PROPOSED changes to prison sentences are driven by politics and “pandering to public opinion”, and fail to take a look at the larger, longer-term picture, the Bishop of Gloucester, the Rt Revd Rachel Treweek, has said.
She was addressing the House of Lords on Wednesday in the course of the Second Reading of the Sentencing Bill, which seeks to scale back the prison population by increasing the usage of community orders and suspended sentences, including harsher restrictions and more intensive supervision.
The Minister of State for Justice, Lord Timpson, told peers that this is able to bring stability and sustainability to prisons and to a criminal justice system “buckling under insurmountable pressure”.
Bishop Treweek, who’s the Church’s lead bishop for prisons, expressed dismay that the main focus of the Bill was the crisis of prison overcrowding. “Surely our long-term vision and massive picture shouldn’t be simply about more prisons and even decent prisons, but ultimately about strengthening communities so that folks flourish in a network of healthy and secure relationships,” she said.
“There must be scope to be attentive to the underlying reasons for people’s behaviour, not least in an endeavour to interrupt the cycle of reoffending and fractured communities which is expensive: physically, emotionally and financially.”
The Bishop also expressed concern that recommendations of the Goake independent review, published in May, had been chosen piecemeal.
“The review found that ‘punishment . . . has been given disproportionate weight and . . . there was insufficient deal with reducing crime.’ It stated that custody must be ‘a final resort’. We are failing to ask what is going to enable a discount in reoffending in the person and produce transformation not just for them but for individuals who are impacted by their selections.
“Creativity with community sentencing might be life-changing, but sadly, even the proposed changes are set inside such a punitive framework and tone. This is pandering to public opinion, not changing it.
“Measures to name-and-shame people completing unpaid work as a part of their community sentence need greater scrutiny. I’m sure that the very last thing the Government would intend is harmful consequences for 1000’s of youngsters and young people whose parents are completing their sentence.”
Bishop Treweek can be looking for amendments to the Bill that might define in laws the aim of imprisonment, she told the House. “In recent days, we’ve seen, yet again, intense media and political attention on prisons, but we’d like to scale back the political heat and seek cross party solutions,” she said.
“We must shape public opinion, not follow it. Is the Minister prepared to face down the media on matters of principle and evidence?”
Furthermore, there was nothing within the Bill to offer assurance that the planning and management of the general prison population was going to be significantly higher than it was now, she said.
“We have didn’t articulate the large aim and make clear what good would appear like for victims, offenders, families and wider society in the long run. If we had a well-functioning prison system with good headroom and capability, lower rates of violence and self-harm, and folks coming out of prison less prone to offend than after they went in, this Bill may need been sufficient. Instead, it’s a great distance from the unconventional and daring considering that it’s obligatory to reset the suitable use of prison.”
Justice and mercy were two attributes of God, she concluded, “who’s within the business of reconciliation and transformation. If we allowed mercy and justice to really dialogue, this Bill might be transformed. We need a joined-up public health approach to the criminal justice system that puts relationship front and centre.”
Responding, Lord Timpson said: “The evidence shows that those given a community order or suspended sentence reoffend lower than similar offenders given a brief prison sentence. We are following the evidence to scale back crime, resulting in fewer victims and safer communities. I’m also following the lead of the previous Government, who introduced this measure of their Sentencing Bill.”
