Robert Buckland Weblog

This series has become a little more occasional than I would like.  I have been meaning to write about the unforeseen consequences of a change in criminal sentencing brought about by the Criminal Justice Act 2003, which came into force on 4th April 2005.  Prior to this date, Courts dealing with defendants who had committed a further offence after early release from prison for a previous sentence could order their return to custody to serve a further term equivalent to the time between the commission of the new offence and the final expiry date of their previous sentence.

This power was matched, sometimes awkwardly and for reasons I shall not go into here, by the Home Office’s power of recall to prison for breach of licence.  It was decided to make the system simpler by abolishing the Court’s powers of return to prison, leaving everything to the Home Office.

Simple, eh?  Not so, inevitably.  A Court dealing with offences committed before 4th April 2005 could order the Defendant’s return to custody, AFTER which his new sentence would start.  In other words, he would serve a longer period of custody.  Good, I hear everyone say.  What is the position now?  A Defendant who commits a new offence at at time when he is on licence from prison for a previous offence will be recalled to serve his licence period by the Home Office.  For the new offence, however, any sentence passed by the Court CANNOT be ordered to start after the end of the recall period, but has to start from the day that the sentence is passed, making it concurrent.  The result: shorter terms of imprisonment.  Bad, I hear you say.

Bearing in mind the on-going prison numbers crisis (reaching new heights today), accidental or deliberate?