Prisoners will be released from jail as little as a third of the way through their sentences if they behave well, under Government plans to tackle the overcrowding crisis. The Telegraph has the story.
Offenders will be able to earn their freedom if they complete work, training or education assignments and demonstrate good behaviour.
If they fail to behave, they will have to spend longer in jail under the shake-up that will see the current automatic early release of offenders 40% of the way through their sentences scrapped.
Instead, convicted criminals will be given minimum and maximum sentences. Prisoners who fail to behave and engage with their training, education or work will face upper jail time limits that are significantly longer than the current 40% automatic release date.
The changes – designed to incentivise rehabilitation – are part of a package of measures to combat prison overcrowding which will be recommended to the Government next week by its independent sentencing review led by David Gauke, the former Tory justice secretary.
It will be the biggest shake-up in sentencing for more than 30 years, ending a blanket approach to automatic early release introduced in the 1991 Criminal Justice Act. Most prisoners are currently guaranteed release after serving 40%, 50% or, since 2003, two-thirds of their sentences.
The Tories will claim the plans amount to “soft justice”, while Labour will argue that the scale of the prisons crisis it inherited from the Conservatives requires radical solutions. The number of spare spaces in men’s jails has again dropped below 1,000, with prisons at 99% of their 89,300-inmate operational capacity.
Internal Ministry of Justice (MoJ) forecasts predict jails will run out of space again by early 2026, despite Labour introducing an early release scheme last September, whereby prisoners are freed 40% of the way through their sentences rather than halfway through.
Worth reading in full.
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Nightingale hospitals were built very quickly. The government has commited to 1.5 million homes by the next general election.
Building additional prison capacity cannot be that difficult. Cells don’t need to be plastered when put into use and facilities can be pretty basic. Just get in with it. Are there any plans at all to build additional prisons?
They could build the prisons; they can’t get Prison Officers. And that will become even more difficult after the two violent attacks by convicted terrorists reported in the last couple of weeks.
If the officers were allowed to meet violence with a like amount of violence they would be less likely to offend.
The changes – designed to incentivise rehabilitation
Are they? Or are they designed to provide empty spaces to be filled with patriots and opponents of The Great Replacement? If this vile regime wanted to reduce the numbers in prison it could reduce immigration from countries with – how shall I put it? – a more relaxed attitude to crime.
No doubt Liebour inherited a prison capacity crisis but they’ve yet to announce plans to build anymore. It might take a while to find companies owned by friends/family of ministers or senior civil servants that can be given contracts to supply some of the things needed in a new prison, I’m sure that companies that normally supply stationery can easily supply half a million bricks. Then there’s the wait because they have to complete 40,000 pages of environmental impact assessments and work out they’re going to offset the destruction of a few clumps of rare moss. However if they don’t start the whole torturous process they’ll never increase prison capacity.
It won’t be long before hardened criminals in Scotland are begging to serve their whole sentence in the new £1billion prison with it’s landscaped gardens, organic fruit orchards, mindfulness rooms, spas and who knows what else.
Hot and cold running whores
I actually appreciate the honesty this will bring to sentencing. Three to five years (yank style) is much more honest than “sentenced to five years” with automatica early release at 40%
Sentences for repeat offenders should increase dramatically though.
The guidelines will be as follows:
All criminals to be treated with maximum leniency, except those sentenced for thoughtcrimes.
Any tweets criticizing the official ideological narrative of the government will be punished with utmost severity.
What could possibly go right?
Folks listen up. If you do not start to speak up about the incompetent way this country is being managed, you can expect more of the same. Early release of criminals is hardly a deterrent. Write to your mp. Do something.
Prison serves several purposes:
1) It keeps criminals off the streets, so they cannot commit any more crimes while they are in prison (well, other than the ones they commit in prison) and thus harm society.
2) It serves as a deterrent.
3) It puts a value on the seriousness of various crimes.
4) It may stop the punished person from committing more crimes after they have been punished.
Releasing some people so early, regardless of how well behaved and “reformed” they might seem, doesn’t help purposes 1-3 at all – in fact it detracts from them. If we think it’s better overall for some people to serve shorter sentences, let’s debate that with reference to what we think the purposes of prison are, not because we’ve somehow (how could this possibly have happened…/) ended up with more criminals than we expected and not bothered to build prisons to house them all.