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Prisons: Population

My right honourable friend the Minister of State (David Hanson) has today made the following Written Ministerial Statement. On 19 June 2007 (Official Report, House of Lords, col. 96) my noble and learned friend Lord Falconer of Thoroton, the then Lord Chancellor, announced a new scheme, the end of custody licence (ECL), which introduced a presumption in favour of release on licence for prisoners serving between four weeks and four years for the final 18 days of their sentence, subject to meeting strict eligibility criteria and providing a release address. Prisoners who would normally be subject to supervision on release (prisoners serving 12 months or more or under 22 years of age) are required to meet their probation officer after release and to have regular contact after that, in line with their supervision plan. All prisoners released on ECL are liable to recall if they are reported to have misbehaved during the period of the licence. The first releases under the scheme took place on 29 June 2007. Tables with the full set of data for this report have been made available in the Libraries, the Vote Office and the Printed Paper Office. The tables are being published on the Ministry of Justice website today at www.justice.gov.uk/publications/endofcustodylicence.htm The following information applies only to the releases and recalls in the first week of operation of the scheme, and future reports will be published monthly: between implementation of the ECL scheme on 29 June 2007 and 5 July 2007, there were 1,701 releases on ECL. Of these, 1,552 (91 per cent) were male and 149 (9 per cent) were female; the greatest number of releases was for offenders serving sentences for theft and handling, with 404 (24 per cent of all releases) coming from this offence group; and, 1,412 (83 per cent) of releases were from sentences of less than 12 months, with the remaining 289 (17 per cent) from sentences of 12 months to less than four years. The number of releases on ECL each day are shown in the table:

There were 30 notified decisions to recall between 29 June and 5 July. The most common reason for recall was the offender being out of touch with their supervising probation officer, with 11 (37 per cent) of recalls being for this reason. Any prisoners falling into the following categories are excluded from release on ECL: registered sex offenders, whether or not they are currently serving a sentence for a sexual offence; prisoners serving sentences for serious violence as specified in Prison Service Instruction 27/2007; prisoners who have previously escaped from custody; prisoners who have previously breached temporary release conditions during the current sentence, have offended during a period under temporary release at any time, or who are currently serving a sentence for failing to return from temporary release; prisoners who report that they do not have a release address; foreign national prisoners who will be subject to deportation at the end of their sentence; prisoners who are subject to extradition proceedings; sentenced prisoners who have been remanded into custody on further charges or who are awaiting sentence; prisoners who, within the period of their current sentence, had been recalled either from HDC or from normal licence;. prisoners under 18; prisoners serving DTO sentences; and prisoners required to undertake a treatment programme as a condition of the normal (end of sentence) supervision licence that could not be arranged during the period of ECL. The data presented in this Statement are drawn from the prison administrative IT systems. Although care is taken when processing and analysing the returns, the detail collected is subject to the inaccuracies inherent in any large-scale recording system. While the figures shown have been checked as far as practicable, they should be regarded as approximate and not necessarily accurate to the last whole number.

In addition, NOMS has been notified of one offender released a week earlier than his due ECL date of 5 July and two other prisoners now back in custody, having been recalled following release without appropriate authorisation. (1) The number of actual further offences committed, as notified to NOMS, is eight. This number is higher than that of recalls for reoffending, because offenders will sometimes commit/be charged with more than one offence and not all offences are identified while the offender is serving the period of ECL. Some offences will be identified and notified to NOMS after the offender has completed the period of ECL and is therefore not liable to be recalled. (2) The offender did not live, whether for one night or longer, at the address given on the ECL licence and which the governor had approved for the purpose of release on ECL. (3) The offender did not report on release or thereafter to his supervising probation officer as required by the conditions of the supervision licence. (This would apply to offenders serving sentences of 12 months or over and all those under 22 who are subject to supervision by the National Probation Service). (4) The offender has exhibited behaviour that indicates non-compliance, or a risk of reoffending or harm in respect of the conditions of the licence. Data sources and quality: all the figures above are as notified to NOMS and may therefore be subject to inaccuracies. There may be recalls, reoffending, further offences, offenders returned to custody and offenders release not in accordance with the scheme, some of which may not have been notified to us.