1,750 criminals are set to walk free from UK prisons today, after serving a measly 40% of their sentences as the prison population has exploded to a record-breaking 88,521. There were fewer than 300 spaces left for male prisoners yesterday, prompting the government prepare to scramble towards a desperate “one-in, one-out” scheme…
Worryingly, a “high proportion” of those released are domestic abusers, with Chief Inspector of Probation Martin Jones predicting “around a third” of today’s fresh releases will reoffend. Homeless and jobless, they’ll be hitting the streets, adding to the chaos. So the problem won’t necessarily be solved…
Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds, as ever, was quick to point fingers at the Tories for leaving prisons with “no capacity” for having to release criminals after serving less than half their sentence. Conveniently, he forgets this was, in fact, a Tory policy—as Guido reported earlier this year. Meanwhile, the BBC are rolling live coverage from Wormwood Scrubs as prisoners start to be released in the next few hours. Not exactly the best optics for Labour…
Statement by Paul Dacre, Editor-in-Chief of Associated Newspapers Limited, following Harry’s loss in court today:
“Prince Harry wrote a sad book which boasted about his killing of 25 Taliban, his drug-taking and, in cringe-making detail, how he lost his virginity. There isn’t a laundry in the cosmos big enough to wash all the dirty linen he has aired about his own family. For him, to complain about HIS privacy being invaded takes, not just the biscuit, but the whole tin. Poor Harry. I feel sorry for the way a confused and angry young man has been drawn into this case. The bitter irony is that his mother, Diana, liked the Mail. We were her paper. We took her side in her acrimonious break up with Charles. She and I would speak and meet. The Mail’s superb royal reporter was her friend and confidante. The truth is that this trumped-up action – which has cost well over £50 million and wasted a huge amount of valuable court time – should never have been brought to trial. That it did, raises profoundly disturbing questions about the conduct of elements of the legal profession. Today’s verdict is not just a victory for Associated’s magnificent journalists – several of whom have had a terrible toll imposed on their health and lives – but a free press generally. Make no mistake. This was a conspiracy, supported by Hacked Off, to destroy a paper. Financed by the orgy-loving, racist Max Mosley and involving the actor Hugh Grant, it was also a sinister bid to resuscitate Leveson Two and impose statutory regulation on the press which, even now, is rearing its ugly head in Labour’s Media Green Paper.”