My Lords, I welcome the noble Lord, Lord Timpson, to the Dispatch Box as the Minister for Prisons, Parole and Probation. From the noise the House made earlier, I think I am not alone in thinking that he is probably the best man for the job. I suppose I should draw attention to my entry in the register of interests; I am a non-practising member of the Faculty of Advocates. In fact, I presently have another interest that I suppose is not yet registered, in that I have a pair of shoes in my local Timpson for repair.
Speaking to Channel 4 News earlier this year, my noble friend said that in his view only one-third of people in prison needed to be there. In order to emphasise that radically reducing the prison population is not impossible, he added that the Netherlands had halved its prison population while reducing crime. That contradicts what I think the noble and learned Lord, Lord Stewart of Dirleton, implied in what I can describe only as a plea in mitigation on behalf of the previous Government, which was that these two things were impossible. I know the Minister has studied this. How did the Netherlands manage to reduce crime and reduce the prison population by almost half?