Shadow justice secretary warns jail crisis ‘threatens repeat of Strangeways riots’

The crisis in British jails threatens a repeat of the biggest prison riots in UK history at Strangeways in Manchester almost 30 years ago, the shadow justice secretary has warned.

Lord Falconer of Thoroton argued unless the “chronic” problems in the system were tackled and the number of prisoners reduced, government reforms were “tinkering while Rome burns”.

He was speaking as peers continued to debate the Tory administration’s legislative plans set out in the Queen’s Speech.

These included a Prison and Courts Reform Bill which proposes to give governors new powers to control their own jails and overhaul education and rehabilitation programmes.

But Lord Falconer said: “The prison reforms billed as the centrepiece of the Queen’s Speech have no prospect of success unless the fundamental crisis in the prison system is addressed.

“First, there is chronic under staffing in our prisons, second there is chronic overcrowding, third there is a chronic rise in violence and self harm.

“Seven thousand fewer officers and a prison population that has risen by nearly 3,000 since 2010.

He added: “I worry, as do many informed observers, that we are on a road which led 30 years ago to the Strangeways riots.

“Until we tackle those issues and see a reduction in the prison population these reforms are tinkering while Rome burns.”

Opening the debate, justice minister Lord Faulks had told peers: “There’s no doubt our prison system is in need of reform.”

He said it currently “hinders rather than helps” the efforts of those seeking to rehabilitate offenders.

Lord Faulks said the Bill put forward by the Government formed “part of a comprehensive strategy to reduce crime”.

He added: “It will reduce reoffending by making prisons places of education and purpose.”

In his speech, the minister also referred to controversial plans to replace the Human Rights Act, which enshrined the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) into domestic law, with a British Bill of Rights.

Lord Faulks said: “This Government remains committed to human rights but it is committed to reforming domestic human rights law so that we can have a system that protects people’s rights but also commands the confidence of the public.

“This Government was elected with a clear mandate to reform the UK’s human rights framework.

He told peers: “I want to address some of the worries that have been raised and talk about what our proposals will not do.

“Our reforms are not eroding people’s human rights. They are not about walking away from the list of fundamental rights set out in the European Convention on Human Rights.

“The Government is and will remain committed to the protection of those rights.”

“We want our Bill to protect fundamental human rights but to also prevent their abuse and restore some common sense to the system.”

But Lord Falconer said the Human Rights Act had “effected a fundamental change between an over-mighty state and its citizens”.

He pointed out the second Hillsborough inquests would not have been held without the Human Rights Act.

The Labour peer said: “There can be no going back on the rebalancing of the relationship between the citizen and the state.”

He added: “If as a nation we are serious about human rights then there must be human rights for all.

“A commitment to the rule of law carries with it a commitment to defend people’s basic rights.

“We stand by the Human Rights Act 1998 and we implore the Government to do the same.”

Crossbench peer Lord Pannick, a leading QC, said: “There is a problem with the protection of human rights in this country.

“It is the willingness of politicians, the willingness of the press, to use human rights as a political football.”

He added: “Instead of denigrating human rights law, instead of undermining human rights law because of objections to a tiny majority of Strasbourg court judgments, this Government should focus on educating children and on informing adults of the value of the Human Rights Act in contributing to our civilised society.”

Liberal Democrat Lord Paddick, a former deputy assistant commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, said the Government appeared to be “careering down an authoritarian and xenophobic path” with the potential to create division in communities.

He said it was time to treat drug addiction as a medical issue, rather than a criminal one, and put addicts into treatment, rather than prison, while exploring the practicalities of a regulated and controlled drug market.

“Rather than a market-driven underground controlled by criminals with no safeguards in terms of the chemical composition of the drugs or the people they are sold to, starting with cannabis, the Government should take control to ensure strength and harm are limited and drugs are only sold to responsible adults,” Lord Paddick said.

Labour former Cabinet minister Lord Hain warned that England remained one of the most centralised nations in Europe and devolution had been addressed only “half-heartedly”.

He said English identity had to be constitutionally recognised and respected “otherwise the current rumblings of discontent, not just on the right but also on the left of politics in England, become an uproar, fuelling English separatism….”

Independent crossbencher Lord Green of Deddington, chairman of Migration Watch, said the “colossal task” of providing homes for Britain’s rapidly growing population was not being addressed.

Lord Green said a “moderate level of immigration” was a natural part of an open society and often of considerable benefit.

“But mass immigration is in nobody’s interest. The issue is one of scale,” he told peers. The continuing failure to tackle the issue was leaving many young people locked out of the property market.

If the UK remained in the EU “we will not have the powers or ability to reduce the future inflow from other member states whatever its scale and whatever its impact on our society,” Lord Green warned.
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Former lord chief justice and independent crossbench peer Lord Judge raised concerns over the size of the upper house, amid reports the Prime Minister plans to create a number of new peers in a bid to stop Government defeats.

Highlighting the current number of peers, Lord Judge said: “It is a joke. It is the issue of all issues that brings us into disrepute. We have become a laughing stock.

“There are more of us than there are in the Commons.”

He added: “We are supposed to be part of the system that controls the executive and yet here we are being filled by the head of the executive. This is simply constitutional madness.”

The issue was also touched on by Labour peer Lord Foulkes of Cumnock, who said: “I think the appointments system is suspect.”

Conservative Lord Cormack, who is vying to become the new House of Lords speaker, said a Government review of the chamber’s powers had been ordered in a “fit of pique”.

“The Government is answerable to Parliament and Parliament is not answerable to the Government.

“Our duty is not to make life convenient for government but to examine critically, to scrutinise minutely, the legislation they place before us.”

He argued the job of the Lords is to “try and ensure the imperfect measures the Government sends to us are made a little less imperfect”.

He added: “We have to recognise that the balance must be redressed between Parliament and the executive.”

Former lord speaker and crossbench peer Baroness Hayman said: “The final say must go to the democratically elected house but not the only say.”

She argued the review of the Lords had been set up to “administer a short, sharp shock”.

Green peer Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb raised concerns over the Investigatory Powers Bill, which has been dubbed the Snooper’s Charter.

She warned: “This could have a very serious impact on all of our privacy.”

Lady Jones also questioned how extremism would be defined under Government proposals to tackle the problem.

She pointed out she and other senior party members had been described as “domestic extremists”.

“I think it’s absolutely ridiculous,” she said.

Lady Jones added: “If you reduce our freedoms you are actually doing the extremists’ job for them, you are doing the terrorists’ job in changing our culture and our society and I think that’s extremely damaging.”

Liberal Democrat peer Lord Carlile of Berriew sounded a “strong note of caution” over the proposals to tackle extremism.

He said: “As one academic analyst has suggested to me, there’s a danger that we may make it an offence for a person to encourage another person, to encourage another person to publish a statement, which indirectly encourages another person to instigate someone else to commit an act of terrorism.”

But Lord Carlile, a former independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, also cautioned those opposed to the Investigatory Powers Bill.

He said: “Puristic libertarianism doesn’t always provide a holistic sense of civil liberties.”

There is a need to ensure “we do not degrade the capacity of the authorities to catch the most dangerous people in our society”, he said.

Tory peer and victims’ commissioner Baroness Newlove argued that for too long victims “had been forgotten about”.

Making the case for a victims’ law, she said: “Victims have told me they often feel sidelined by the criminal justice system and they are made to feel their only role is to secure a conviction. Victims deserve so much more.”

Legislation would provide an opportunity to ensure victims receive entitlements and are treated with “dignity and respect”, she said.

Lady Newlove, whose husband was killed by a gang of youths outside their home in 2007, said: “For so many years the focus has been on the offender and their rights.”

Highlighting the focus on the rehabilitation of offenders, she added: “But what is in place for the rehabilitation of victims and their life chances?”

Independent crossbencher Lord Woolf, a former lord chief justice who led the inquiry into the 1990 Strangeways riot, focused on the proposed prison reforms.

He took issue with the position of Justice Secretary Michael Gove that reforms could be introduced without also dealing with overcrowding issues.

Lord Woolf said: “All the lessons over the period I have been involved in the prisons situation the evidence has been entirely to the contrary.

“The biggest problem in the prison system has continuously been caused by overcrowding.

“It is as a result of overcrowding that again and again attempts to introduce reforms have been unsuccessful.

“I urge him to think again about that particular policy.”

The peer added: “It should be very important that he uses that position and his powers in that position, to ensure that sentences are reduced and that as a result of sentences being reduced there’s less of a problem of overcrowding.”

He suggested a clause could be introduced to the Prison and Courts Reform Bill where the overriding principle on sentencing was that no court should sentence an offender to jail unless it was in the interests of justice or to protect the public.

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