Grooming gang members and killers blocked from early prison release under changes announced
Anyone convicted of unlawful killing, including all forms of manslaughter and death by dangerous driving, will now be excluded
Grooming gang members and killers will be blocked from early prison release under changes announced by Andy Burnham following a backlash over the scope of the scheme.
Some offenders serving indefinite jail sentences, which were abolished in 2012, will also be freed through legislation to be brought forward by the end of this Parliament, the Prime Minister pledged.
Some 5,000 prisoners had been due to be released early from October under plans to ease jail overcrowding, down from 6,000 after ministers intervened to exempt rapists and “serious” child sex offenders.
Under fresh changes announced on Sunday, August 30, anyone convicted of unlawful killing, including all forms of manslaughter and death by dangerous driving, will now be excluded.
Grooming gang perpetrators will also be blocked from early release after concerns were raised about a potential loophole in the system.
Indecent assault, an offence for which some child sex offenders were prosecuted before changes to sexual abuse laws in 2003, will be added to the list of exemptions to the scheme.
Mr Burnham said “hundreds” of extra people will remain in prison following the changes, which will be laid in Parliament through secondary legislation this week.
The Prime Minister said extra space in prisons would be created by deporting foreign prisoners and releasing inmates who are serving indefinite sentences under imprisonment for public protection sentences (IPPs), which were given to offenders considered a significant risk to the public between 2005 and 2012.
But the changes to IPPs could take years to implement and will not be part of the initial measures to ease overcrowding.
The Prime Minister said releasing some offenders on these sentences would require a “very careful” approach because some will still pose a risk of harm.
A cross-party group will be set up to look at how to correct the “injustice” of the IPP system, which has seen many offenders convicted when they were young remain in jail for crimes that are “not at the same level of seriousness” as some of those who were previously eligible for early release, he said.
“It does need to be done in a very careful way with regard to public safety, national security and all of those issues,” Mr Burnham said.
The law was changed to stop courts handing out IPP sentences in 2012 after warnings that they were being applied too widely, but the abolition was not retrospective, meaning many prisoners already serving such sentences are still behind bars.
Ministry of Justice figures show some 856 IPP prisoners remained unreleased as of June 30 this year. A further 1,415 offenders were recalled after being handed IPP sentences, according to the data.