Speeches by Juss.

“You have all said that the change in law, where the recall period will be 56 days, is a step in the right direction. Would you like any further support to stop the number of recalls?”

“I remember visiting a prison, and a couple of the prisoners told me they were recalled because they missed the train and then their probation appointment. In your experience, have such things been happening?”

“I want to follow up on getting the balance right between public protection and rehabilitation and resettlement. If you get rehabilitation and resettlement right, lessening the risk of reoffending then follows. You were in the room when I spoke about the letter in yesterday’s Guardian, and Linda said in the previous ses…”

“You have all said that the change in law, where the recall period will be 56 days, is a step in the right direction. Would you like any further support to stop the number of recalls?”

“I would like to ask you some questions on recall now. Most recall takes place because of relatively minor or technical breaches, such as non-compliance with licence conditions, rather than actual reoffending. In your experience, does the current recall framework have a negative impact on your efforts towards achieving …”

“Can I ask a couple of very quick questions on caseloads? In your regions, what is the average caseload of a probation officer, and what should the target be?”

“As I said earlier, it is my firm belief that if we get rehabilitation and resettlement right, we reduce the risk of reoffending. You gave some statistics earlier about the characteristics of people who end up in prison. Do you feel that your job may be made more difficult because the education services, for example, th…”

“I would like to ask you some questions on recall now. Most recall takes place because of relatively minor or technical breaches, such as non-compliance with licence conditions, rather than actual reoffending. In your experience, does the current recall framework have a negative impact on your efforts towards achieving …”

“Martin, do you think the recall framework is too risk-averse? It is very easy just to say, “You have broken a licence condition. Back into prison you go for public protection.””

“Good afternoon. I am Warinder Juss, the Member of Parliament in Wolverhampton West. I am a solicitor with a practising certificate, but I do not practise at the moment. I am a member of various APPGs, and I am an executive council member of the GMB trade union.”

“Can I ask you about the Probation Service in general? It has gone through considerable resourcing pressures, which hopefully will be eased by the recent investment the Government have announced. But I was taken aback by a letter I read in The Guardian yesterday. A chap had spent five and a half years in custody. He cam…”

“Can I ask a couple of very quick questions on caseloads? In your regions, what is the average caseload of a probation officer, and what should the target be?”

“Is the hon. Member aware that the evidence submitted by the Electoral Reform Society says that research has shown that the younger people are engaged in voting, the more likely they are to carry on voting later in their lives? What he has said about there being no evidence is not correct.”

“I am a member of the Justice Committee, and my biggest focus is rehabilitation and resettlement. I take the hon. Lady’s view that rehabilitation is extremely important, and that that is the way that we stop reoffending. But as someone who grew up suffering a lot of racist abuse—physical and verbal—I would be very affro…”

“I want to reiterate what the hon. Member has said. In my experience, the younger the person the more politically engaged they appear to be. I spend so much time going into schools, and I find that younger people are more concerned about the environment than anyone else. I have more emails and letters from schoolchildre…”

“It is misguided to compare the ability to vote with being a representative. There is a huge step between someone having the right to decide who should represent them and being that representative themselves. Many people well beyond the age of 18 would be able to vote for their representative, but would not necessarily …”

“Q Since being elected as an MP, I have spent a lot of my time going into schools and engaging with young people, talking to them and having Q&A sessions. The level of engagement that they show is phenomenal, and the younger they are the more engaged they seem to be—even asking me questions like, “Why did you join t…”

“Q My question is about automatic voter registration. One witness in the previous sitting suggested that there might be a problem with data being disclosed without the consent of the individual. Do you have a view on that? Obviously, the automatic registration of voters would not necessarily compel a person to vote; it …”

“Can I please ask you something following on from that? I assume you are therefore suggesting that, if we had more black judges, the risk of disproportionate outcomes would lessen. Why do we have only 1% of Crown court judges who are black? Why have we not increased the diversity there? What would you recommend the Judi…”

“That is right—in the equalities assessment.”