Andy Burnham is immersed in a deepening political row after ordering a review of plans for the early release of thousands of killers, rapists and sex offenders from prison in September.
After the family of PC Andrew Harper expressed outrage that his killers may be eligible for release, the prime minister responded by pledging to make sure that “everything has been looked at again” before a fresh tranche of about 6,000 offenders were freed on tags.
But soon after Burnham’s comments, prison reform groups, government officials and politicians warned that abandoning measures to ease jail overcrowding could lead to the criminal justice system “collapsing under its own weight”.
Burnham has intervened quickly on policy issues just a few days into his premiership, including by indicating a possible increase in the personal allowance on income tax, which has been frozen since 2022.
Attempting to clear up confusion, he said there was no “commitment” to increase the allowance from £12,570 but the move would be considered at the budget, expected in the autumn.
“I want to answer questions honestly in this job, as I said before. I think that’s all about trust in politics and doing politics differently, and I’m determined to keep working in that way,” he said.
New sentencing laws were passed under Keir Starmer’s government to ease a looming prison overcrowding crisis that ministers said could seize up the criminal justice system in November.
Unlike previous emergency measures under which tens of thousands of prisoners were released in the early months of Starmer’s government, the Sentencing Act includes no exemptions for prisoners convicted of serious crimes, domestic abuse or terrorism.
PC Harper was 28 when he sustained fatal injuries while responding to a quad bike theft in Sulhamstead, Berkshire, in August 2019. Jessie Cole and Albert Bowers, who were passengers in the vehicle and both 17 at the time, were sentenced to 13 years in custody for manslaughter but may be eligible for early release under the new Sentencing Act.
His widow, Lissie Harper, successfully campaigned for legal changes, called Harper’s Law, to bring in harsher sentences for the manslaughter of emergency workers on duty.
In a statement, she said: “When I fought for Harper’s Law, I was supported not only by the Conservative government of the day but by the Labour party too. They pledged to support our cause and agreed that those who kill emergency workers should face tougher sentences because some crimes are so grave they demand meaningful punishment.
“That cross-party support helped make Harper’s Law a reality. Today, it feels forgotten.”
Asked to respond to the Harper family’s comments, Burnham said he would examine the plans with the justice secretary, Alex Norris. “I will review the whole of this policy. We did not invest in the prison estate when we should as a country, going back a decade or so ago, when it was clear that there was going to be pressure. That has created an unacceptable situation now.
“But I want to assure myself that everything has been looked at before this policy proceeds, and I can give that assurance that every single part of this I will look into with the justice secretary. I can’t say that I can change the policy completely, but I will look at it in detail before we go further forward,” he said.
Whitehall insiders have pointed out that any change in the early release scheme will contradict claims from the previous justice secretary, David Lammy, who told the Guardian this month that without it there could be “no capacity” across prisons in England and Wales in November.
One government official said: “There is very little wriggle room because it takes seven years to build a prison. Andy will need to get into the issues, but there are no easy choices because we will hit prison capacity by Christmas if he doesn’t do it.”
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Andrea Coomber, the chief executive of the Howard League for Penal Reform, urged caution. “This is a system that is on the verge of collapsing under its own weight. When originally introducing these proposals, Shabana Mahmood described the alternative as being the ‘total breakdown of law and order’.
“We need this government to finally grapple with the fact that, for 20 years, politicians have allowed sentence inflation to run rampant. With longer and longer sentences, we are sleepwalking our way into US-style mass incarceration.”
Enver Solomon, the chief executive of the social justice charity Nacro, said prisons must not be allowed to fill up again. “It should not be forgotten that the reason the Labour government put in place an early release scheme was to ensure there isn’t yet another prisons capacity crisis,” he said.
The former Conservative prisons minister Rory Stewart said: “Early release is not an easy choice – but it is the least bad option if we want to genuinely try to work intensively with prisoners and reduce reoffending.”Under the act, some serious offenders will be eligible for release halfway through their sentences rather than two-thirds of the way through. Those convicted of less serious crimes can be freed after serving a third of their sentence instead of 40%. Prisoners locked up for some violent or sexual offences are eligible for release halfway through their sentences rather than two-thirds.
The bill was drawn up and introduced to parliament by Shabana Mahmood, the home secretary. The Conservative shadow home secretary, Chris Philp, wrote on X that the “early release scheme allows rapists and serious criminals out of prison early and it must be urgently cancelled”.
He said releasing the jailed car passengers “is an insult to Andrew Harper’s memory and to police officers who put themselves at risk every day to protect us”.
Burnham’s pledge to review the policy was welcomed by groups working with victims. The former safeguarding minister Jess Phillips told the Guardian it was important that “proper systems” were put in place to assess risk and involve victims. “There is a chance to radically change how victims are considered in the system and to improve victims of violence against women and girls’ end-to-end experience of the justice system,” she said.
Ciara Bergman, the chief executive of Rape Crisis England and Wales, said: “Obviously there are significant challenges facing our government, including how overcrowding and under-resourcing is going to be managed, but the solutions to these challenges cannot come at survivors’ expense.”
Katie Kempen, the chief executive at Victim Support, said the review was encouraging. “This review must urgently fix the fact that most victims currently have no way of knowing whether or not an offender could be released early. It is unacceptable that so many victims are being kept in the dark about this – that must change.”
