IPP prisoners need resentencing – before even more lives are lost

Editorial: The UK’s prison system is under significant pressure and the justice secretary’s new rules on parole will not fix it. We need to reform this unjust and unworkable institution

The justice secretary Alex Chalk has decided not to organise for the resentencing of thousands of inmates held under so-called imprisonment for public protection tariffs (PA)

The justice secretary, Alex Chalk, a relative newcomer to the cabinet table, has distinguished himself, if only by comparison, as one of the more rational and pragmatic members of Rishi Sunak’s team. As far as the balance of power at the top of government goes, over the past six months or so, the departures of Dominic Raab and Suella Braverman, and the arrival of Mr Chalk and the return of David Cameron, give some hope to anxious observers that the Tory slide into populist nationalism has at least stalled.

However, Mr Chalk’s decision not to organise for the resentencing of thousands of inmates held under so-called imprisonment for public protection (IPP) tariffs is a disappointment. These sentences place prisoners – who are guilty of offences and may indeed be dangerous – at more risk to themselves and to their fellow inmates and prison staff because of the psychological pressure of simply never knowing when or if they might be considered for release.

Designed to deal with a particular type of criminal capable of reoffending, but who has not yet done so, the system seems to have been used far more freely than the last Labour government anticipated at the time the IPP was instituted, about 20 years ago.