A week is a long time in politics, so the saying goes, but 20 days, the length of time the UK has had a new Government, is but a brief moment in Whitehall time. So it is a sign of the desperate situation that the new Lord Chancellor, Shabana Mahmood MP, found herself in that she made the decision to take swift action on prison capacity only 7 days into the job.
In our paper, Systems Shift, we were one of the first voices to call for a new government to take the emergency measure of reducing the automatic release point for a range of determinate sentenced prisoners from 50% of their sentence to 40%. The new Lord Chancellor should be admired for persuading a new Prime Minister to do something so obviously unpopular, a feat that evaded her immediate predecessor. The fact that she did so, and so quickly, speaks both to her political weight and to the acute nature of the crisis.
Usually, in not-for-profit land a Government enacting a policy proposal you recommend is considered a big win. But this time round, there are no grounds for us or anyone else to celebrate. Taking emergency action was the inevitable, awful consequence of a justice system in turmoil. As prominent KC Joanna Hardy-Susskind rightly said on the day of the announcement, “Prisons are the problem today. But… (t)his isn’t a prison crisis. It’s a criminal justice crisis. Releasing a few thousand gives the government time. But it doesn’t give it answers.” As Ian Acheson, former prison Governor and adviser to the previous Government, rightly pointed out “It was a clever way of playing an awful hand…But let's be clear, the risk is displaced not dissipated.” Until we can deliver a shift in how the whole system works, we are destined to be back at the same crisis point far too soon.
So, we were pleased to see additional signs of hope and long term thinking in the Parliamentary Statement and debate on prisons capacity held on 18th July. For example, we have called for independent forecasts of criminal justice capacity and demand, in part to help open up the public debate on long-term prison population and capacity options. The Ministry announced they will, “publish an annual prison capacity statement, legislating to make this a statutory requirement.” On one of the most egregious sentencing injustices of our time, sentences of Imprisonment for Public Protection, she hinted that “We want to make progress with that cohort of prisoners.” On probation, an area in its own acute capacity and workforce crisis, she committed to the recruitment of an additional 1,000 probation officers.
Of course, one statement does not a strategy make. At the Centre, we will continue, as we always have done, to work with practitioners and policymakers to put in place evidence-led solutions to deliver better outcomes for our communities. We remain clear that a new Government needs to take a long term and sober approach to the criminal justice system, responding to the complexity of the cases coming into the system and tackling the root causes that lead to offending. But we also recognise that until the system has the time and space to get out of the brace position, that can’t happen. The Government’s first step, of bold quick action, is but only one step on a long path, but it is a first step that has at least been promising.