IPP.Thank you for your letter about the department's plans to reform the prison estate and those held on IPP sentences.

The Right Honourable _{Ministry Elizabeth Truss MP}

Lord Chancellor & Secretary of Justice

of State for Justice

Bob Neill MP

Chairman

Justice Committee

House of Commons

 

 

SW1AOAA August2016

 

PRISON ESTATE TRANSFORMATION and IPP SENTENCES
 

Thank you for your letter of 26 July about the department's plans to reform the prison estate and those held on IPP sentences.

It remains my intention to make changes to the physical estate to make it safer, more efficient and to enable a greater focus on rehabilitation. As I know you are aware the current prison estate is overcrowded and out of date, and the physical environmental conditions can also be very poor. Improving the estate will provide the essential infrastructure and foundation for the wider prison reforms to build upon.

We still want therefore to build new prisons fit for the twenty-first century and close and sell the old and ineffective prisons. We are in the process of establishing the preferred locations for the new prisons

based on a number of factors including demand and site availability. At the same time we are continuing to develop our strategy for potential future closures. I will of course provide you with the detail of these plans once they are finalised.
I am aware of the concerns about prisoners serving IPP sentences and I will be looking at all the issues and options in this area. You will however be aware already of the work being undertaken to increase opportunities for prisoners serving IPP sentences to reduce their identified risks and progress through their sentences towards release. This includes enhanced case management for IPP cases where it has been identified that they are struggling to progress and a Progression Regime for IPPs and others who are ineligible for open conditions. This specialist regime is designed to re-introduce the responsibilities, tasks and routines associated with daily life in the community and to allow the prisoner to pursue activities and relationships which support rehabilitation. I can confirm this work, the details of which have been provided by my predecessor in earlier correspondence, will continue.

You have asked also for information on the number of places on offending behaviour programmes that have been available to IPPs for the last 5 years. I have provided this information below. Accredited programmes however are not a mandatory requirement for IPP prisoners. There are many ways in which prisoners may reduce their risks, e.g. through accessing the Progression Regime as outlined above, education, vocational work, one to one work with psychologists etc. Completion of a programme does not automatically mean that risk has been reduced. As you will see from the table there has been a drop in accredited programmes in custody since 2011. This can be explained as being a consequence of the change in investment focus on higher intensity programmes and changes to commissioning arrangements in relation to substance misuse services. I have explained these in more detail below, continuedhttp://www.parliament.uk/documents/commons-committees/Justice/correspondence/Letter-from-Elizabeth-Truss-to-the-Chair-on-the-Prison-estate-and-IPP-sentencing.pdf

Comments

Brackenbury Oh bloody wow! Did I just read that right!! Completion of an accredited offending behaviour course does not automatically mean risk is reduced! So what the bloody hell the point then! She says it's not the only thing they can do to gain release! Well I. I know we all know different! Because it's all they throw at them. One after the bloody other!! Another prat who hasn't a clue what she's saying before putting pen to paper! So angry right now! This is exactly why I said we all need to highlight our own personal heartache stories and bombard her with them, if that doesn't make her develop a conscience nothing will, she needs to hear all the hoops and heartaches our loved ones have jumped through and been through, every last little detail! And by letter not email as well, I'm half way through mine! And I'm telling her I expect a response or il keep sending it until she does! I will put it nicely.. The first time! after seeing this it definitely needs addressing asap! She's opened up a can of worms saying that, put her foot right in it!! have a funny feeling she's going to live to regret those words! But in some senses she's done us a favour and left the door open! We need to get this statement public... Very loudly too!!

 

Abbott When are these so called Muppets going to get right, what do they want blood. !!!

 

Horton So she says that courses are not compulsory and not necessarily helpful. Wonderful. So why then does the Parole Board keep harping on about the need to do courses?!!!! Is there any joined-up thinking in the MoJ? Or is there even any kind of thought process at all?

 

 

Mccarthy Does she even know what she is talking about, Had no reply yet to my Email, so will now be sending her a letter, And if the courses are not compulsory, why are the ipps not being released until they do them, pissed right off with her rubbish, she needs to address the ipps situation now, instead of chatting crap

 

 

Pettit I would certainly point out that she was not the first to say that and would not be the last. I know I had this info sent to me before. Semms they all shout from the same script. Hopefully is  something that can be seized on used to our advantage. Why should they be able to go unvhallehged over this

 

McSherry Basically just chatting shit

Laila I swear that is a joke I can't believe that she said that they don't have to do the courses so why r the IPP made to do them??? That's really disgusting...

 

Abbott It makes you wonder what the hell is going on,Liz truss needs to be questioned over the letter.

 

Zing They have a quota system so they used to say things about historic offenses before 09 (parole board members don't know what they r doing that is like saying u can't be rehabilitated) so government advised parole board to give knockbacks based on failure to complete offending behavior courses. (means u won't even notice that most members are stupid and don't understand what they are doing) what they are doing is fabricating evidence in order to abuse human rights they isolate ipps, I'm still isolated outside (they don't beleive me when i talk about ipp, harder to get a job, social isolation) that is psychological torture, having an arbitrary sentance is psychological torture (if u aggitate a misbehaving prisoner in a cage and make it feel isolated, does the prisoner behave itself? Is it rehabilitation or punishment?) violent reoffending is 20 times higher in prison than outside (no ipp is easier to manage inside than out. No ipp is being rehabilitated by the state they are being punished, best place for treatment is outside) every discussion uses their terminology. Those courses are intended as being a replacement for previous bs arguments to keep prisoners inside, at the time they needed mass excuses to keep prisoners in otherwise the quota would have been even more obvious (quota on releases is illegal) uk saying we will release 1500 next year is illegal (its against seperation of powers) Montesquieu said without separation of powers there can be no liberty, so judges should be independent from government (however it is not independent) even though the rulling that most ipps will b released some next year some year after is proof that the quota system exists (it is a big quota tho) but keep these tjings in ur mind. Especially the argument regarding violent offenses u r much more likely to commit one inside. Especially for lifers (oasys risk assessment is based on data from all prisoners but length of sentance is biggest factor, those with longer sentances are much less likely to reoffend. This is not factored in, oasys is just a joke, it is not adequate for ipps/lifers, it has been designed to give much higher risk. the risk is not relevent it is a future prediction all risks or probabilities are just predictions for a coin 1/2 heads if flipped does that tell you it will land heads? (no sometimes u can flip it 10 times without a head) the rule with the coin is this, u cannot take the predictive statistics and comment on what will happen as a result, if its 1/2 for heads that doesn't mean on a individual spin it will be heads or that there will b one head in two flips. (i have a degree in physics and mathematics.