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Prisons and Probation

My Lords, I am grateful to both noble Lords, who, as I understood it, were in favour of our announcement today on new prison building—certainly, the noble Lord, Lord Henley, spoke as though he welcomed it. We believe that prison is the appropriate place for serious, persistent and dangerous offenders and we make no apology for it. Of course, we also believe very much in community sentences, and think that more use should be made of them than sometimes has been. We have worked hard to increase the confidence of sentencers by strengthening the range of community options available and ensuring that sentences are rigorously enforced. We invested £13.9 million over three years to run seven intensive alternatives-to-custody demonstrator projects, including community payback and other projects that are known about in this House. For less serious offences, community sentences can be a better and more effective punishment than a short prison sentence. It is therefore important that there are effective community sentences to achieve the best outcomes for the victims of crime and the public. That is why we have invested not just in prisons but in probation, too. Since 1997, if I may remind the House, the amount that we have spent on probation has increased by 67 per cent in real terms. In 2008-09, probation areas received an additional £40 million to facilitate the use of community orders. However, the fact is that in any modern society it is necessary to send people to prison. Prison is not just for punishment; it is for reform, too—which is why it is important that new prisons should have in them all the facilities they possibly can to rehabilitate those who have offended seriously. The noble Lord, Lord Henley, asked me a number of searching questions. He asked why the prison population was rising at a time when crime was falling. We have had this exchange before; the fact is that we are catching and imprisoning more violent and dangerous offenders and they are not being released until it is safe to do so. There are 70 per cent more serious and violent offenders in prison than in 1997. Sentence lengths for most offence groups have increased. If an offender is released but poses a risk to the public, we are recalling them to prison. People generally do not question the proposition that crime has fallen under this Government, which is something that we are proud of. The noble Lord, Lord Henley, asked me about Ashwell. No warnings were given, and there are none about other institutions—although I am not sure that I would tell the noble Lord if there were. As for this very welcome U-turn, as he describes it, he seemed slightly sceptical as to whether it was as a result of consultation. It is as a result of consultation and of very strong opinions expressed by a very wide variety of people, not least in this House, about the original idea about the 2,500 prisoners. The Government cannot win either way; if we stick with what we originally said, because we are fearful of being accused of backing down for various reasons, we get criticised. If we do make a U-turn and say that we are persuaded that it is a better way of producing new prison places, we are immediately accused of doing it for all kinds of other reasons. Ah, well. As for parole, we had a brief exchange over the Dispatch Box earlier this afternoon. We need the extra money for parole, because too many prisoners have not had their assessment by the Parole Board at the appropriate time. We have to reform the system of parole and how it is managed to ensure that that does not happen again. On cost, the bill costs estimated for Titans were £367 million per prison, which makes a total of £1.1 billion. I am talking, of course, in slightly broad terms. The bill costs that we have estimated for these five prisons, two of which I have announced today, are £264 million per prison, making a total of £1.3 billion. Rather than cutting, as has been suggested, we are going to spend a little more, because we are persuaded that this is a better way in which to build new prisons and is something that is generally wanted. I hope that I have answered most of the questions. Prison projections are produced by the Ministry of Justice analysts and are published as national statistics. They are subject to quality assurance oversight by the independent UK Statistics Authority. Of course, the noble Lord, Lord Thomas, is right. How can one ever say that a projection or forecast will be absolutely accurate? One cannot, but we do the best that we can, and I hope that the announcement that I have repeated in the House today receives generous support.