The Pains of Indeterminacy, and the Pains of Hope

It was abolished in 2012 but only prospectively: the 8,000 sentences imposed to that point remained.

In 2019 I co-authored with Dr Christina Straub the report A Helping Hand, published by Prison Reform Trust, which drew on collaborative work with families affected by the IPP sentence to make recommendations for change. We argued that:

• There remains a need to legislate to end the injustice the IPP represents for those still serving it, whether in custody or on licence in the community.
• Changes in legislation, policy and practice are required in order better to enable families to support the successful resettlement of their family member serving an IPP sentence.
• There must be a recognition of the difficulties for families in maintaining hope in the face of the persistent delays and challenges faced in relation to the IPP sentence.
• All organisations must avoid inadvertently placing further burdens on families and other individuals who have often given years of devoted support to their family member.

I am pleased to see the Justice Committee report agree with these arguments.

However, the Justice Committee’s report is, inevitably, no silver bullet.

First, the IPP sentence’s deleterious impact has been allowed to persist for so long that its unwinding becomes a task of ever-increasing complexity.

Second, the Justice Committee has no power itself directly to effect change: legislative action requires a Bill to be produced by government and supported by parliament.

Changes to policy require the Ministry of Justice to decide to make such changes and to provide sustained support for the organisations that would need to effect such change in practice (most centrally, the Parole Board, The Probation Service and the Prison Service).

In a recent paper I co-authored with Professor Rachel Condry, ‘The Pains of Hope’, we argued that the IPP sentence has caused immense pains for many families affected by it, due to a double liminality:

First, families experience the liminality of the indeterminate sentence itself. This led many to feel hopeless but unable to abandon hope, hopeful but worn down by constant setbacks. Second, campaigning families experienced the liminality of political activity – and in their case specifically the lack of alignment between supportive talk and substantive action – and the unpredictability of the political process, with multiple opportunities passing by without reform being achieved. (p1253)

The Justice Committee’s report is welcome. It sets out a clear path by which the government, parliament and the judiciary can act. And the report is the result, in large part, of the admirable commitment and sustained hard graft of many families and other close supporters of those sentenced to IPP.

It can only be hoped that the Ministry of Justice, led by the ninth Justice Secretary in ten years, shows the courage and conviction to follow through on the logic of the state’s official position on the IPP sentence, as set out at the time of its abolition:

[IPP sentences are] unclear, inconsistent and have been used far more than was ever intended...That is unjust to the people in question and completely inconsistent with the policy of punishment, reform and rehabilitation.

For ways in which you can help to achieve positive change, see the UNGRIPP Twitter thread here and their ‘get involved’ webpage here. You can also check the IPP Committee in Action webpage here.

Dr Harry Annison is an Associate Professor in Criminal Law and Criminology at Southampton Law School.