Overview

IPP sentences were abolished in 2012, but not retrospectively, meaning that thousands of people who were serving them at the time remain in prison serving them today. At the end of 2024, the number stood at 2,614, comprising 1,045 people who had never been released and 1,569 who had been released but were later recalled to prison. Almost all of them had been imprisoned significantly longer than the tariff they were given when they were sentenced by the court; more than 700 people have served more than 10 years longer than their tariff. 

The working group’s report puts forward six recommendations – including an important change to the Parole Board test, which would require the Parole Board to give people on IPP sentences a certain release date, within a two-year window, and to set out what action is required to achieve that safely. 

The proposals were presented at a launch event in the House of Lords yesterday evening.

Proposals

The report’s key recommendation is to modify the approach taken by the Parole Board in IPP cases. The current release test requires the Parole Board to decide whether it is necessary for the protection of the public for a person to be detained. But the working group proposes that the Parole Board should be asked to set a date as to when the person will be released within a two-year window, and what is required to achieve that safely. A one-year window would apply to those people serving the Detention for Public Protection (DPP) sentence – a sentence like the IPP that was imposed on children. There are still dozens of people who have never been released who were children at the time of their sentence.  
 
Setting a date of up to two years in the most serious cases provides a long period of time to enable professionals and statutory agencies to work together and help the person to prepare for a safe release. As a further safeguard, the reconsideration mechanism and setting aside provisions would continue to apply: these procedures enable decisions to be reviewed or set aside in certain circumstances. 
 
Once implemented, there is another safeguard in the Victims and Prisoners Act 2024 – for the Secretary of State for Justice to review certain serious cases in which the Parole Board has decided to release someone and refer them on to a relevant court for a second check. 
 
To ensure that no one spends longer in custody than necessary under this scheme, the working group recommends giving people on IPP sentences the right to apply to the Parole Board to ask for their release date to be brought forward. This would mean that, where someone has made greater progress than expected within the timeframe set, they would be entitled to be considered for release earlier. 
 
The report’s second recommendation is to reform the system by which people on IPP sentences are recalled to prison. The working group finds that the system is currently failing in two main ways: the threshold for recall is too low and the ‘causal link’ test is often misapplied; and there is no independent scrutiny of recall decisions before they are enforced. 
 
The working group’s third recommendation is for a change that would mean some IPP sentences can become spent. Currently, under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974, indefinite sentences are never spent, which means that people serving IPP sentences in the community will always need to disclose information about their conviction – even on basic Disclosure and Barring Service checks – adversely affecting their ability to get work, insurance or become a volunteer. 
 
The fourth recommendation in the report is for the introduction of an aftercare offer to all people serving IPP sentences who are released from custody with health or social care needs. This would be equivalent to the aftercare duty provided under section 117 of the Mental Health Act 1983. 

 
The working group’s fifth recommendation is to restore the right for people on IPP sentences to apply for annual licence termination reviews. 
 
The sixth recommendation is to reduce the hurdles for someone to bring an appeal against their IPP sentence. The working group suggests creating a positive obligation for every person serving an IPP sentence to have access to a special Criminal Cases Review Commission process, which can expedite their application to the full Court of Appeal (Criminal Division). 

Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, the former Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales who led the working group, said in the accompanying press release:

“Although 12 years have passed since the IPP sentence was abolished, it continues to cause despair to those serving it, and to their family and friends. The harm done is well understood by all, and we must now deliver justice for those who were left behind in 2012. 

“Unfortunately, the status quo – the government’s IPP Action Plan – will not meet this challenge. It will take too long, and it will become all the more difficult to deliver as the prison capacity crisis continues. It imposes too great a burden on the prison service. 

“Our key recommendation – of changing the Parole Board test – provides a solution to the previously intractable problem of how to release safely those who have so far not been released. This proposal has public protection at its heart, with safeguards, but will also provide hope to people on the sentence and their families, giving the certainty of a release date. Everyone – the individual, and professionals in and outside prison – will then be able to work towards release at this time.” 

Thanks to Andy Aitchison for kind permission to use the header image in this post. You can see Andy’s work here