Labour’s prison plan will fix one problem – but could cause plenty of others

Justice secretary Shabana Mahmood has bowed to the inevitable: acknowledging that ‘our prisons are on the point of collapse’, Mahmood has announced that, from September, most prisoners serving sentences of less than four years will be released 40 per cent of the way through their sentences instead of the halfway point, which is currently the case. It’s a policy that will ease the pressure on prisons, but could end up backfiring badly.

The Prison Governors’ Association advocated for this early release policy during the election campaign, and while it may seem that the government has no other choice, it will create serious risks. The problem is that the prison system is part of a wider justice system which is broken. Although the government is clear that prisoners serving life sentences or extended determinate sentences will not be eligible for early release, letting prisoners out early – even with the exemptions for those serving sentences longer than four years, sex offenders and domestic abusers – will mean thousands more offenders being supervised by a probation system which is already suffering a staffing crisis.