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Prisons and Probation

My Lords, I do not think that there has been. I remember well the time when the noble Lord played a prominent part in these matters, and the House has fond memories of the late Lord Jenkins of Hillhead, of course. He was an outstanding Home Secretary for his time, but times have changed. It is important to recognise that people outside are concerned about the number of serious, persistent and dangerous offenders who did not get sent to prison for long enough in the past. It is all very well for us to say that we must do everything that we can to keep such offenders out of prison and in society, but there are people who are in prison because they will not behave themselves when they come out. It is necessary for any sensible Government to have a policy that means that the kind of offenders that I have mentioned are kept in prison. However, that is not the end of the story. Many non-custodial sentences are available now that were not always available, even in the 1960 and 1970s. The Government encourage courts to use these sentences. I referred to community sentences for offences that would otherwise require short terms of imprisonment. It is important that both custodial and non-custodial disposals are available to us. I question whether we as a Government and a country are much better or worse than other countries in Europe. We need to make sure that those who are properly convicted of serious offences by the courts are punished and, we hope, reformed. One matter that was not raised by the noble Lord was the fact that what happens in prisons now is vastly different from what happened in the era that he was talking about. There are now all sorts of courses and attempts at rehabilitation that did not exist then.