Summary of the day …
Keir Starmer’s government will release thousands of prisoners in England and Wales after they have served 40% of their sentences and recruit 1,000 probation officers to solve an overcrowding crisis that threatens “a total breakdown of law and order”, the justice secretary has announced. The lord chancellor, Shabana Mahmood, described the policy as “the only way to avert disaster”, saying if prisons were to run out of places, courts would be forced to delay jailing offenders and police unable to arrest dangerous criminals – a crisis that would leave the public at risk. Rishi Sunak’s government released more than 10,000 prisoners up to 70 days early, figures revealed, but prisons have been at 99% capacity for about a year
Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood firmly laid the blame at Sunak’s door, saying “Sunak and his gang in Number 10 are the guilty men, she says, responsible for the crisis in the prison system”. Starmer earlier described the state of the system he had inherited as “grossly irresponsible”
Chief inspector of probation Martin Jones questioned whether there is “enough time” to get probation processes “right” ahead of the early release of some prisoners under government plans. He said the probation service already has “a caseload nearly three times the number of those in prison”
Liz Saville Roberts, the Plaid Cymru leader in Westminster, has said the Labour government needs to go further with its plans to tackle prison overcrowding in England and Wales, and that full devolution of justice to Wales – as it is in Scotland – would be the way forward. Green Party of England and Wales co-leader Carla Denyer urged the Government to focus more on “prevention, rehabilitation and restorative justice”
Home secretary Yvette Cooper has said the deaths this morning of four people attempting to cross the channel were “truly awful”. Shadow home secretary James Cleverly said “As a country we must do everything in our power to stop the boats and put an end to this vile trade in human suffering”
Labour has summoned the bosses of some of the worst-performing train operators, including Avanti West Coast and TransPennine, for meetings next week as it seeks to rapidly reform the railways and reset industrial relations. The transport secretary, Louise Haigh, will bring in Network Rail route directors to attend all talks with the train companies, signalling the move towards an integrated railway
The Treasury has said chancellor Rachel Reeves spoke to Ukrainian finance minister Sergii Marchenko. It said she “reaffirmed the UK’s continued support, in the same week the government recommitted to £3bn a year of military support for the country”
The Post Office chief executive Nick Read will temporarily step back from the role so that he can give his “entire attention” to the next stage of the Horizon inquiry, he has said
Some other details from the government policy announcement on prisons today. It said that Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood also visited Bedford Probation Office today to speak with frontline staff to hear about the challenges they were facing.
The government statement said:
Acknowledging these challenges, the Justice Secretary has also set out plans to recruit over 1,000 additional trainee probation officers by March 2025, allowing for greater oversight and management of offenders once they leave prisons.
During her speech, the Justice Secretary reiterated her commitment to tackling the prison crisis for the long term. This included clear plans on how prisons can be built quicker by unblocking the planning system and enacting wider system reform and a 10-year capacity strategy will also be published in the Autumn, in line with the spending review timeline.
An annual statement on prison capacity will also be published every year, making sure the government is being held to account and must always have the prison places to keep dangerous offenders off the streets. This will make sure the public will never face the situation it is in today again.
The government has announced it will release thousands of prisoners after they have served 40% of their sentences, with Mahmood describing the policy as “the only way to avert disaster”.
Probation chief questions whether there is 'enough time' to prepare for release plan
Chief inspector of probation Martin Jones questioned whether there is “enough time” to get probation processes “right” ahead of the early release of some prisoners under government plans.
PA Media reports he told Times Radio:
The probation service has a caseload nearly three times the number of those in prison.
Now, they need to ensure that they identify the risk that those people represent and that they identify what their needs are when they leave prison. Do they have accommodation? Do they have jobs to go to? Do they have, for example, drugs and mental health support in the community?
Now, my concern is, is there enough time to get that right, to ensure they get the right information and that they can then deal with those people effectively when they leave prison.
Our recent inspection programme has found that there’s some real problems at the frontline with the probation service at the moment, particularly in relation to staffing. Some areas that we inspect have fewer than 50% of the probation officers they need. So how are they going to have the capacity to ensure that they safeguard the public when they’re being released from custody?
As part of the announcement today, Labour said it intended to recruit 1,000 additional trainee probation officers.
Updated
Freshly installed as deputy leader of Reform at the expense of a somewhat miffed Ben Habib, the new MP for Boston and Skegness, Richard Tice, has been out and about in his constituency today.
Delighted to meet Lincs Cty Cllr @ColinDavie1 to discuss significant common grd on flooding protection, sea level defences, stopping the pylons in Boston & Skegness pic.twitter.com/pLWVaTaxEe
— Richard Tice MP 🇬🇧 (@TiceRichard) July 12, 2024
Liz Saville Roberts, the Plaid Cymru leader in Westminster, has said the Labour government needs to go further with its plans to tackle prison overcrowding in England and Wales, and that full devolution of justice to Wales – as it is in Scotland – would be the way forward. She posted to social media to say:
HMP Swansea is at 145% of its capacity. Ten people died in HMP Parc between February and June. Action to address the prison overcrowding crisis is welcome, but probation and housing need additional support while changes are under way.
This is just a temporary fix to deep-rooted failings. To solve this crisis long-term, we need cross-government prevention and rehabilitation strategies, which all evidence shows would be best achieved through the full devolution of justice powers to Wales.
The government have issued some quotes from Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood. She says:
When prisons are full, violence rises – putting prison officers on the frontline at risk. When no cells are available, suspects cannot be held in custody. This means vanloads of dangerous people circling the country, with nowhere to go.
The police would have to use their cells as a prison overflow, keeping officers off the streets. Soon, the courts would grind to a halt, unable to hold trials.
With officers unable to act, criminals could do whatever they want, without consequence. We could see looters running amok, smashing in windows, robbing shops and setting neighbourhoods alight.
In short, if we fail to act now, we face the collapse of the criminal justice system. And a total breakdown of law and order.
She also had some harsh words for the previous administration. This was what Tamara Cohen had to say about it as they trailed the announcement on Sky News:
She [Mahmood] puts the blame firmly at the door of the previous government saying that Rishi Sunak and his gang in Number 10 are the guilty men, she says, responsible for the crisis in the prison system.
Time and again, she said, they ducked the difficult decisions that could have addressed this challenge, instead keeping the public in the dark about the state they had left this country in. The lights were flashing red, she said, and they chose to put the country at risk.
Keir Starmer is back from the Nato summit in Washington, and has attended a meeting at St James Palace where King Charles III was hosting, among others, actor Idris Elba. They were discussing youth opportunity.
Baroness Newlove, the Victims’ Commissioner, has said the safety of victims must never be compromised, and welcomed “the decision to exclude domestic abusers and stalkers from benefiting from an early release date” in today’s announcement.
She went on to say:
Public safety must remain the top priority as these changes are implemented. We must acknowledge these exclusions have limitations and cannot address every potential risk.
Clear communication with victims is essential to building trust throughout the process. It is important victims are informed if release dates are brought forward and are given the opportunity to request protective measures. Thorough risk assessments are essential, as are robust release plans. The Probation Service plays a critical role in this. They must be properly resourced to effectively manage licensing conditions and exclusion zones, which are vital for public safety and victim reassurance.This change in sentencing lays bare the significant long-term challenges facing our justice system. It is paramount victim confidence, already fragile, is not impacted further.
The Green Party of England and Wales are advertising for people to work in parliament with its four new MPs.
We're hiring!
— Sian Berry (@sianberry) July 12, 2024
With our historic vote share and three new seats in Parliament I will be recruiting additions to my team:
🚨Parliamentary Assistant
🚨Caseworker
Find out more and apply! https://t.co/jmBBKL6kSM pic.twitter.com/BFtpoULzqy
Pia Sinha, chief executive of the Prison Reform Trust, has said: “In this moment of crisis for the prisons system, the incoming government has had the good sense to listen to the advice of its officials and introduce further emergency measures to prevent dangerous levels of overcrowding and the criminal justice system literally grinding to a halt.
“Reducing the automatic release point for prisoners serving determinate sentences is the most straightforward and comprehensive way to reduce demand to give our prisons vital breathing space.”
Reform UK’s new MP for Great Yarmouth seems somewhat less impressed. Earlier this week he was accused of mounting a “witch-hunt” against local teachers.
Labour Government, just over one week in. pic.twitter.com/PWAMUAx0Jn
— Rupert Lowe MP (@RupertLowe10) July 12, 2024
PA Media reports that former Conservative justice secretary Alex Chalk reportedly pressed former prime minister Rishi Sunak to make the change that Labour are enacting.
In her announcement Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood is expected to stress “this is an emergency measure” and “not a permanent change”.
The Law Society has said the announcement by Labour’s Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood that some prisoners will only serve 40% of their sentences in prison in order to make space in England and Wales’ over-crowded prisons is “pragmatic”.
Law Society of England and Wales president Nick Emmerson said:
The new Lord Chancellor has acted pragmatically and decisively to tackle a prisons crisis she inherited.
It will be important to ensure that appropriate safeguards are in place so that any risks to the public are minimised. The concerns of victims who are having to wait years for justice and then see offenders released early must also be recognised. We are encouraged that the Lord Chancellor appears to be very alert to this issue.
The prisons crisis is just one of many connected problems in the criminal justice system following decades of underfunding and cuts. We have seen growing backlogs in the magistrates and Crown Courts, a shortage of lawyers, judges and court staff and a crumbling court estate. Probation services are still on their knees.
When the justice system is in crisis the rule of law and public protection are at risk. The emergency in our prisons illustrates the consequences of the neglect of the criminal justice system.
We hope this announcement will create the time and space for a more fundamental review of solutions to this wider crisis.
Thousands of prisoners to be released early to avoid ‘total breakdown of law and order’
Keir Starmer’s government will release thousands of prisoners in England and Wales after they have served 40% of their sentences and recruit 1,000 trainee probation officers to solve an overcrowding crisis that threatens “a total breakdown of law and order”, the justice secretary has announced.
The lord chancellor, Shabana Mahmood, described the policy as “the only way to avert disaster”, saying that if prisons were to run out of places, courts would be forced to delay jailing offenders and police unable to arrest dangerous criminals – a crisis that would leave the public at risk.
“If we fail to act now, we face the collapse of the criminal justice system. And a total breakdown of law and order,” she said at a press conference at HMP Five Wells in Northamptonshire.
Beginning in September, the government will temporarily reduce the proportion of certain custodial sentences served in prison from 50% to 40% in England and Wales, and claims it will implement safeguards and exemptions to keep the public safe and clear release plans to manage them safely in the community.
Sentences for serious violent offences of four years or more and sex offences will be automatically excluded. In a distinction from the end of custody supervised licence scheme (ECSL), the early release of offenders in prison for domestic abuse-connected crimes will also be excluded. This will include:
Stalking offences.
Controlling or coercive behaviours in an intimate or family relationship.
Non-fatal strangulation and suffocation.
Breach of restraining order, non-molestation order, and domestic abuse protection order.
The new release scheme is expected to allow several thousand prisoners to leave early this year, starting in September. Sources said the numbers would be eased out gradually.
The measure is expected to be applied to prisoners serving sentences of under four years and will not apply to those convicted of violent, sexual or terrorism-related offences.
Updated
The Treasury has said chancellor Rachel Reeves spoke to Ukrainian finance minister Sergii Marchenko. It said she “reaffirmed the UK’s continued support, in the same week the government recommitted to £3bn a year of military support for the country.”
Marchenko also posted a readout of the call, saying he received reassurance and thanking the UK for it contributions.
Today, I had a call with newly appointed UK Chancellor of the Exchequer @hmtreasury @RachelReevesMP . Received assurances regarding further 🇬🇧-🇺🇦 fruitful financial cooperation. Grateful to the UK for ongoing budget support - over $2.5 billion since February 24, 2022. pic.twitter.com/Nri4l20HtH
— Sergii Marchenko (@SergiiMarchenk3) July 12, 2024
George Georgiou, national officer for the GMB Union, has said the crisis in prisons is a “toxic legacy” from the last government.
PA Media quotes him saying:
GMB is clear: probation workers need better pay and conditions. This need is magnified as they deal with the overcrowding chaos – another toxic legacy of the Tory government. The Justice Secretary was very receptive and seems to grasp things have got to change if we want a prison service that’s fit for purpose.
By the way we are expecting the statement about prison over-crowding in England and Wales from new Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood at about 2.30pm.
Green Party of England and Wales co-leader Carla Denyer urged the Government to focus more on “prevention, rehabilitation and restorative justice”, ahead of the Justice Secretary’s announcement on plans to reduce prison overcrowding.
PA Media reports she said in a statement:
The Labour Government’s welcome appointment of James Timpson as prisons minister is a chance to set a new tone on criminal justice.
Now they need to work to reduce the number of people being sent to prison in the first place, starting by immediately publishing the expert drug policy advice sent to the home secretary in 2016, and heeding its advice to decriminalise possession.
Prison is demonstrably an ineffective way of reducing reoffending. We know that short prison sentences have devasting effects on people’s lives by losing jobs, homes and even relationships. And ultimately, we know it leads to higher rates of reoffending.
James Timpson previously said that ‘we’re addicted to punishment’. He is right. Now is the time for the government to take the bold action necessary to place a much bigger emphasis on prevention, rehabilitation and restorative justice.
But this means resourcing the frontline services that have been decimated under 14 years of Conservative rule. It means restoring funding to youth services, rebuilding people’s lives through investment in probation and prison services, and diverting people away from the criminal justice system that drags their lives into an endless downward spiral and towards support services instead.
An anonymous civil servant writes for the Guardian today that after years of being gaslit by government, civil servants can breathe again under Labour …
There is a profound sense of relief that, as the incoming chief secretary to the Treasury recently purred, “the adults are back in the room”. One particularly long-serving colleague told me: “I’ve never been so glad to see the back of a government – of any colour.” But that relief is tempered by the lingering worry that too much has been promised. As another colleague told me: “I’m worried that the public won’t like the time it will take for things to change … will ministers take the blame – or will it be passed down to us?”
A worker from the aforementioned housing ministry also spoke of their relief at the announcement that “levelling up” would be deleted from the departmental boilerplate, almost audibly sighing that “we were widely ridiculed by stakeholders. MHCLG (Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government) feels so much more professional and signals a fresh start.” A Welsh government civil servant told me that Keir Starmer’s visits to Cardiff and Edinburgh were a “positive start” and hoped for a kinder and more collaborative approach to working with Scotland and Wales.
Read more here: The civil servant – After years of being gaslit by government, we civil servants can breathe again under Labour
The Post Office chief executive Nick Read will temporarily step back from the role so that he can give his “entire attention” to the next stage of the Horizon inquiry, he has said.
PA Media reports Read wrote in a note to staff that he and the board agreed he should step back over the summer to prepare for the next phase of proceedings, which will look at current practices at the Post Office, and begins in September.
An Institute for Government report on the crisis in prisons in England and Wales identified some key factors which have contributed to the crisis facing the incoming Labour government.
It noted:
The prison population of England and Wales has doubled over the last 30 years, despite crime rates falling substantially. It is currently just over 87,000, up 13% just in the last three years, and the Ministry of Justice projects this to hit 99,300 by the end of next year. Even with new prisons being built, capacity is not expected to grow anything like that fast: only around 4,400 new spaces are planned – but this is against an estimated 12,000 more prisoners.
In 2023, the average custodial sentence given at the crown court, which deals with more serious offences, was more than 25% longer than in 2012. Some of this is due to more convictions for violent offences, which tend to attract longer sentences. But the same crimes are now attracting longer sentences as well. Sentences for robbery, for example, were 13 months longer on average in 2023 than in 2012, an increase of 36%.
These longer sentences kept the prison population largely flat during the 2010s, even as the number of people tried and convicted in the courts was falling.
In the last few years, however, it is two other groups – those on remand and those recalled to prison – that have principally caused the population to rise rapidly. The number of people on remand has risen 84% since 2019 and now accounts for almost 20% of the total prison population. Of these, two-thirds are yet to be convicted of a crime.
Updated
Plaid Cymru have called again on the Labour government to end the two-child benefit cap, stating that 30% of Welsh children are living in poverty.
In a post to social media, the party said “Keir Starmer won the general election on a ‘change’ ticket. The most powerful change would be to lift millions of children out of poverty across the UK by ending the two-child benefit cap.”
Ann Davies, newly elected as the Plaid Cymru MP for Caerfyrddin, added “As the joint owner of a children’s nursery, I have seen the devastating impact of child poverty on families in Carmarthenshire”.
As the joint owner of a children’s nursery, I have seen the devastating impact of child poverty on families in Carmarthenshire
— Ann Davies - Caerfyrddin (@AnnBremenda) July 12, 2024
Plaid Cymru is today calling on the Labour UK Government to end the two-child benefit cap to reduce child poverty https://t.co/8UR94MfFpL
Ruth Cadbury, the Labour MP for Brentford and Isleworth who was formerly shadow minister for prisons, parole and probation, has asked people commenting on the government’s plans for the system to “remember just how bad a state our prisons are in” on account of the previous government.
In a series of posts to social media, she said:
With prisons in the news it’s worth remembering just how terrible a state they are in. Whatever your view on the purpose of prison they are not working. Poor conditions mean prisons are becoming unsafe and failing in their function of helping to rehabilitate prisoners.
Prisons are suppose to be secure. Yet we have seen breach after breach of prison security. In HMP Bedford the security strategy was even deleted & body scanners were left unattended.
Under the Conservatives the number of trained prison riot officers decreased massively, meaning there is a serious risk of disorder if a serious incident breaks out at more than one prison.
Then we have drugs. The number of drugs into our prisons has skyrocketed over the past decade. This funds organised crime and leads to prisoners and officers being targeted to bring drugs into prison.
Then we have the failure to rehabilitate. The re-offending rate of those leaving prison was increasing under the Conservatives towards the end of their term. With prisons being unsafe, drug ridden and dangerous it was no surprise.
Frontline prison officers were facing an impossible job: increased levels of violence, huge amount of stress and increased responsibilities in a system that was crumbling around them. The Prison Officers Association are rightly campaigning & raising awareness about these attacks on their officers.
A lack of housing for those leaving prison was the biggest issue mentioned to me by those working in the sector. People were leaving prison and being given tents. They were being set up to fail.
The poor provision of mental health care, both in the community, the NHS and in prison was also a huge driver behind problems in prison. I’m glad [health secretary] Wes Streeting and the health team have committed to improving mental health care as it is key.
And of course the crisis in our prisons cannot be ignored without looking at the huge backlog in the courts, the lack of support given to our probation service and the shortage of housing – especially in the south-east.
After 14 years of Conservative rule our prisons were frankly left in a terrible state and condition. I really hope that people commenting on the announcement today remember just how bad a state our prisons are in.
The co-leader of the Green Party of England and Wales has called for the Labour government to “immediately create safe and legal routes” for asylum seekers after the deaths of four people this morning trying to reach the UK via the Channel.
Carla Denyer said “I am horrified to hear of the deaths of four people who risked their lives crossing the Channel last night. My condolences go out to their families. I, and all the Green Party MPs, urge Labour to immediately create safe and legal routes for people in desperate need of seeking asylum.”
Home secretary Yvette Cooper has said the deaths this morning of four people attempting to cross the channel were “truly awful”.
In a social media statement, Cooper said:
The further loss of life in the Channel this morning is truly awful. My thoughts are with all those affected. Criminal gangs are making vast profit from putting lives at risk. We are accelerating action with international partners to pursue and bring down dangerous smuggler gangs.
My colleague Emily Dugan has a report here.
Jeremy Corbyn has written for the Guardian today. The independent MP for Islington North says:
The general election did not allow for the full expression of people power. Rather, we saw a rejection of the political establishment, leading to a loveless landslide; this election saw the second-lowest turnout since 1918 and the smallest combined vote share for the two main parties since 1945. Public discontent with a broken political system will only grow as the government fails to make the real change that people expect.
That energy needs somewhere to go. It needs to be channelled. It needs to be mobilised. That’s why our campaign will organise with those who have been inspired by our victory to build community power in every corner of the country. Once our grassroots model has been replicated elsewhere, this can be the genesis of a new movement capable of challenging the stale two-party system. A movement that offers a real alternative to child poverty, inequality and endless war. A movement that provides a real opposition to the far right – one that doesn’t concede ground to divisive rhetoric, but stands by its principles of anti-racism, equality and inclusion.
You can read more here: Jeremy Corbyn – People-power led to my re-election. It is the start of a new politics
10,083 prisoners released early by Sunak government, but now only 708 places available in England and Wales' adult male prisons
Back on the prison crisis, PA Media reports that the latest data published by the government, which goes up to 8 July, shows there were only 708 places remaining in adult male prisons in England and Wales.
The adult male prison population on Monday stood at 83,755 out of a “usable operational capacity” of 84,463, the data suggests.
More than 10,000 prisoners were released up to 70 days early by the previous government, according Ministry of Justice figures.
Under the End of Custody Supervised Licence (ECSL) scheme, announced in October 2023, some prisoners could be freed 18 days before their conditional release date. That was increased to 35 days in March, and then to 70 days in May.
The number of ECSL releases between 17 October and 30 June was 10,083, the data shows.
Gwyn Topham is the Guardian’s transport correspondent
Labour has summoned the bosses of some of the worst-performing train operators in England, including Avanti West Coast and TransPennine, for meetings next week as it seeks to rapidly reform the railways and reset industrial relations.
The transport secretary, Louise Haigh, will bring in Network Rail route directors to attend all talks with the train companies, signalling the move towards an integrated railway.
After Haigh vowed to “move fast and fix things”, legislation to kickstart Great British Railways is expected to be announced in the king’s speech next week, and officials are beginning work to set up the new structure before the summer parliamentary recess.
Haigh has already met rail union leaders at the Department for Transport as the new government looks to facilitate an end to the long-running rail dispute. Haigh said her meetings with Mick Whelan and Mick Lynch, the general secretaries of Aslef and the RMT respectively, were a departure from “the days of antagonism and gimmicks” and the start of “an era of grownup industrial relations”.
Avanti and TransPennine Express are the first of a number of failing operators expected to meet the transport secretary in the coming week, with Labour warning it will be making a clear break with the previous government, which it claimed “failed passengers”.
It is understood that the party is seeking legal advice over when performance constitutes a contractual breach sufficient to swiftly terminate contracts. The government will otherwise bring train services into public ownership under GBR as contracts expire.
Read more here: Labour summons bosses of worst-performing train operators to meetings
Severin Carrell is the Guardian’s Scotland editor
The Scottish Conservatives are likely to again debate controversial plans to break-away from the UK party as it prepares for a leadership contest in the wake of the general election.
A tetchy debate about the party’s future has already begun even though the party’s Scottish board is still debating when and how to structure the internal election to replace Douglas Ross as Scottish leader.
Ross was forced to announce he would quit as leader after polling day in the early days of the general election after ousting David Duguid as candidate for Aberdeenshire North and Moray East, in what Ross’s critics saw as an ugly attempt to ensure Ross could remain an MP.
Duguid, a former Scotland Office minister, had been ill, so party officials claimed that would harm his reelection campaign. Ross, however, had promised his colleagues he would not to stand again for Westminster and would focus solely on being an MSP and party leader at Holyrood.
In the event, Ross lost to the Scottish National party. The Scottish Tories successfully held on to their other five Westminster seats. Ross blamed Reform for splitting the right wing vote in the constituency.
Liz Smith, a respected elder figure at Holyrood, has told the Telegraph a discussion on whether to form a separate Scottish party “has to be part of the mix”. That would allow it to carve a distinct identity and policy agenda, and distance itself from the scandal-beset UK party.
Smith is an ally of former leadership candidate Murdo Fraser, who stood against Ruth Davidson in 2011 on a platform of establishing a break-away party. Smith said he would probably stand this time.
Meanwhile Ross Thomson, the former MP who quit frontline politics after a controversy over his conduct at Westminster – he was subsequently exonerated – has told the Daily Mail this “bleating” about a split is “really tiresome” and arrogant.
An early favourite for the leadership content, justice spokesperson Russell Findlay has told the Times a break-away would be unwise. He said the Scottish party needs “a distinct new Scottish identity” but said a divisive civil war would damage its fortunes.
In an opinion piece for the paper’s Scottish edition he wrote: “We must move on from simply opposing independence. I just hope we don’t succumb to an ironic obsession about our own party’s fragmentation.”
Metropolitan police commissioner Mark Rowley has described government plans to release some prisoners early as “the least worst option”.
PA Media report he told ITV’s Good Morning Britain:
The Government have got a situation where there’s no easy solution. Prisons are very, very close to full and filling up day in day out. The worst possible thing would be for the system to block, because the system blocks in prisons if they get completely full. That kicks back into the courts and into what we do. And that’s really dangerous for the public.
So the Government are forced into making a rapid decision to avoid that risk. So it’s going to be the least worst option they’re going to have to find, so I understand what they’re trying to do, however not ideal it is.
Robert Buckland, the former secretary of state for justice and former MP, has appeared on Sky News to talk about the prison crisis.
He said that only 6,000 of the 20,000 new places the Tories promised by the end of this year have been created, and that the prison building programme “which I started with Rishi Sunak is coming forward, but not at a pace that is quick enough I think to meet demand”.
He told viewers:
My advice to the new Justice Secretary – and I wish her well, she’s just come into post – is to make sure that we aren’t releasing people who could pose a risk, particularly domestic abusers, stalkers, those types of offenders. I think it would be wholly inappropriate to release them.
I think we do need to be absolutely iron on our commitment to protect the public. And the new government would be best advised to make that clear from the outset. Because sending mixed messages about punishment is not a good way, frankly, to start a penal policy when you’ve just taken office.
Last week Buckland lost his Swindon South to Labour’s Heidi Alexander.
Updated
Shadow home secretary James Cleverly has responded to reports of the deaths of four people this morning while attempting to cross the channel. In a message on social media, Cleverly said “Reports of more deaths in the channel are a tragedy. As a country we must do everything in our power to stop the boats and put an end to this vile trade in human suffering.”
Ellie Chowns, the new Green Party of England and Wales MP for North Herefordshire has published the first of what she says she hopes will be weekly video updates about what it is like being one of the four new Green Party MPs.
In the first video she described her first week in parliament as “such a buzz”, saying there had been an “incredibly friendly atmosphere in the Houses of Parliament” with a lot to learn and lots of new faces to get to know. You can watch it here.
My first week in Westminster! ✅
— Ellie Chowns (@EllieChowns) July 12, 2024
Thank you for all of your votes and support!
Today I'm back in the constituency, holding my first surgery.
(PS Do let me know if these videos are helpful and tell me if you have any questions about our daily activities as Green MPs) pic.twitter.com/28mMx0eGA5
Prisons are not the only sector facing a crisis. In our First Edition newsletter today Nimo Omer spoke to the Guardian’s City editor, Anna Isaac, about Thames Water:
The heavily indebted water supplier Thames Water has been placed in special measures, on a turnaround oversight regime. Under this scheme, it is going to face increased scrutiny from Ofwat over its finances and the way the company is run. It has been told that it needs to reduce sewage spills by 64%, supply interruptions by two-thirds and leaks by 19%.
The purpose of this intervention goes beyond the financial situation, Anna says. “The regulator is also scrutinising how Thames’s operations are working on a day to day level, so it’s a turnaround plan, as well as an investment plan.”
The measures will remain in place until Thames can prove that it is in an acceptable financial position. There could be conditions to exiting the regime: the amount of debt it can take on could be limited; it may have to restructure and separate the business; it could face some form of nationalisation; or it could be listed on the stock exchange to secure extra equity.
Nothing changes immediately because of this intervention. Thames has enough money to run until the middle of next year and the special measures are meant to help get it back on track, “but ultimately, it’s about whether or not private investors want to put money in the medium term and that reality has not changed”.
Read more here: Friday briefing – What the crisis at Thames Water means for customers
Polly Toynbee’s latest column is up, in which she argues Labour will rightly be judged by how it fixes our problems, but we should never forget who left the UK in such a rotten state …
Mark Fairhurst, chairman of the Prison Officers Association, has told the BBC it is more dangerous to use police cells when prisons run out of space than it is to release prisoners early.
PA Media reports he told BBC Breakfast:
What is more dangerous to the public is if we don’t act, so if we’re clogging up police cells they’re unable to arrest people because there’s nowhere for them to go. That’s more danger to the public. What we’re doing is releasing people early who are going to get released anyway at some point.
It is expected that those convicted of sex offences, violent crime with a sentence of more than four years, domestic violence, stalkers, and anyone who has breached a harassment order would probably not be eligible for early release.
Fairhurst said releasing some inmates after they’ve served 40% of their sentences rather than 50% would give prisons about 12 to 18 months before further measures are needed.
How full are the prisons in England and Wales? PA Media reports that for the prison system to run smoothly and effectively, officials ideally want to keep a buffer of 1,425 cell spaces free in men’s prisons at all times to make sure there is enough space to hold sudden influxes of inmates.
According to sources, just 700 are now free. It is understood the latest figures show 83,380 inmates are currently being held in the adult male estate.
A senior prison source told PA: “If nothing was done, I would be professionally very, very worried by the August Bank Holiday. We’re operationally in trouble at less than 300 spaces left.
“We have been running at over 99% occupancy for the best part of two years. That puts huge pressure on our ability to reduce re-offending, to deliver purposeful activity, and obviously on our staff. It definitely exacerbates issues like safety in terms of violence, it makes the estate much more tricky for us to run.
“We’re very vulnerable to shocks in the estate. That can be big, high profile shocks, like the 2011 civil disorder, like a prison riot or it could actually be much more mundane things like an outbreak of bedbugs that would require us to close the wing, and fumigate it for two or three weeks. We are very vulnerable to shocks at this level.”
Starmer: prison crisis left by Tory government is 'gross irresponsibility' and 'unforgiveable'
Prime minister Keir Starmer has said the state of the prison service in England and Wales his government has inherited from Rishi Sunak is “unforgiveable” and shows the “gross irresponsibility of the outgoing government”.
He accused them of failing to provide “a basic function of government”, noting that “I can’t build a prison in the first seven days of a Labour government.”
Speaking in Washington while attending the Nato summit, and with the government expected to announce the early release of some prisoners to free up space, PA Media reports Starmer said:
The crux of the problem we face at the moment, and it is a terrible problem, is that we’ve got far too many prisoners for the prison places that we’ve got and we soon will have.
That is gross irresponsibility of the outgoing government. It is a basic function of government that you should have enough places for your prisoners that judges are sending to prison.
And for that to have failed I think tells you something material about the last government – that we have to pick this up and we have to fix it.
I can’t build a prison in the first seven days of a Labour government.
We knew there was going to be a problem, but the scale of the problem was worse than we thought.
And the nature of the problem is pretty unforgivable in my book, having worked in criminal justice, to have allowed your criminal justice system to get to a state where you simply haven’t got the prison places for prisoners.
This is a predictable problem – it’s shocking. And I think that when further details are released of this, you’ll have plenty of extra questions for those that came before us.
Justice secretary set to announce plans on prison overcrowding crisis
The Justice Secretary is set to announce plans on Friday to address prison overcrowding in England and Wales, with fears jails will run out of space within weeks.
Shabana Mahmood is expected to set out emergency measures that could include reducing the time before some prisoners are automatically released. She is expected to argue that the level of overcrowding, described by the Ministry of Justice as “catastrophic”, requires “immediate action” to “pull the justice system back from the brink of total collapse”.
On Thursday, the prime minister said the scale of the problem was “worse than I thought” and expressed anger at being faced with taking emergency measures so early in his premiership.
Responding to a question at the Nato summit, Keir Starmer called the crisis “unforgivable” and showed “gross irresponsibility” from the previous government.
One of the moves expected to be announced on Friday is a reduction in the amount of a sentence a prisoner must serve before being automatically released.
Most prisoners currently serve 50% of their sentence in jail, with the remaining 50% being served on licence and under threat of being returned to prison if they break their parole conditions.
Welcome and opening summary …
Good morning and welcome to our live coverage of UK politics for Friday. It is Martin Belam here with you today. These are the headlines …
A prisons crisis is dominating the news today, with justice secretary Shabana Mahmood expected to set out emergency measures today
UK ministers are preparing a king’s speech containing at least 30 bills
Keir Starmer is said to be on a collision course with unions over public sector pay
Labour cannot build 1.5m homes without cash for affordable housing, providers say
In enthusiam news, we just had the lowest turnout in a UK general election since universal suffrage
There is no business scheduled in the Commons or Lords, and the Scottish parliament is in recess from 29 June to 1 September. There is nothing scheduled in Stormont, but in the Senedd at 10am there is a first minister scrutiny committee meeting. Richard Callard, a shareholder executive and UK government investments official is appearing at the Post Office Horizon IT inquiry.
Do drop me a line by emails if you spot typos, errors or omissions. You can find me at martin.belam@theguardian.com.
