Coroners and Justice Bill

Sentencing guidelines can be extremely helpful, particularly for the young tyro sentencer who does not want to pluck a sentence out of the air but wants to know what the general going rate is. With that at the back of his mind, he can apply what he thinks is just in the particular case. Twenty years ago at a judicial studies conference the question was asked: how can we have consistent sentencing all over the country? I recall I proposed that, instead of having the Court of Appeal decide sentencing appeals, three circuit judges from different circuits should go round the country deciding sentencing appeals and we would thereby achieve some sort of consistency. I recall that my proposal was voted down by 60 votes to two. The other day I spoke to the person who supported me on that occasion. He had completely forgotten about it but I have not—it is burnt into my soul. On the other hand, we are not used to winning on this side, so it does not worry me too much. I was a member of the Gage committee until I resigned because I felt that it was too political and that it was not appropriate that I should continue. One of the concerns of the Gage committee was the effect of the grid system that had been examined in Minnesota and South Carolina. The members of that committee were concerned that it had increased sentences significantly, the use of a formula was not satisfactory and that it just increased prison places. Your Lordships may recall that, possibly at Second Reading of the Bill but certainly fairly recently, I pointed out that if we were to sentence in accordance with the average sentences passed throughout the European Community, to which we belong, instead of having 80,000 people in prison we would have 58,000 and there would be ample prison places. Therefore, I approach the Bill with suspicion. When I see that a member of the Sentencing Council is to be a statistician, I question why that is so. What does a statistician know about justice, sentencing and what exactly happens in the courts? Clause 113 is headed, "Resource implications of guidelines". It states that where the council publishes draft guidelines or issues guidelines as definitive guidelines, it must publish a resource assessment of, ""the likely effect of the guidelines on—""(a) the demand for prison places,""(b) the resources required for probation provision, and""(c) the resources required for the provision of youth justice services"." That is fine. Perhaps the Minister can put me right, but I do not think that the current Sentencing Guidelines Council has the job of trying to assess how many prison places are required as a result of what it is putting forward. I recall another sentencing conference in Wales addressed by Lord Justice Tasker Watkins VC, who said, "Don’t you worry about prison places; you pass the sentences you think are right and it’s for the Government to find those places". If the council must take resource implications into account when it publishes its guidelines, and judges did not follow those guidelines, it might knock its assessments about a bit, and its assessments of prison places might not be neat and tidy and accord with what the Home Office wants. We are not concerned with prison places as such. We are not concerned with units. I think that I mentioned on Monday my opposition to having prisoners appear in court on television screens, as that depersonalises them. I sometimes feel that the Wizard of Oz in the Home Office, who is full of knowledge about everything, sees prisoners not as people but as units to be slotted in, and that we have to ensure that we have enough places into which we can slot them. To my mind this simply takes away from the judiciary its traditional role in a democratic society. I keep on emphasising that because sometimes you hear Ministers, such as former Home Secretaries, suggesting that judges are unelected and therefore one must not have any regard for what they say. Judges are part of our democracy and have a function. Part of their function is to ensure that people who come before them have their just deserts. If it means locking them up for the rest of their lives, so be it. Each individual is not a unit to be slotted in. I am very suspicious about the fact that the proposed guidelines council will have to produce an assessment of prison places, and that judges must follow the guidelines that the council lays down so that the places and the units slot together.