In a bid to be ‘tough on crime’, politicians have pushed Britain’s prisons to breaking point

Editorial: As David Gauke, the former justice secretary, makes clear in his welcome report into Britain’s failing jail system, it is easy to promise ‘tougher’ sentences – but what the UK really needs is smarter ones

Justice secretary Shabana Mahmood was wise to appoint one of her more rational predecessors, David Gauke, to chair the independent review on sentencing. Mr Gauke served in government under David Cameron and Theresa May and, while unmistakably a Tory moderate of the old school, inevitably ditched by Boris Johnson, he is no Labour patsy.

As justice secretary and lord chancellor (2018-19), he faced the same problems of prison overcrowding, reoffending and a weak probation service as the present government, albeit in a less severe form. Above all, Mr Gauke has brought an unpityingly forensic eye to the weaknesses in the system.

Admittedly, Mr Gauke is no Dostoevsky but his first, interim, report is fluent, clear and persuasive – a model of its kind, promptly delivered. It sets out precisely why the system ended up in such a crisis that some serious criminals had to be released early after the last general election. Later in the spring, Mr Gauke will suggest ways in which matters can be improved.

The only fault that can be picked out in Mr Gauke’s work is not one of his making: the unnecessary presence of more than 2,000 prisoners held under the IPP (indefinite public protection) regime. For whatever reason, Ms Mahmood kept them out of Mr Gauke’s terms of reference.

The situation in Britain’s jails is a crisis that has been decades in the making. Perhaps to the surprise of the public and the more reactionary sections of the media, the large increase in the prison population is not related to some huge upsurge in serious crime in recent times – indeed, quite the opposite.

As Mr Gauke’s report points out, the latest estimates from the Crime Survey for England and Wales show that there has been an overall decline in incidents of headline crime since 2017. The pattern of criminality has changed, too, as society has evolved – more online fraud, for example, and fewer bank raids.

More transgressions are now being linked to mental illness, which might not even be considered a crime deserving punishment in the traditional sense. At any rate, even if some official figures may understate criminality, the explosion in the prison population far outstrips any such discount; and more credible explanations lie elsewhere.

The reason why the number of prisoners has doubled since about 1993 is not because the country has become twice as lawless. It is, rather, because more people are being sent to prison and for longer periods for any given offence than was the case in the relatively recent past.

Once inside for these extended periods of time, they become more likely to reoffend – and returned to custody either on recall from probation or after fresh offences. The courts have also drastically reduced the number of non-custodial punishments, such as community service; and a badly underfunded court system has meant more suspects kept on remand.

Set against such trends, and without a commensurate increase in the prison building programme (despite many politicians pledging to remedy that), the wonder is that the system managed to avoid collapse before reaching more than 99 per cent capacity last summer. When the racial riots came, drastic emergency measures had to be taken to avoid even wider civil disorder. Mr Gauke restrains himself from stating it but that is plainly a disgrace – and we know where the blame lies.

However, Mr Gauke, a practising politician in government for some years, is prepared to concede that political decisions – reflecting intense media and public pressures in a democratic society – have driven the surge in incarceration. The thirst for retribution, often triggered by periodic outbreaks of moral panic at a particularly heinous crime, has pushed parliament to approve ever more draconian sentencing guidelines, and the courts have been encouraged to show less mercy and more toughness in sending people down.

Terrified of the press and public opinion, a generation of politicians have allowed themselves to be defined by their ruthlessness. Michael Howard, for example, was the home secretary who will forever remembered for his clever but misleading slogan: “Prison works.” He, a barrister, was followed by another former member of the bar, Tony Blair, whose mantra “Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime” helped propel him into No 10.

In 2019, Boris Johnson promised to abolish parole before – fortunately and predictably – quietly dropping the impractical idea. In recent years, Suella Braverman and Priti Patel seemed permanently engaged in a constant auction among themselves about who could display the most contempt towards “lefty lawyers” and scorn for universal human rights. A sane society would have placed the pair under restraining orders; Mr Johnson promoted them.

We await Mr Gauke’s final recommendations but solutions to the prison crisis almost write themselves. With newer technologies such as tagging and internet surveillance, the courts should be allowed to experiment with alternatives to incarceration – leaving the prisons more able to try to rehabilitate the worst offenders, and, in egregious cases, keep them in for life.

Somehow, the probation service needs to be strengthened, as a more economical and effective way to reduce recall and reoffending – and perhaps also make probation panels less risk-averse. Sentencing guidelines and laws need to be revised for the simple reason that in their present state, they cannot be implemented due to lack of space in jails and will only result in periodic crises of overcrowding.

Even with those reforms, some increase in the quantity and quality of prison accommodation will still be needed, given that the Victorian estate is so unsuitable. And, of course, the IPP prisoners, some having spent decades inside for relatively minor thefts, should be resentenced in a sensible fashion.

There are no votes in prisons, in any sense, and the public’s demand for harsh punishment is difficult for any administration to sate or resist. It is always easier to promise “tougher” sentences. Yet, what the country needs, to make it safer, is actually “smarter”, more effective sentences. There is no alternative.