy would come into effect from September and would be reviewed after 18 months.

The measures, which early modelling suggests would free up space “in the low thousands”, are needed to prevent paralysis in the criminal justice system, she said. Without them prison will run out of space, leaving police unable to arrest “dangerous criminals.”

“Our prisons are on the brink of collapse,” Mahmood said in her first major speech at Five Wells prison in Wellingborough, blaming the capacity crisis on the Conservative government that was ousted in last week’s general election.

“When prisons are overcrowded, violence increases, putting frontline prison officers at risk. When there are no cells, suspects cannot be held. This means carloads of dangerous people are traveling across the country with nowhere to go,” she said.

Outlining measures Labor is taking to reduce overcrowding, she said the government would temporarily reduce the proportion of some prison sentences from 50 to 40 per cent. She stressed those released would be managed “safely”.

Offenders sentenced to four years or more in prison for serious violent crimes will be automatically disqualified, along with inmates convicted of sex crimes and crimes involving domestic violence.

This includes non-fatal stalking, strangulation or suffocation, and “controlling or coercive behavior in an intimate or family relationship.”

Mahmood said anyone released would be closely monitored by the probation service, including electronic tagging and a curfew, and would be recalled to prison if they breached their licence conditions.

Recognizing the additional strain that early release would put on the probation service, Mahmood said the government plans to recruit an additional 1,000 probation trainees by March 2025.

The new measures will close the End of Prison Supervision Licence (ECSL) scheme, which the previous Conservative government started last October when the prison system was just a few hundred places short of capacity.

The Conservatives release 10,000 prisoners earlier than expected under the program, which was from October 17 to June 30 this year, according to figures released by the Ministry of Justice on Friday.

The ECSL program allows some inmates to be released up to 18 days before their release date. This period is extended to 35 days in March and 70 days from May onwards.

Labor’s more drastic intervention, recommended by the Prison Governors Association and several charities, is designed to buy the government more time to build an effective buffer for reform.

Pia Sinha, chief executive of the Prison Reform Trust charity, welcomed the emergency measures and said they would stop the “criminal justice system literally grinding to a halt”.

“Reducing automatic release times for prisoners serving time-bound sentences is the most direct and comprehensive way to reduce the need to provide our prisons with vital breathing space,” she said.

Sinha added that the probation department will need enough resources to monitor the growing number of licensees in the community.

Chief Inspector of Prisons Charlie Taylor, whose recent reports have often described conditions inside the prison complex as inhumane, welcomed “swift action to manage the prison population”.

But he said the measures would inevitably lead to the early release of some “dangerous criminals”.

“How these men are prepared for release and how prisons and probation are supported in managing them will be crucial. We will be watching this very closely,” he said.