Are longer jail terms easy headlines or proper reform?
The government has announced a “radical sentencing overhaul” that it says will help protect the public and stop criminals reoffending. But the evidence for its claims is under scrutiny, after the past decade saw crime rise and prosecutions fall to a record low despite waves of laws increasing jail terms.
The new sentencing white paper contains a range of eye-catching proposals, from forcing sexual and violent offenders to spend longer in jail, allowing whole life orders for younger criminals and GPS tagging released burglars.
Speaking to journalists yesterday, the justice secretary said the proposals were not “something that is just designed to get some easy headlines”. Robert Buckland insisted it contained measures to support rehabilitation and address the underlying causes that contribute to crime and reoffending.
But the British public has heard such promises before. Each of the seven Conservative justice secretaries
who have served since 2010 have unveiled policies aiming to reduce crime, toughen punishments and reduce reoffending.
And yet in the past decade, the number of crimes recorded annually by police has risen from 4.15 million to over 5 million. The proportion prosecuted has fallen to a record low of 7 per cent, down from 16 per cent in 2010-11. The number of people formally dealt with by the criminal justice system is at a record low, but a series of moves to increase prison sentences mean that the average jail term served is the highest for a decade.
Almost a third of offenders reoffend, and more than three-quarters of people convicted or cautioned in England and Wales already have at least one other criminal conviction or caution to their name.the figures are higher for juveniles or people handed short prison sentences.
It was these very issues that David Cameron pledged to address almost a decade ago. In June 2011, the then prime minister vowed to “reform the broken criminal justice system to fight crime and improve punishment”.
“Serious and dangerous offenders must go to jail and stay there for a long time, while community sentences must be clearly punitive, making greater use of elements such as curfews and travel bans,” he added.
“Breaking the cycle of reoffending needs to be right at the heart of the criminal justice system. This requires a completely new approach ... protecting the public, properly punishing serious offenders and cutting reoffending, that is how we plan to transform the criminal justice system.”
Nine years, seven justice secretaries, two prime ministers and several packages of criminal justice laws later, the problems appear unchanged. Ken Clarke unveiled “tough, intelligent sentences” in 2011, Chris Grayling announced a “radical overhaul of sentencing” in 2013 and then “tougher sentencing measures” two years later.
In 2016, Michael Gove called for sweeping reforms to make rehabilitation more effective but he was sacked by Theresa May months later and the Prison Reform Bill never came to pass. In 2017, Liz Truss supported “longer sentences that better reflect the seriousness of crimes” and months later her successor David Lidington vowed to make “prisons true places of reform and rehabilitation”.
Mr Clarke and David Gauke both backed an end to short prison sentences after research suggested they contributed to reoffending, but left their posts as justice secretary shortly afterwards. Now, Mr Buckland says his white paper will “make the sentencing system work better to protect people and to reduce crime”.
Victims of crime and the wider British public will hope he is right.