Tories accused of ‘cover up’ over early release of violent criminals

The Government has been accused of a “cover up” for refusing to publish details on the number of violent criminals being released from prison early to deal with an overcrowding crisis.

Shabana Mahmood, Labour’s shadow justice secretary, said that ministers’ “stonewalling” over the early release scheme was “nothing short of a scandal” and that they had a “moral responsibility” to “come clean”.

In October, the Justice Secretary Alex Chalk announced that hundreds of prisoners would be freed up to 18 days before their scheduled release date halfway through their sentence to alleviate pressure on the most overcrowded jails.

In March, the ‘‘end of custody supervised licence’’ scheme was expanded to enable prisoners to be freed up to 60 days early.

Violent offenders sentenced to less than four years in jail are eligible for the scheme, as are burglars, thieves, shoplifters and fraudsters serving any length of fixed-term sentence.

Sex offenders, convicted terrorists, category A prisoners and all violent offenders serving four or more years are excluded.

Labour have asked at least 14 parliamentary questions requesting data on the scheme, such as how many criminals are being released early and the breakdown by different offences.

However, the Ministry of Justice has refused to comply, saying that it cannot release figures “intended for future publication” and that statistics will “be based on one year’s worth of data and published on an annual basis”.

Labour say this is despite the MoJ releasing weekly prison statistics and quarterly figures on a range of other measures.

Ms Mahmood suggested that the Government was motivated by political reasons and that the eventual data dump could come after the general election. She told The Telegraph: “They should level with the public about the sort of people that they are releasing early.

“They’re just stonewalling and saying they’ll do it on an annual basis, which, luckily for them, takes it past the next general election, which I think is nothing short of a scandal.”

She said those eligible for release include “violent offenders, domestic abusers, stalkers”.

“One of the reasons why I want to see the data, and I believe they have a moral responsibility to share the data, is because they’ve increased the pressure on the probation service.

“You are potentially loading more pressure on that service, mistakes can and might happen, so I want to see the data so we can take a proper sense of whether the probation service can cope.”

While Labour introduced its own 18-day early release scheme to deal with overcrowding when it was in government in 2007, Ms Mahmood said “the big difference” was “we released data, we replied to parliamentary questions”. She added: “We were just upfront, and it was a much more transparent scheme, whereas this government just isn’t giving any data at all.”

Ms Mahmood said that prison capacity was a “national emergency” because the Government “just haven’t built enough prison places”.

Terrible option

“When you run out of prison places, of course, every option you’ve got is a pretty terrible option,” she said.

Describing the state of the prison estate as “horrendous”, she said jails had become “drug-addled, rat-infested colleges of crime which march to a drumbeat of violence and misery”.

She said that if Labour wins the general election it would immediately “press the button on prison building” by “getting rid of the blocks in the planning system”, although she admitted “you can’t build a prison overnight”.

Asked whether new prisons would be a tough sell to local communities, Ms Mahmood pointed out that she had a prison – HMP Birmingham – in her own constituency.

“Generally speaking, once prisons are built they become part of the fabric of a local area, in that they are a good source of jobs,” she said. “That can be a real positive for a local economy. And also, if you’re running your prisons properly and they’re not overcrowded, the threat of escape is very, very minimal.”

Annual figures

An MoJ spokesman said: “We make no apology for ensuring the data we release is accurate and quality assured which is why figures on ECSL – which began in October 2023 – will be published on an annual basis, in line with other comparable statistics.”

A Government source accused Labour of “pure hypocrisy” for running an “early release scheme of over 80,000 prisoners between 2007 and 2010 which had fewer safety checks and restrictions in place”.

They added: ‘‘Labour has also not said if they would [end] ECSL because they know it is necessary to alleviate the unprecedented pressure on our prisons following the pandemic and barristers’ strike, a pressure which has been seen in prisons around the world.”