Lack of prison space means Government wants to double returns of foreign offenders
Alex Chalk KC MP, the Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice, said in a statement to the House of Commons yesterday that the Government will be introducing measures to see more foreign national offenders (FNOs) removed from the country.
Chalk said he wanted to see what he called "spurious barriers" to removals quickly dismissed and more FNOs removed from the UK as quickly as possible.
According to a Daily Telegraph article published last month, the plans were outlined after ministers were warned that increased pressures on prisons could lead to places running out within weeks.
The Lord Chancellor told the Daily Telegraph that he wanted to see some foreign prisoners removed instead of being prosecuted. Chalk was quoted as saying: "There is a power that exists in certain lower-level cases, that in place of prosecution, the Home Office deports someone. Now there are some cases where it's absolutely right that you are going to want to go through the criminal justice process to ensure that that person is properly punished. But there will be other cases where actually it's in the public interest to simply get them out of the country."
Chalk said "intense frustration" at the cost of holding FNOs in UK prisons had driven his plans.
Sky News reported today that the Lord Chancellor's statement was made as Ministry of Justice figures showed the prison population stood at 88,220 as of 8 March, nearing the operational capacity of just over 89,000.
For background information on the removal and deportation of FNOs, see the House of Commons Library's recent briefing available here.
The section of yesterday's statement by the Lord Chancellor covering FNOs is reproduced below:
Statement made by
Alex Chalk
Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice
[…]
The number of Foreign National Offenders (FNOs) has increased over recent years and now makes up over 10,000 (c.12%) of prisoners in England and Wales, at an average cost to the taxpayer of £50,000 per year and reducing the capacity of the prison system. These are people who should be removed back to their own countries of origin wherever possible. We have made progress: last year the Government returned nearly 4,000 FNOs from prison and the community – a 27% increase compared to the year before.
In January, the Government extended the Early Removal Scheme from a maximum period of 12 months to 18 months – so eligible FNOs can be deported up to 6 months earlier. Almost 400 FNOs have already been removed from the UK via this scheme since January – a 61% increase compared to the equivalent period a year earlier. We have also signed a robust new agreement with Albania which has restarted transfers of Albanian FNOs; and we are legislating in the Criminal Justice Bill to enable prisoners to be transferred and held in rented prisons overseas, as several EU countries have done.
We must now build on this progress by ensuring that even more FNOs are removed from the country as quickly as possible and spurious barriers to removal are quickly dismissed.
So, we will:
• Radically change the way we process FNO cases – we have created a new taskforce across the HO and MoJ – including the prison service, immigration enforcement and asylum and modern slavery teams, surging 400 additional caseworkers to prioritise these cases who will all be in place by the end of March and streamlining the end-to-end removal process.
• Expedite prisoner transfers with our priority countries such as Albania and conclude new transfer agreements with partner countries such as Italy.
• Be fully prepared to make use of the powers provided under the Nationality and Borders Act 2022 to restrict visas for any country where no progress on Foreign National Offender removals can be made.
• Amend our existing deportation policy to enable Foreign National Offenders given suspended sentences of 6 months or more to be considered for deportation under the Immigration Act 1971 on the ground it is conducive to the public good, enabling us to remove more Foreign National Offenders from the country.
• Bring forward an amendment to the Criminal Justice Bill to extend foreign national conditional cautions to Foreign National Offenders with limited leave. Currently, this type of caution can only be given to Foreign National Offenders who do not have leave to enter or leave to remain in the UK, enabling us to remove more Foreign National Offenders from the country.
This will allow us to return almost double the number of FNOs directly from prison in 2024 – compared to 1,800 last year and more returns of FNOs from prison than in any year since 2010, saving the taxpayer millions of pounds and keeping our streets safe.