Howard League responds to the Lord Chancellor’s announcement on the prison capacity crisis 

The Howard League for Penal Reform has responded to the Lord Chancellor Shabana Mahmood’s statement on measures to address prison capacity, announced today (Friday 12 July).  

Measures include ending the End of Custody Supervised Licence scheme and temporarily reducing the proportion of certain custodial sentences served in prison from 50% to 40%.  

Changes to custodial sentences will come into force in September and will only apply to standard determinate sentences of under four years, excluding people convicted for sex offences and domestic abuse. Those released early will be supervised by the probation service.  

In addition, an announcement was made to recruit over 1,000 additional trainee probation officers by March 2025. 

 Andrew Neilson, Director of Campaigns at the Howard League for Penal Reform, said: “This is absolutely the right decision by the Lord Chancellor and the only way to buy a new government time to think more deeply and seriously about the use of prison and the functioning of the wider criminal justice system. We also welcome a commitment to investment in the probation service, which is the ultimate guarantor of public safety. 

“This is not simply an emergency to do with capacity, although that is driving the immediate need for action. Our violent and overcrowded prisons are holding the country back by failing to tackle the underlying causes of crime. If anything, they make reoffending far more likely. 

“The first step must be to stabilise the system. As the Howard League outlined in its own recommendations earlier this week, bringing forward the point of automatic early release for those on standard determinate sentences will both free up space and allow prisons and probation the chance to properly plan the resettlement of people in prison. The previous government’s early release scheme was chaotic and ultimately insufficient to address the capacity crisis behind bars. 

“The Ministry of Justice will need to go further in due course, as the billions earmarked for building new prisons will still not be enough to stop an untenable surge in the population over the coming years. That means, as the Prime Minister said in his press conference last weekend, that we ‘do need to be clear about the way in which we use prisons.’ We can also be clear that there is a better way.” 

Notes to editors 

1. The Howard League for Penal Reform is the oldest penal reform charity in the world. It is a national charity working for less crime, safer communities and fewer people in prison.
2. A briefing outlining policy options, Grasping the nettle: Options for a lasting solution to the prison capacity crisis, can be found on the Howard League website at: https://howardleague.org/publications/grasping-the-nettle-options-for-a-lasting-solution-to-the-prison-capacity-crisis/ 
3. For more information about prison overcrowding, how it came about, and how it can be solved, visit the ‘Why are prisons overcrowded?’ page on the Howard League website at: https://howardleague.org/why-are-prisons-overcrowded/ 

Contact 

Noor Khan 

Press and Public Affairs Officer 

Tel: +44 (0)20 7241 7873 

Email: [email protected] 

Out-of-hours contact: Andrew Neilson on 07918 681 094