§ Lord LEATHERLANDasked Her Majesty's Government:
What action is proposed with regard to giving prisoners reasons for the refusal of parole.
§ The MINISTER of STATE, HOME OFFICE (Lord Harris of Greenwich)Opinions differ as to the desirability of giving prisoners reasons, and before deciding whether to do so it is necessary to establish the practical possibilities and problems. The Parole Board have been 961WA conducting a domestic experiment from which it appears that, given the necessary resources, a system which would be feasible for the Board could be set up.
However, the majority of refusals of parole result from the recommendations of the local review committees in cases which are not referred to the Parole Board. It is thus necessary to establish that the scheme worked out by the Board is also feasible from the point of view of the local review committees. We intend therefore that the experiment should be extended to a number of local review committees selected to provide a cross section of the various types of prison. As with the Parole Board, the experiment these local review committees will be asked to conduct will be an internal experiment to establish the feasibility of the system so far as the committees are concerned. There is no intention at this stage to communicate the reasons to prisoners; that would require a further extension of the experiment.
Although no prisoners will be involved at this next stage, the Prison Department will be communicating with the various staff associations to inform them of what is now proposed.