Hundreds more prisoners to be freed in second phase of early release scheme
Second Early-Release Wave Set to Ease Pressure on Prisons
Ninoda.com – About 650 prisoners in England and Wales are due to leave custody early on Tuesday as the government moves into the next stage of its plan to reduce severe pressure on the prison system.
This group includes people serving sentences of up to two and a half years. Under the revised arrangements, eligible prisoners can be released after completing one-third of their custodial sentence, rather than the previous halfway point.
The release programme began earlier this month, when roughly 700 people serving terms shorter than 19 months were freed. The latest phase broadens the scheme to prisoners serving longer sentences and begins a staged expansion that is expected to continue until June next year. By then, the policy is intended to encompass some people serving sentences exceeding 12 years.
Supervision After Release
Leaving prison does not mean a sentence has ended. Those released early are generally expected to spend the next third of their sentence under supervision in the community. Conditions can include electronic tags and other restrictions designed to monitor compliance and reduce the risk of further offending.
The arrangement places additional responsibility on the probation service, whose staff must oversee those leaving custody while continuing to manage existing caseloads. Napo, the probation service union, has said the releases are creating significant pressure for its members.
Union members are scheduled to meet on Tuesday ahead of a ballot next week that could result in industrial action. The dispute centres on both pay and workload. Probation officers have been offered a 5% rise by the Ministry of Justice, while Napo had sought 12% to address earnings lost following cuts introduced from 2010.
The Ministry of Justice argues that its offer is reasonable, noting that two other unions have accepted it. It has also linked the pay proposal to a £700m investment in probation, including plans to recruit 1,300 additional officers and introduce artificial-intelligence tools intended to reduce the administrative burden involved in supervising offenders.
Criminal Courts Overhaul Returns to Parliament
The expansion of the early-release scheme coincides with renewed parliamentary scrutiny of the government’s proposed reforms to criminal courts. Ministers are seeking to reduce court delays as well as prison overcrowding, with changes aimed at moving more cases through the justice system more quickly.
A contentious proposal has already been dropped. The government had considered creating a type of Crown Court process in which a judge, without a jury, could decide cases involving defendants facing prison terms of up to three years. That element will no longer proceed.
However, jury trials are still expected to be removed for the longest and most complex fraud cases. The plans also include ending a defendant’s right to seek a jury trial in a category of cases that would otherwise move from magistrates’ courts to Crown Court. The government believes this could keep another 5,500 trials in the lower courts.
The distinction matters because magistrates’ courts generally deal with less serious cases and are intended to provide a faster route through the system. Crown Court proceedings, particularly jury trials, can take longer to schedule and complete. Ministers hope that retaining more suitable cases in magistrates’ courts will help reduce the wider backlog.
Shorter Trials and More Remote Hearings
Another part of the court reform programme involves wider use of “blitz” or short-trial courts. These bring together similar types of cases so they can be handled more efficiently. Pilot projects have suggested that grouping related offences can speed up case progression.
One pilot at the Old Bailey focused on cases involving assaults on emergency workers. During the summer, it reduced London’s backlog of around 500 such cases by half.
The government is also acting on recommendations from Sir Brian Leveson, a former appeal judge who carried out a major review of criminal courts. His work called for greater use of virtual hearings, including appearances by defendants from police cells rather than transporting them to court. Ministers have ordered pilot schemes to test that approach.
More than 150 of Sir Brian’s 180 recommendations on modernising criminal courts have been accepted. But the government has declined to follow his advice on one important limit affecting magistrates. At present, volunteer magistrates can normally impose a prison sentence of no more than 12 months. Under the proposed reforms, their maximum sentencing power would rise to two years.
That change is intended to allow magistrates’ courts to retain more cases that might otherwise be sent to Crown Court, again with the aim of shortening delays.
A System Under Strain
The early-release policy and court reform programme reflect connected pressures across the justice system. Prison capacity, probation workloads and court backlogs each affect the others. Releasing eligible prisoners earlier can create space in custody, but it also requires sufficient community supervision. Moving cases through courts more quickly may limit future pressure, but depends on courts, legal professionals and probation staff having the capacity to carry out the work.
For those leaving prison on Tuesday, the next stage of their sentence will take place outside custody but under conditions that can be closely monitored. For the government, the success of the policy will depend not only on freeing prison places, but also on whether probation services can manage the expanding number of people released into the community.
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