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Prisons: Howard League Commission

My Lords, like my noble friend Lord Elton, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Carlile of Berriew, for giving us the opportunity to debate the Howard League report. Sadly, we have only four minutes each to speak and only an hour for the whole debate. Perhaps the usual channels would consider a fuller debate on this matter in due course. We will also be debating some of these matters later in the Chamber, when the Minister repeats his Statement on prisoners’ early release. At this stage, we are debating a much broader strategy about prisons and, on that occasion, we should be able to listen to what the Government are doing or claim they are doing. In the time available, I shall not set out the entire opposition policy on prisons, which was set out very ably by my honourable friends in another place in their report of last year, Prisons with a Purpose. I commend that to the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, and others and I hope that they will look at it. In the title of that document, Prisons with a Purpose, my honourable friends made it clear what they thought prisons ought to do: for example, that people should emerge from prisons in a better state than when they went in. One of the problems, which will be addressed in the Statement later, is gross overcrowding within the prison system, which makes it is very difficult for prisons to achieve much in the way of improving the lives of prisoners and making them more fit to face society when they are released. Our brief debate has been very useful and a great many ideas have been put forward by all who have spoken. My noble and learned friend Lord Mackay of Clashfern was quite right to highlight the dramatic increase in the number of 10 to 14 year-olds in custody. The noble Lord, Lord Wallace, was also right to draw attention to the problems of NOMS, with which virtually everyone who has spoken in the debate would agree. The Minister will have to address the defence of NOMS when he replies, if he can. We would agree with the vast majority of the report’s recommendations and the general direction that it takes. It is an excellent report. However, in some respects it is perhaps a little optimistic in that it goes further than we would as regards closing prisons. We are in a very strange state where the Government are boasting about a dramatic reduction in levels of violent crime, but as the noble Lord, Lord Elystan-Morgan, pointed out, despite the alleged drop in the levels of violent crime, we have seen a dramatic rise in the number of people going to prison. We offer broad support for the report, while being careful to state that implementation would be possible only when resources allowed. Some speakers referred to the very severe constraints as a result of our current economic position—I think particularly of my noble friend Lord Elton, who referred to the Oregon experiment with localism, to which the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, also referred. That is a way of looking at things in other ways, which might lead to a reduction in the costs that this will impose on the taxpayer. I welcome the chance that we have had to debate these matters briefly, and look forward to the Government’s response.