Custodial sentences of less than 12 months should only be used in exceptional circumstances and use of community punishments should be increased, says the long-awaited final report of former justice secretary David Gauke’s Independent sentencing review. Suspended sentences should also be allowed for up to three years, the document states, including for low-risk offenders with substance use issues.
The review was commissioned after the prison system came close to collapse last year, with demand for places exceeding supply. The aim of the review is not only to reduce the prison population but also to address ‘other related challenges to the criminal justice system that will reduce future pressures’, Gauke says in the document’s foreword – including reducing reoffending.
The three ‘foundational principles’ of the review are to ensure that sentences ‘punish offenders and protect the public’, that they ‘encourage offenders to turn their backs on a life of crime’ and that greater use is made of ‘punishment outside of prison’. However, if more offenders are to receive community sentences these need to be ‘effective and properly enforced’, Gauke states.
The review supports more investment in community sentence treatment requirements (CSTRs) ‘which will be particularly important for prolific offenders with drug and alcohol addiction needs’. While out of court resolution and diversion were outside the scope of the review’s terms of reference, the evidence ‘indicated that the government should also consider whether earlier intervention, entirely outside the criminal justice system, in services such as housing, substance misuse and employment, may be more appropriate for low-risk offenders’, it adds. ‘This would require a cross-government effort.’
Professor Dame Carol Black highlighted in the first part of her Independent review of drugs that more than a third of the people in prison at the time were there for – mostly acquisitive – crimes related to drug use, and serving short sentences that gave little time for any kind of effective treatment. This created a situation where drug users were ‘cycling in and out of our prisons at great expense but very rarely achieving recovery or finding meaningful work’, she said, and meant they were consequently ‘very likely to re-offend’.
‘What we haven’t achieved yet is enough diversion from prison, but I’m hoping David Gauke’s forthcoming sentencing review will help that,’ she told DDN earlier this year.
The problem, however, was that diverting people meant having somewhere to divert them to, she said  – ‘high-quality treatment in the community where you can hold people carefully and appropriately, and that has not been easy to achieve. The workforce is simply not there.’
Less than half of people released from prison in 2023-24 also had settled accommodation on their release, according to a report from earlier this year, with 13 per cent either homeless or sleeping rough.
The sentencing review was a ‘once in a generation opportunity to reset the sentence framework so that it is more focused on reducing reoffending and keeping the public safe’, said Prison Reform Trust chief executive Pia Sinha. ‘Proposals to expand the use of effective community alternatives and limit pointless short spells in custody will not only free up limited prison capacity but also lead to better outcomes for victims and wider society. We hope the government will accept and implement the majority of measures in this review and we look forward to its response.’
‘This is a watershed moment for a prison system which has been pushed to the brink of collapse,’ added Nacro chief executive Campbell Robb. ‘The government has a rare opportunity to turn the tide on escalating prisons sentences that have fuelled the prison overcrowding crisis. We are glad to see a recommendation of a presumption against prison sentences of less than a year. Restricting the use of short prison sentences has the potential to reduce reoffending, save money and give people the best chance of a second chance, something we will all benefit from.’
Independent sentencing review: final report available here