The Howard League Parmoor Lecture 2011
Monday 17th October 2011

It is a pleasure to be here this evening to address supporters and members of the Howard League

I am privileged to have been invited, and to be the first Labour Party front bencher to deliver the annual Parmoor Lecture

In anticipation of this evening, I obviously did my homework, and swotted up on Lord Parmoor himself

Milo Cripps – as Lord Parmoor was known – had a family background in the Labour movement

His grandfather was Lord President of the Council in Ramsay MacDonald’s ill-fated Labour government

His uncle was the austere Stafford Cripps, Chancellor in Clement Attlee’s post-war Labour government

But Milo himself had talents that were many and varied – a talented linguist, a successful investment banker, active in antiquarian books, and, I believe, a leading authority on great crested newts – are just a few of these

The annual Parmoor Lecture is a testimony to his commitment to the issues of prison reform, and his long-standing support for the work of the Howard League

In the short lifetime of the Parmoor Lectures, I follow in illustrious footsteps

A current and a past Director of Public Prosecutions

A Master of the Rolls

An ECHR judge

And now me!

Some might well be asking; what are my qualifications for delivering this year’s Parmoor Lecture?

I have asked myself the very same question!

Well, there’s my background growing up in South London

There’s my legal career before I entered Parliament

There’s the past twelve months as Shadow Secretary of State for Justice

And there’s the fact that over the next three years I will be trying to persuade you why Labour should be given the chance to govern once more so I can be the Secretary of State for Justice

I’m very lucky to represent Tooting, the part of south-west London where I was born and raised, living on a council estate with my six brothers and sister

My dad driving a London Transport bus and my mum a seamstress working from home

And on our estate, anti-social behaviour and crime were recurring problems

Victims and offenders often lived side by side

Shaping my experiences of our justice system, long before I dreamed of pursuing a career in law

And although I may be a rusty solicitor, I bring to tonight’s lecture a recent and rich experience of the legal system

Well, certainly more recent than the Secretary of State for Justice, who has been in parliament longer than I have been alive, and hasn’t practiced law in this century!

In my recent career, I spent a lot of time with victims, witnesses, in police stations, in courts, in tribunals, in prisons and I have grappled with the intricacies of how our justice system works

And in my spare time I was vice-chair of Legal Action Group, Chair of Liberty, a founding member of the Human Rights Lawyers Association and I worked with Inquest, Police Action Lawyers Group, Immigration Law Practitioners Association, Association of Personal Injury Lawyers, Justice as well as law centres and CABs

All of these experiences were highly formative

Providing me with a good sense of what works and what doesn’t work

Imbuing me with a grasp of what policy makers need to look at in order to make our justice system better

In a way which is still fresh in my mind, with recent enough memory to still be very relevant

And it was during the early years of my legal career that I first came across the Howard League

Your reputation spreads far and wide

Your unrelenting campaigning for reform of our justice system is to be applauded

And I would like to take this perfect opportunity of paying tribute to the hard work of Frances (Crook) and all in her team

That being said, the Howard League and I don’t agree on a number of things

After all, if we did, life would be rather dull!

And if everyone did agree on justice-related issues, there’d be no need for any campaign organisations, no need for the Howard League, and I wouldn’t be here this evening for that matter!

But, on the other hand, if it wasn’t for campaign groups and reformers such as the Howard League and others, there wouldn’t have been the progress that there’s been on prison reform

Reformers fighting hard to improve conditions in our prisons; seeking to maximise the opportunities for former offenders to be rehabilitated

Facing down those who wished to regress to far less humane treatment within our criminal justice system

For those new to the Howard League or prison reform it’s worth reminding ourselves of the history in this area

Sanctions in the past for criminal behaviour tended to include the ducking stool, the pillory, whipping, branding and the stocks

For many other offences, the sentence was death

These were gruesome times

Some of the polling after this summer’s disturbances showed support for flogging, live ammunition and the stocks – dismissed as lamentable by lawmakers of all parties, and rightly so – but a demonstration of how some of this still bubbles just below the surface

Back in 1777, the Howard League’s very own John Howard published a controversial report into the state of prisons in England and Wales which really got the ball rolling

By the time of the Gaols Act of 1823, government sought to impose general standards in prisons across the country

And there was Elizabeth Fry’s brave work to bring to the attention of parliamentarians the inhumane conditions in many of Britain’s prisons during the 19^th century

Then we had the 1877 Prisons Act, which brought control of all prisons under the centralised jurisdiction of the Home Office

Incidentally, it was this Act which also sought to make the prison environment much harsher, in the belief that this would act as a deterrent to criminal behaviour – an indication that the past 250 years hasn’t just been a steady trend towards ever greater liberalism!

In 1907 came the country’s first probation service – recognition by government that the state had a role to play after an offender was released

By 1910, when Winston Churchill said:

“We must not forget that when every material improvement has been effected in prisons, when the temperature has been rightly adjusted, when the proper food to maintain health and strength has been given, when the doctors, chaplains and prison visitors have come and gone, the convict stands deprived of everything that a free man calls life.”

the debate really was shifting towards the social reformers – that punishing offenders by restricting liberty needn’t require their mistreatment

But each development was subject to the kind of polarised dialogue we still see being played out today

Each reform tweaking the relationship between punishment and rehabilitation of offenders

And, in retrospect, we see that justice policy over these hundreds of years has steadily shifted towards ever greater rehabilitation and more humane treatment of offenders in an effort to bring down crime

This has been the right and proper trend

But there remains more yet to be done

This is why the work of the Howard League and others in the coming years will remain as important as ever

In an open and decent society, it is the role of such groups to push the boundaries of what is right and wrong, and to probe what the public will accept

Those of us in authority should be challenged, and norms tackled

We should not rest on outdated orthodoxies, or stale dogma

And you must never resile from that role

But it is important at the same time to realise the pressures of the environment in which we all operate

Elected politicians have a job of balancing many opposing interests

It’s a tough job!

And, yes, that means we must take account of public opinion

But in a world of tight public finances, we also have to prioritise in all aspects of Government

Prison reform is no different in this respect

We won’t achieve prison reform without bringing public opinion with us

We’ll waste energy and we’ll waste goodwill

That’s why, when leading on prison reform, it is important that we articulate clearly our motivations and justifications

Be clear about why we are proposing what we are proposing

Articulating prison reform in a context which resonates with the general public

Drawing in their support by framing the agenda in a way which demonstrates how they, their families and the law abiding majority will benefit

And, in this context, highlighting how reforming prisons to reduce re-offending ultimately means safer communities up and down the country

But at the same time, we must not lose sight how important it is to punish offenders

And I don’t shy away for one minute from the importance of punishment

For offenders that commit serious and violent crime, a custodial sentence is the only appropriate option

And we should never underestimate the respite that communities receive from the incarceration of serial offenders

Nor should we underestimate the importance of custodial sentences can provide to victims of crime

We simply cannot hope to maintain the confidence of the public in our justice system if we downplay the importance of punishment

And if people don’t see justice being done, they will take the law into their own hands

A justice system without the confidence of the public would be a dangerous thing

So, our big challenge is to communicate that punishment and reform can and should go hand-in-hand with lower crime and a safer Britain

But, as well as politicians taking a lead, there’s an important role for prison reformers

You have to share the burden of demonstrating to the public – and to the media – the virtues of prison reform

And, as I have already highlighted, framed in the context of what is in it for the law-abiding majority up and down this country

How their communities will benefit through lower crime, but also through a reduced call on the taxpayer because of a smaller justice system

Providing reassurances that this isn’t about risking their safety – but, in fact, quite the contrary

Coupling punishment and reform together, building a justice system which delivers both, and benefits the nation

However, at this point I wish to be quite frank

To deliver this calls for an honest debate

It needs a grown-up approach to the world we find ourselves in

One in which politicians, campaign groups like the Howard League, the media and the general public can debate what works, what doesn’t work, and what serves to deliver punishment and reform in our justice system

This has to be one not shrouded in dogma and myth, but is instead evidence-based and pragmatic

I would hope that you would apply a proper examination and scrutiny of the Labour government’s legacy in crime and justice

I’ve met a lot of groups in the past 12 months, and heard a full range of views about Labour’s 13 years

I appreciate candour and sincerity

But there’s candour and sincerity, and then there’s being disingenuous and unfair

I’ve been party to some pretty scathing assessments, some which were totally negative about our time in office

Let me be frank - it’s simply disingenuous to say that our time in office was a total and utter failure

On one level, I’d point to the 43% fall in crime – not my figures, but those of the British Crime Survey

We were the first government since records began to leave office with crime lower than when we entered office

That’s 7 million fewer crimes a year

Just pause for a moment and consider how many fewer victims of crime that means

How many more communities up and down our country were safer as a result

And in youth justice, I’m fiercely proud of Labour’s record

The creation of Youth Offending Teams and the Youth Justice Board

Our joined-up approach has borne fruit – a sharp decline in incidents of youth crime, a reduction in youth custody to the extent to which Young Offender Institutions and Secure Training Centres have been closed down

And we recognised that preventing a drift into a life of crime in the first place – being tough on the causes of crime – was the most sure-fire way of stopping people ending up in the criminal justice system

It was the Labour government that introduced early intervention projects like Sure Start and family intervention projects, parenting classes and youth inclusion programmes

But we also invested in smaller class sizes, created the Education Maintenance Allowance, improved our poorest housing stock and, yes, delivered record levels of employment

Tirelessly rooting out the deprivation which often underlies criminality

Earlier, I made a call for honesty in the debate on criminal justice

And I’m prepared to put my money where my mouth is and be honest about our record

It’d be so easy for me to stand here and list a string of achievements from our 13 years in government

Regurgitating the positives, but neatly glossing over those areas where we fell short

But in my 12 months in this role, I have always sought to be candid

I’ve regularly identified that re-offending rates fell too slowly on our watch

I’ve highlighted the importance of rehabilitation, of reducing re-offending and in improving diversionary policies away from the criminal justice system where appropriate

We should have done even more to root out mental health problems, tackle drug and alcohol addiction and equipping prisoners with the skills and training needed to thrive in the world outside prison

I’ve regretted how we became drawn too easily into the oversimplified, polarised debate on “prison works” versus “prison doesn’t work”

I’ve sought to dispel these oversimplifications

I think we should have done even more to ensure a level-playing field across our justice system – with no one group be it the voluntary sector, public sector or private sector – operating under favoured terms and conditions, or shielded from public scrutiny

But I have to tell you, I believe that it is delusional to claim the Labour Government years as some kind of dark age for our criminal justice system

I’m afraid it’s simply not true

I challenge even the harshest of harsh critics that there are positives from our time in office

You might deny that crime fell

In response, I use all the official data available in good faith, which on every single official measure shows a decline

You might decry the involvement of the private sector in the running of our prisons

In response, I argue dogma must not obstruct what is in the best interests of punishing and reforming offenders, and pluralism has a role to play

On this particular issue, honesty means not portraying the landscape as simply ‘public good’, and ‘private bad’ or vice-versa

It’s much more complex than that, and deserves much better discussion

So, while I am honest, I am looking for honesty in return

That honesty has also to extend to a proper examination and scrutiny of the policies being proposed and implemented by this coalition government

And I’ll kick this off by being honest about our current Secretary State for Justice

He can on occasions talk a good talk – when he’s not nodding off that is!

On the Human Rights Act – another of my key interests – he is one of the few senior Tories that truly gets it

Unlike our Home Secretary!

And I admit that some of Ken Clarke’s language on our justice system – particularly in his first few months – was refreshing for a Conservative

And I know that many of you here in this room found it encouraging

But I warn you - don’t be hoodwinked

Let’s not forget that he offered up his department for savage budget cuts in last year’s spending review

The Ministry of Justice will lose a quarter of its budget over coming years

What makes it worse is that Ken Clarke didn’t even put up a fight with the Treasury

In fact, he even boasted publicly about how he refused to take part in a “macho contest” with his cabinet colleagues on who could have the smallest budget cut

He didn’t bother to put up a fight for the investment our prisons, probation service, courts and rehabilitation programmes need and deserve!

And all his policies stem from this 23% budget cut

He has retrofitted everything he has done since the spending review around the need to make cuts to satisfy the Treasury

It’s not about what’s in the best interests of offenders, or victims or communities up and down the country

It’s what’s in the best interests of the Treasury cuts – cuts that Labour happens to believe are too fast and too deep

We would have sought to reduce the deficit

We would have made savings but not at this reckless scale or pace

Let’s look at our prison population

Leaving to one side the record high figures of the past five weeks, the Justice Secretary originally called for a reduction in the prison population of 3,000

I would remind you the prison population in May 2010 when we left office was 84,982

A 3,000 reduction takes the figure to down to around 82,000

But what started out as an explicit target, has gradually become less concrete an objective, with Ken Clarke now positively distancing himself from the figure

Hardly surprising bearing in mind the prison population stood last week at 87,551

But Ken wants the reduction because it saves him £140million

Not because it is in the best interest of our justice system, or of offenders, or of victims

I differ totally from Ken Clarke in that I want to bring about a smaller prison population through lower crime and reduced re-offending

This is the right and proper way – the only way

You can’t deliver a smaller prison population by reducing capacity, cancelling prison building and closing prisons

This simply leads to more overcrowding and increasingly squalid conditions – far from conducive in supporting rehabilitation

This government’s policies must not lead to people who should be in prison not being given a custodial sentence

This can lead to all sorts of problems not least trust and confidence in our justice system breaking down

Remember his 50% sentence reduction proposal for early guilty pleas? Rightly opposed by victims groups and the judiciary, and now ditched after considerable political pressure?

The motivation for this – to save money

On Indeterminate Sentences for Public Protections (or IPPs) – a subject I know causes anxiety for many in this room – Ken Clarke has no clear policy

I’m being pressured by many of you to support Ken Clarke’s policies on IPPs

The problem for me is that he hasn’t got one!

No policy for their future and he has no policy for dealing with the backlog of those who have completed their minimum tariff

He has launched an urgent review – despite having 18 months to look at the issue

He had a Green Paper and a public consultation on sentencing, and still didn’t address it

I admit that while the intentions behind the introduction of IPPs was sound, the implementation of them initially was problematic, and their use did at first mushroom way beyond what was originally envisaged

But I am clear that we will not support their total removal if that means that there is any watering down of the protection of the public

The public will rightly want reassuring that the system is sufficiently resourced to ensure those who have completed their minimum tariff have undertaken the appropriate courses in order to satisfy the Parole Board they are not a danger to society

Abolishing IPPs just to save money is taking risks with public safety

By playing games with sentencing and offending victims of crime in this way, Ken Clarke has contributed to this government’s growing neglect of the needs of victims and witnesses

They refused to introduce a Victims’ Law

They’ve refused to pay out compensation to victims of overseas terrorism

The future of the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority is under threat

And now we’re hearing murmurings that there won’t be a replacement for Louise Casey who recently stood down as the Victims Commissioner, championing victims needs across government

And we mustn’t forget that Ken Clarke himself risked undoing the progress that our justice system has made in supporting victims of rape with his bungled policies, compounded by his infamous Five Live radio interview, back in the spring

And also a stubborn refusal to understand why his comments were so offensive and dangerous

And what about Ken Clarke’s latest wheeze?

His recent announcement on work in prisons

Again, I support the concept of engaging prisoners in meaningful activities whilst in prison, and in victims receiving some of the proceeds

Gaining skills and expertise which will prepare offenders for life outside of prison

But, as is usual, when the detail was examined, more questions were asked than answered

Engaging prisoners in a working forty hour week will be resource-intensive, requiring additional supervision by prison officers

But this is at a time when there is already enormous pressure on prison officer numbers

And nowhere have the government highlighted where these meaningful employment opportunities will come from – this is a government which can’t currently create employment outside of prisons let alone in prisons!

I could give many more examples of why this Justice Secretary is wrong

Time constraints mean I will give you only one more

This government claims to support restorative justice

Where it has been used – like in Northern Ireland – the lower reconviction rates and higher satisfaction rates for victims are encouraging

A 2010 Prison Reform Trust report shows almost a 50 per cent reduction in the reoffending rates of young offenders that took part in Northern Ireland’s restorative justice programme

Restorative justice programmes that make offenders take responsibility for their crimes can indeed be transformative justice

It can help offenders develop the moral vocabulary, emotional intelligence and offer a level of reparation for the victim that punishment alone can’t always deliver

It is of course not appropriate for every crime or every offender

But it is a mechanism that merits further emphasis within our justice system and something Labour would be committed to expanding where victims feel it would help

But, let me remind you all, that when push came to shove, this government bottled it

During the Committee Stage of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill, we put down an amendment so that courts would have an explicit duty to consider making an order to participate in a restorative justice course

What did this government do?

They opposed the amendment, thus undermining any credentials they ever had as supporters of restorative justice

So the lesson from all this is don’t be taken in by cuddly Ken

In contrast, I am determined to mould a justice system fit for the challenges of today and the future

One which succeeds in punishing and reforming offenders

That is grounded in an honest, open and frank debate about what works

And, central to this, is the critical question of how do we define success

What would be the measure by which our justice system can be seen to be working?

Well, partly, this is answered by going back to the first principles that drive the sentencing of offenders

If we ask the question why do we sentence those found guilty of committing an offence, then there are a number of reasons:

It’s a punishment

It provides retribution for victims of crime

It protects the public

It allows the opportunity to reform offenders and to prevent re-offending

And custodial sentences provide respite for communities blighted by crime

Well, in my opinion all of these are important – and we should not be shy to say this

We should certainly not downplay the importance of punishment for the reasons I highlighted earlier

That way, we can ensure that we have the confidence of the law abiding majority

Generating the public support we need to deliver the genuinely reforming justice system we all want to see

And, in order to help deliver this, I’ve already launched a justice policy working group grappling with many of these big issues

Reporting next year, we’ll be interrogating many of the issues which underpin success in punishing and reforming offenders

So, I lay down the challenge to the Howard League – and to others in the room tonight – we want to hear your views

We want your honest and fair opinions on what works in reforming offenders and supports reductions in re-offending

How can we root out alcohol and drug dependency, and support those with mental health problems or lack of basic education?

What is the best practice in delivering meaningful work opportunities so that offenders gain the skills and confidence they need for a life outside of prison?

What are the best ways to run our prison estate, so that we support the punishment and reform of offenders?

BUT, again, on the theme of honesty – I have to be frank

The landscape in 2015 will still be one of limited finance

The theme will be prison reform in a financially constrained landscape

Our policies need to be costed, and demonstrate their long-term benefit

That’s why I am also determined to find ways of delivering a justice system which can be delivered in a more efficient manner

And I want you to bear this in mind when considering responses to our policy review

My approach to our justice system is founded on two interlinked imperatives

An economic imperative and a social imperative

Socially – our duty as progressives to work with those trapped in deprivation

Our duty to reform those who have committed crime, to prevent the chances of re-offending, and provide the opportunity to turn their lives around and play a productive role in society

And to ensure communities are free to live their lives safe from the threat of crime and the misery this brings

Economically – our imperative is driven by a safer society, characteristed by lower crime levels and reduced re-offending, requiring a reduced call on the hard-pressed taxpayer to fund prisons, probation and rehabilitation

And one which will, as a result, ensure communities face lower economic costs through lower levels of crime

Coupled together – this social and economic imperative – must underpin our approach to justice

This government just doesn’t get the full consequences of all this

They place short-term economic cuts – too fast, and too deep in our view – ahead of what is in the best interests of our communities up and down the country

And they place economic expediency ahead of what is in the best interests of our justice system

It is dangerous, and is a risk to our wider society

But there is no honesty from them on this

I am being honest – honest about our record in government, honest about this government’s policies and honest about the challenges we face in the future

But I remain positive and enthusiastic about the scale of this challenge, and I look forward to working with you all in building a justice system that successfully punishes and reforms offenders