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Offender Management Bill

Of course we try to bear in mind all contributions, particularly—and most importantly, I would think—those from the Home Affairs Committee. In the past, I have had to remind hon. Members that we ought to be careful with international statistics. If we compare the statistics for the number of prisoners per 100,000 of the population, we see that the figure is very high; for England and Wales, it is 142, compared to 96 in Germany, Italy and so on. However, the number is very low compared to that in the United States, where the figure is 726. If we ask a different question—what the prison population is, relative to the number of recorded crimes—our figures are very low, even when compared to those for Europe. We have 12 people in prison per recorded crime. The European average is 17, but in Ireland it is 35, in Spain it is 46, and in Sweden, it is only 5. Of course, that indicates that there could be a number of variables, including the level of criminality and the way in which crime is recorded. Things are not as easy as stating one simple fact, and then claiming that our prison population is out of all proportion to every other country’s—and it is not, depending on the statistics that are available.