Members of the House of Lords yesterday challenged the government to act on the Imprisonment for Public Protection (IPP) sentence.
During a debate yesterday, initiated by Baroness Burt of Solihull, speaker after speaker urged the government to take more concerted
One of the speakers, Lord Woodley, quoted the United Nations in describing the IPP sentence as “a form of torture” and called on the government to set up an expert advisory panel to explore the possibility of resentencing all those under an IPP.
Lord Woodley is currently taking a Private Member’s Bill through parliament that, if passed, would establish a resentencing exercise.
He also challenged ministerial claims that respect for the Parole Board process meant that they could not support resentencing:
Ministers also claim that they are opposed to resentencing because they don’t want to overrule or usurp the role of the Parole Board, which sounds on first listening quite reasonable. But last week... an answer to a written question by Kim Johnson MP revealed that since July, the new government have refused to follow the Parole Board’s recommendations on transfer or release of IPP prisoners in over 45 per cent of the time.
In total, ten Peers spoke in the debate: Baroness Burt of Solihull, Lord Woodley, Lord Moylan, Lord Hastings of Scarisbrick, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, Baroness Blower, Lord Carter of Haslemere, Lord German, Lord Wolfson of Tredegar and Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede.
Some powerful quotes from the debate include one from Baroness Burt of Solihull, who said:
On access to and the quality of the courses, I am still getting reports not just that prisoners cannot find the courses they need but that the courses are often not fit for purpose. I have been told that half of prisoners cannot access courses.
And from Lord Hastings of Scarisbrick, who said:
If any of us were put in the same position—held for a 10-year sentence and then another 10 years—would we be fit for training? Would we have the right approach? Would our minds be ready for release? We would be screwed up—and the Government want to pretend that this equals change. It does not; it equals sitting back and giving in to the panic of the public.
Watch the various speeches below or via this YouTube playlist.
You can also download our parliamentary briefing for the debate from this page.
