My Lords, I too support this array of amendments on IPP, both the current amendments and the ones that will follow. As the Committee will know, I am a regular visitor—twice a month—to prisons across the UK, and I will visit another one tomorrow morning. On a regular basis—two a month—I meet many incarcerated men and sometimes women, and many who have left prison over the last 10 years, and I have found relentless IPP tragedies around every corner.
I shall refer to one story from a meeting in December, when a man came up to me and said that he had been released from an IPP sentence 14 years ago but was recalled back to prison in September after he forgot to inform his then probation officer that he had gone on holiday with his wife in August for two weeks to Spain. This is just sheer stupidity, let alone the fact that this system is organising to persecute people compared with recognising their renewal. In his case, and not just because I have now met him twice, he does not deserve the taxpayer to spend nearly £50,000 for an extended period to make sure that he is further detained and punished.
I hope the Minister will gather up all his strength and either accept this array of amendments in one gulp or go back to the Lord Chancellor and determine to bring back an effective set of government amendments that will allow us to end this appalling stain of injustice and unfairness. Another man I met eight years ago from a prison in Kent had been recalled three times. From an initial sentence of seven years, he had done over 24. The persecution of this man’s mental abilities was blatantly obvious; he was no risk to anyone. I can tell noble Lords that since we campaigned for his release, and he has been released, he is an honourable citizen paying his taxes. That is how we should treat many of these men—they are largely men—to see that they are given the opportunity to prove their new life.