My Lords, the Committee will appreciate that there is a significant overlap between this and the previous group. I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames, and indeed no other participant in this debate, will regard it as discourteous if on some occasions I take as read, as it were, points that I made in the previous debate. If the Committee finds it helpful, I propose to say a few words about each of the clauses and schedules to which objection has been taken and then come back to address some of the particular points raised by participants in the debate.
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Clause 27 removes the prospect of early release for the most dangerous terrorist offenders in England and Wales. The provision is central to one of the core aims of the Bill—namely, to ensure that the most dangerous terrorist offenders are serving sentences that truly reflect the serious nature of their crimes. It does that by amending Section 247A of the Criminal Justice Act 2003, under which all relevant terrorist offenders are currently referred to the Parole Board at the two-thirds point of their custodial term to be considered for discretionary early release. The clause would therefore ensure that offenders who receive an extended sentence for a terrorist or terrorist-related offence which carries a maximum penalty of life will instead serve their full custodial term before being released on extended licence. It also provides a release mechanism for those sentenced to the new serious terrorism offence.
Critically, the clause ensures that no offender sentenced for a serious terrorism offence would be eligible for discretionary early release but would be required to serve the whole custodial term imposed by the sentencing court. In that context, I reiterate the point that I made in the previous debate that the purpose of this clause and architecture is not to remove the role of the Parole Board per se, which I understand several Members of the Committee who spoke were concerned about; it is about removing any possibility of early release for this most serious and dangerous cohort of offenders.
Ensuring that those offenders serve their whole custodial term will protect the public, by incapacitating these offenders for longer. It will give the public greater confidence in the sentencing framework and maximise the time that various services have to work with offenders. I appreciate and acknowledge the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, about the importance of that work and the workload that it imposes on people— we are paying attention to that. The longer sentence maximises the time that services have to work with offenders, giving them more time in which to rehabilitate and disengage them from their often deeply entrenched ideological views.
This cohort of offenders is also subject to an extended period on licence, which for an extended sentence could be up to 10 years and for a serious terrorism sentence could be up to 25 years. That period enables
services to mitigate the risk the offender poses to the community and supports their successful reintegration into society, which is, we recognise, an integral part of this process. I explained in the previous debate the way licence conditions would be determined by prison governors on behalf of the Secretary of State, and I hope that no discourtesy is perceived if I merely refer back to what I said in that debate. For those reasons, I am satisfied that Clause 27 and its effect on the release of the most serious and dangerous terrorist offenders is both proportionate and robust.
Schedule 9 sets out the offences relevant for the provisions in the Bill relating to England and Wales in three parts. It will be substituted for Schedule 19ZA to the Criminal Justice Act 2003. Part 1 lists all UK terrorism offences for which the maximum penalty is life imprisonment. Part 3 specifies other non-terrorist offences with a maximum penalty of life which are eligible to be designated with a terrorism connection at the point of sentencing. Together, Parts 1 and 3 set out the offences for which a serious terrorism sentence may be imposed, or, if an extended determinate sentence is imposed, set out that the offender will serve the whole of the appropriate custodial period in prison. That will be critical for the courts in determining which offences are eligible for the new serious terrorism sentence for England and Wales introduced by Clause 5 of the Bill and for the extended determinate sentence where the custodial period is to be served in full, set out in Clause 27.
Part 2 covers all other UK terrorism offences carrying a maximum penalty of more than two years’ imprisonment. These are further offences which will be subject to restrictions on early release under Section 247A of the 2003 Act, as introduced by the Terrorist Offenders (Restriction of Early Release) Act 2020. This part ensures that all terrorist offenders convicted for an offence under the part will not be eligible for release until two-thirds of the way through their custodial sentence, at which point they will be referred to the Parole Board to decide whether they are safe to release before the end of their custodial term.
Therefore, the removal of Schedules 9 and 10 would undermine many of the measures introduced by the Bill. We recognise the importance of licence periods in managing the risk associated with terrorist prisoners being released once they have served their appropriate custodial term, which is why we are extending the range of offences that can attract a sentence for offenders of particular concern. This will ensure that terrorist offenders are released with a minimum supervision period of 12 months, even if the Parole Board does not release them before the end of their custodial term. Schedule 9 fulfils both those purposes. It also has another function, which is that, where terrorist offenders are convicted and sentenced elsewhere in the UK but transferred during their sentence to England and Wales, they serve the appropriate custodial term and are not released early, or are subject to restricted early release, depending on the sentence.
I should perhaps say a word about Clause 28, to which challenge is also made in this group of amendments. This clause creates the equivalent provision for Scotland of that made by Clause 27 for England and Wales by amending Section 1AB of the Prisoners and Criminal
Proceedings (Scotland) Act 1993. It has the same substantive effect and thus ensures consistency across Scotland and the rest of the UK, which means that the British public are better protected, no matter where they live. Schedule 10 makes the corresponding changes for Section 28 as are made by Schedule 9—this time for the Scottish regime—and it is structured in the same way. Clause 31 creates the equivalent provision for Northern Ireland to that made by Clause 27 for England and Wales and Clause 28 for Scotland, as I have just said. That is the structure of these clauses, and we consider that they must remain part of the Bill.
The noble Lord, Lord Marks, asked me what has changed. As I understood his question, he was asking what has changed since the TORER Act 2020 that motivates the changes to release of early determinate sentence offenders. The change is intended to capture a more serious cohort of prisoners than those we sought to capture with the changes under the TORER Act. The removal of early release set out in the Bill will apply only to those sentenced to an extended sentence or a serious terrorism sentence for a serious terrorism offence—that is, one that could attract a life sentence. By contrast, the TORER Act primarily sought to remove the automatic early release of terrorist offenders sentenced to a standard determinate sentence who, before that Act was introduced, were entitled to automatic release on licence at the halfway point of their sentence.
To respond to the points made by the noble Baroness, Lady Prashar, I hope that she will allow me to refer back to the points that I made in the previous debate, which she instigated.
The noble Lord, Lord Anderson, put a couple of points to me. The first concerned an inconsistency which he said had been identified by Jonathan Hall QC in the material that he put out—I cannot remember whether it was in his report or in a tweet. I am sure that this is something that we can continue to discuss, but my immediate response is that the provisions of Clause 27 may remove the prospect of early release, but those subject to those provisions retain automatic release at the end of their custodial term, unlike those sentenced to a life sentence. At the conclusion of their extended licence, they will no longer be subject to statutory supervision or potential recall to custody, while those on life licences are subject to that for the rest of their lives. I therefore respectfully take issue with the noble Lord, and perhaps with Mr Jonathan Hall QC, that you are necessarily better off if you are sentenced to a life sentence, but I have no doubt that that is something that we can continue to discuss.
The noble Lord, Lord Anderson, also invited me to conclude that it was a necessary consequence of my comments at the end of the last debate that there would be rare cases, to use his phrase, in which the Parole Board might recommend release. I respectfully say that there is nothing inconsistent in how I have approached this part of Committee and the previous debate. The important point is that removing the prospect of early release of these offenders sends a clear message that this Government will treat this kind of offending seriously. That is not inconsistent with saying that these offenders are, to use the words in a previous debate, incorrigible.
In that regard, I respectfully agree with my noble friend Lord Naseby, who reminds us that the nature of the offences that we are dealing with here are such that the carnage wrought by a single offender can be extremely significant. That is a salutary reminder that, when we are asking ourselves, as a number of noble Lords have, how many offenders we are dealing with, that might not always be the correct question to ask.
The noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, made some points which I hope he will not regard me as discourteous for saying that I hope that I have covered in my responses to this and the last debate. If there is anything that I have not covered, I will of course be happy to discuss it with him.
On the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, regarding the practicality of the work that must be done, we are very aware of, and recognise with appreciation, the work done by prison officers and probation officers. Others in my department are very focused on that part of the criminal justice system.
For those reasons, I respectfully invite the noble Lord, Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames, not to press these various amendments.