Speeches by Mahmood.

“There has to be a system-wide approach because it is a system-wide problem.”

“I gently say to the right hon. Gentleman that the past is relevant in so far as it sets the context for the crisis that we have inherited, which needs resolving. Given that we all but ran out of prison places—numbers had fallen to fewer than 100 in the summer—it is important that we recognise that the prison system is …”

“Anybody who breaches their licence conditions can be recalled immediately to prison. If somebody removes their tag, they can and will be recalled. We have not seen higher than normal rates of recall under the SDS40 scheme, and we have not changed our projections on prison capacity.”

“I believe that all who have written have received a response from the Ministry, but I will chase down that specific case. The way we implemented the policy meant that we were able to give the Probation Service time to prepare which was not available to it under the previous Tory Government’s end of custody supervised l…”

“The hon. Gentleman is right to note that, under current legislation, it is possible to exclude only offences, rather than classes of offender. I am sure that his Bill will gain some interest across the House. If any such changes were to be made, they would be for the future, as they do not help us with the current cris…”

“The sentencing review will primarily look at the sentencing framework and how we treat different cohorts of offenders within that. It will consider drug crime, too, but on the specific issue of county lines, I will ensure that my hon. Friend gets a response from the Home Office.”

“Last week, the National Audit Office released a damning report on the previous Government’s record on prison building, showing that their promise of 20,000 prison places by the mid-2020s was hollow. Unwilling to face down opposition on their own Back Benches, the last Government dithered and delayed, ultimately buildin…”

“SDS40—the standard determinate sentences early release scheme—was an emergency measure that we had to take to avert the complete collapse of the criminal justice system following the shocking inheritance left to us by the previous Government. The emergency measure is not, of course, the solution to the crisis that we i…”

“The shadow Minister could at least have apologised to the country for being part of a Government and a party that ran out of prison places. It was the Tory party that ran the system at boiling hot—at over 99% capacity. I hate to remind him, but for months before the previous election, the Tory party operated its own em…”

“I am tempted to remind the shadow Minister about his own Government’s track record. He ought to know that it was my predecessor, his colleague, the former Lord Chancellor who agreed the allocation of sitting days with the Lady Chief Justice and that that concordat agreement was concluded during the election period when…”

“I am sure the hon. Member’s constituents will also recognise that, even with the new supply that we are building, we will still run out of prison places, as the demand in the system is much greater than the building planned. We simply cannot build our way out of this problem, so to make sure that there is always a pris…”

“We took immediate action to prevent the collapse of the prison system by changing the automatic release point for standard determinate sentences. We are building 14,000 new prison places and we will publish our 10-year capacity strategy shortly, which will set out exactly where and by when we will get the places that w…”

“Yes. There are no additional issues in relation to tagging or the process by which the tagging takes place with Serco, but where there is contract failure by Serco, we will not hesitate to take action. We have already imposed financial penalties for the things that went wrong with the SDS40 releases, and we will keep t…”

“Yes. The specific problem that the hon. Gentleman refers to, which relates to Serco’s performance and the two tranches of SDS40 releases, has now been resolved. The backlog has been cleared, and Serco’s performance is now back to where it should be. Of course, we will continue to monitor Serco’s overall performance and…”

“The length of sentences, and how to deal with the problem of prolific offending, will be looked at specifically by the independent sentencing review panel. My hon. Friend will understand why I cannot pre-empt the findings of that review, but he will note that this Government are committed to scrapping the effective imm…”

“The impact assessment is done over the usual period of time, but I have committed to review the policy 18 months from the moment it was brought in, which is a commitment that we will keep. I recognise that we have a problem with prolific offending. It has gone up over the last decade or so, which is why I have specific…”

“The hon. Member will know that we retain data on foreign national offenders, and this Government are on track to remove more foreign national offenders this year than in the previous year. I obviously want to make further progress on this issue, and I hope that there will be consensus across the House so that we remove…”

“We know that prolific offenders represent only 10% of offenders but account for nearly 50% of all sentences. That clearly cannot continue, which is why I have specifically asked David Gauke to look at this issue in the independent sentencing review, to ensure that we have fewer crimes committed by prolific criminals.”

“I thank my hon. Friend. Tagging technology can monitor offenders effectively in the community. We have tags that monitor curfews and exclusion zones, tags to impose home detention—in effect, the equivalent of house arrest—and sobriety tags with a 97% compliance rate. We are currently looking at expanding the use of tec…”

“The right hon. Member will know that there has been a recent Law Commission report on marriage law more generally. The Government are going to consult on broader reform of marriage law, and we will certainly consider the issues that he has raised before setting out a public position.”