Clause 10
Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill
10:30 am
Philip Hollobone (Kettering, Conservative)
I do not have the privilege of being a practising lawyer, as my hon. Friend does, so my thoughts may be a lot more simple on these things, but surely it is screamingly obvious that the Government’s efforts will not achieve what they intend to achieve? The evidence given to the Committee on 16 October by the chief executive of the Magistrates Association could not be clearer. Cindy Barnett and Sally Dickinson themselves made it very clear that the measure will have no effect at all on custodial sentences and will actually ensure that more people go to prison who otherwise would have been kept out of it. At a time when the national prison population has never been higher, is this not simply the most unfortunate and almost crazy way for the Government to proceed?