§ The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Scotland of Asthal)My honourable friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department has today announced a change to the Home Detention Curfew Scheme (HDC).
HDC has been in operation since 1999. It provides an effective and measured transition for offenders moving from custody into the community. Eligible prisoners are subject to a careful risk assessment before any decision is taken to grant them early release. Previous amendments to the scheme have balanced extensions to the period of early release with restrictions designed to maintain public confidence in the scheme as a whole. In April 2003 the then Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department announced an extension of HDC to a maximum of four and a half months. The extension was accompanied by the introduction of a presumption against release for prisoners convicted of certain serious offences—those which the Government consider cause the public particular concern.
Prisoners released under the HDC scheme serve the remainder of their custody period at home under electronic curfew, usually from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. At present there are approximately 3,700 prisoners on electronic tag. The scheme is kept under constant review.
Public confidence in the scheme is essential. It is for this reason that the Home Secretary has already made it clear that offenders serving sentences for certain current offences and prisoners with any history of sexual offending must be considered unsuitable for release on HDC unless exceptional circumstances exist. This presumption against HDC will continue to apply.
A recent case has highlighted the fact that, in addition, there will be exceptional cases where an offender may be considered unsuitable for HDC even though he or she has not committed one of the offences which give rise to the presumption, if to grant HDC would undermine public confidence in the scheme. This will depend on the circumstances of the particular case.
The Home Secretary has decided that such exceptional cases should be referred to the chief executive of the National Offender Management Service who will take the decision whether or not to grant HDC.