§ Mr. Mark Carlisleasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will make a statement on his policy of referring to the Parole Board the cases of life sentence prisoners who have already spent long periods in custody.
§ Mr. BrittanOn 30 November 1983 I informed the House of my policy on life sentence prisoners. The first stage in the formal review by the Parole Board machinery is the reference of the case to the local review committee at the prison at which the life sentence prisoner is held. The date of this first formal review is normally set for three310W years before the expiry of the period thought necessary to meet the requirements of retribution and deterrence which I decide after consultation with the judiciary. When this period is longer than 20 years, however, I have decided that the date of the first formal review should nonetheless still be set after 17 years in custody or at, or close to, the date when the case would again have been considered by the now disbanded joint parole board-Home Office committee. Both the prison staff and the prisoner are, however, informed that reviews set in these special circumstances do not in any way imply that 20 years has been set as the period necessary to meet the requiremens of retribution and deterrence.
In accordance with this policy, I am asking the LRCs at the prisons in which Ian Brady and Myra Hindley are detained to consider their cases as soon as possible and for the Parole Board subsequently to make its recommendations to me. The review of these cases does not mean either that the periods of detention necessary to meet the requirements of retribution and deterrence have been completed or are near completion; or that the Parole Board will recommend the release of either prisoner; or that I would necessarily accept such a recommendation if it were made.