Lord Morrisasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they will make a further statement on their proposals to restrict the release on parole of violent offenders and drug traffickers; and on the release of life sentence prisoners.
§ The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Home Office (Lord Elton)Parole
On 4th August 1975, the right honourable member for Glasgow, Hillhead, as Home Secretary, made a statement about the ways in which he proposed to exercise the discretion given him in the Criminal Justice Act 1967 with regard to the release of prisoners on parole. That statement was made after consulting the Parole Board and agreeing with them new guidelines for parole selection.
Since then the numbers of prisoners released on parole licence have steadily increased, and in 1982, of all prisoners released from sentences which qualified them for parole consideration, 66.3 per cent. had been granted parole. My right honourable and learned friend the Home Secretary does not propose to exercise his discretion in ways which will significantly affect this trend, since it accords with his broad strategy for dealing with crime and offenders.
788WAHe must, however, take account of the general public concern about the increase in violent crime and the growing criticism of the gap between the length of sentence passed and the length of sentence actually served in certain cases, and he has therefore decided to use his discretion to ensure that prisoners serving sentences of over five years for offences of violence or drug trafficking will be granted parole only when release under supervision for a few months before the end of a sentence is likely to reduce the long-term risk to the public, or in circumstances which are genuinely exceptional. The offences concerned are those where the Secretary of State may not order the early release of prisoners under Section 32 of the Criminal Justice Act 1982 and are set out in Schedule 1 to that Act. In 1982 about 240 prisoners sentenced for these offences were recommended for parole before their final review: in future, there will have to he the most compelling reasons before the Home Secretary would agree to parole being granted in such cases.
The Parole Board has been consulted about how this objective might best be achieved in a way that ensures that the crucial role of the board in the parole scheme is maintained. The Parole Board expressed a wish to continue to see all the cases that are currently scrutinised by the board following the initial review by the local review committees, in order to give full consideration to the circumstances of each individual prisoner. Accordingly, my right honourable and learned friend has agreed that the present practice should continue on the understanding that the reviews will take account of the policy contained in this statement. Under the statute, the acceptance or rejection of a Parole Board recommendation is, of course, a matter for him.
He is asking the Parole Board to implement this new policy with immediate effect. This statement will be issued to local review committees for their guidance. The board intends to publish the text in its next annual report as an addition to the detailed "Criteria for Selection for Parole", in which there will also be some minor consequential amendments.
Life Sentence Prisoners
The release of life sentence prisoners is at the discretion of the Home Secretary, subject to a favourable recommendation by the Parole Board and to consultation with the Lord Chief Justice and, if he is available, the trial judge. Taking account again of the public concern about violent crime, in future he intends to exercise his discretion so that murderers of police or prison officers, terrorist murders, sexual or sadistic murderers of children and murderers by firearm in the course of robbery can normally expect to serve at least 20 years in custody; and there will be cases where the gravity of the offence requires a still longer period. Other murders, outside these categories, may merit no less punishment to mark the seriousness of the offence.
At present my right honourable and learned friend looks to the judiciary for advice on the time to be served to satisfy the requirements of retribution and deterrence and to the Parole Board for advice on risk. He will continue to do so.
The Joint Parole Board/Home Office Committee was established in 1973 to give initial consideration, 789WA usually after a life sentence prisoner had been detained for about three years in custody, to the date for the first formal consideration of the case by the Parole Board machinery. The Lord Chief Justice has agreed that this is the appropriate time to obtain an initial judicial view on the requirements of retribution and deterrence. In future, therefore the Home Secretary will decide the date of the first reference of a case to a local review committee following the initial consultation with the judiciary. The joint committee has therefore been disbanded.
The first local review committee review will normally take place three years before the expiry of the period necessary to meet the requirements of retribution and deterrence. This would give sufficient time for preparation for release if the Parole Board recommended it, having considered risk. The judiciary will also be consulted when release is an actual possibility to meet fully the requirements of Section 61 of the Criminal Justice Act 1967.
These new procedures will separate consideration of the requirements of retribution and deterrence from consideration of risk to the public, which always has been, and will continue to be, the pre-eminent factor determining release. They will enable the prison and other staff responsible for considering and reporting on life sentence cases, the local review committees and the Parole Board, to concentrate on risk. The judiciary will properly advise on retribution and deterrence. But the ultimate discretion whether to release will remain with my right honourable and learned friend.
Life sentence prisoners who already have a provisional date of release are unaffected by these new arrangements. Those who have reached the stage of being held in an open prison are similarly unaffected, because the four prisoners whose release in the relatively near future would not have accorded with his view of the gravity of their offences have already been returned to closed prisons. Life sentence prisoners whose cases the joint committee had asked to consider again will, at the time fixed for that consideration, have a date fixed for their first local review committee review after consultation with the judiciary as outlined above. Those who have a date for review by the local review committee already fixed will be reviewed as arranged, but the judiciary will be consulted on retribution and deterrence before the case is referred to the Parole Board.
When a date for a first, or subsequent, formal review is set for several years ahead, the Home Office will review the case on the basis of reports of the kind now prepared for formal reviews, at regular, and in any event not longer than three-year, intervals. Moreover, governors will be told to report at once any exceptional development requiring action. These procedures will ensure that the Home Secretary can consider any special circumstances or exceptional progress which might justify changing the review date. But, except where a prisoner has committed an offence for which he has received a further custodial sentence, first formal review date will not be put back. In any event, Ministers will review every case when a life sentence prisoner has been detained for 10 years.