My Lords, I am very grateful to all noble Lords who have contributed to this debate, and in particular to the noble Baroness, Lady Prashar, for tabling this regret Motion.
The principal concern is that the recent changes to the Parole Board Rules prevent prison and probation staff making specific recommendations in the reports that they give the Parole Board. It is said that this has implications for the sentence progression of individuals subject to parole review, and complaint is made that this was done through the negative procedure without consultation. What we are not considering today are other changes, such as changes relating to the move from closed to open prisons, which are, strictly speaking, not the subject of today’s regret Motion.
I will provide some background. The Parole Board of England and Wales is an arm’s-length body which, as has been pointed out, performs a judicial, or at least quasi-judicial, function. It is required by statute to decide whether prisoners serving eligible sentences can be safely released into the community—that is the board’s decision. The statutory test requires that the board must direct release if it is
“satisfied that it is no longer necessary for the protection of the public that the person should be confined.”
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As is well known, the Secretary of State is required to refer eligible prisoners to the Parole Board once they have completed the relevant period of their custodial sentence. When a reference is made, the Prison and Probation Service—HMPPS—provides a comprehensive dossier of evidence, which includes information about the offence, risk assessments and information from those who have worked closely with the prisoner during their time in custody. Those reports, including those from psychologists, may be anywhere between 150 and, in some complex cases, up to 1,000 pages. Essentially, that procedure and process will continue.
I simply point out that the change that we are talking about is quite limited. It is concerned with the removal of the previous requirement that written evidence submitted on behalf of the Secretary of State must include a recommendation. The previous legislation said that the staff reports must include a recommendation, and that provision is no longer in force. In other words, the reports continue as they did before, but there is no final conclusion that says, “I therefore recommend” whatever the recommendation is.