Labour to release violent offenders and rapists early under prison plan

The plan has sparked an eruption of anger from victims, legal practitioners and opposition MPs, all warning that the new early‑release thresholds could see some of the country’s most dangerous offenders back on the streets far sooner than the public expects.

Labour’s Sentencing Act rewrites the rule that violent and sexual offenders must serve two‑thirds of their term, lowering it to half for those offences. For a range of lesser crimes the reduction is steeper – offenders may be released after serving just a third of their sentence if they are deemed to have behaved well.

Media additions

Ministry of Justice officials say the changes are necessary to stop prisons from “running out of space entirely” and to safeguard the overall stability of the criminal‑justice system.

“Victims and the public deserve to know how many offenders are being released early and what crimes they have committed.”

Spokesperson, Justice For Victims, via Express

A senior lawyer quoted by the Express warned: “These early release provisions may well ease the pressure on prisons, but at what cost? … Ask any victim of violent crime if they are happy for the offender to be free to roam on the streets…” The solicitor’s comment reflects broader concerns that the human cost of the speed‑up will be borne by survivors.

Tory spokesman Dr Kieran Mullan dismissed the reforms as a “gift to a repeat offender”, saying the programme would “horrify most victims and the public” and urging that “the whole programme needs to be stopped.” He added that Labour’s approach “lets criminals responsible for some of the worst sexual attacks on women and girls out of prison early”.

“We cannot be surprised if this leads the wider public to question their confidence in how the justice system operates.”

Claire Waxman, Victims’ Commissioner, via Yahoo News

Waxman, speaking after The Telegraph revealed the details of the reforms, said the changes were introduced to address “the urgent problem of prison overcrowding, rather than with victim safety as its primary consideration”. She warned that “for victims, hearing that the person who harmed them will be released earlier than expected can be deeply distressing” and called for “electronic tagging and protective orders … to be meaningful”.

The Ministry of Justice has framed the policy as a decisive response to a crisis inherited from the previous government. A spokesperson said: “We are building 14,000 more prison places and reforming sentencing so we can always lock up dangerous criminals. Without this decisive action, prisons would have run out of space entirely, making it impossible for convicted offenders to be sent to prison and risking the complete breakdown of the criminal justice system.”

In parallel with the sentencing changes, ministers announced a £700 million investment in probation, including the recruitment of 1,300 additional officers. The package is described as “strengthening supervision in the community” and will back “tough rules such as restrictions on movements, tagging, being banned from attending public events, pubs and clubs”.

“There will inevitably be individual victims who have suffered at the hands of an offender who will become very upset.”

Tom Wheatley, Prison Governors’ Association, via Daily Mail

Tom Wheatley’s remark captures the anxiety among prison officials that the wave of releases could reignite trauma for those who have already endured violent crime. The Daily Mail notes that “the early‑release scheme means a killer jailed for 15 years for manslaughter would be freed after seven and a half years if they are assessed to have behaved well”, while murderers remain excluded because they face mandatory life terms.

Victims’ groups point to the sheer scale of the early‑release cohort. The Express reports that “more than 90 % of offenders sent to prison for child grooming and more than 60 % sent to prison for rape every year will be allowed out early”. The Daily Mail puts the total at “up to 6,000 prisoners” released from September, and the Yahoo piece says the Ministry of Justice “declined to give a total figure, but it was understood it would be between 5,000 and 7,000”.

One mother, whose daughter’s attacker was sentenced to nine years in 2024, told Yahoo that the new rules made a “mockery of justice”. She said her daughter’s attacker, Simon Tyler, could be released in 2028 after four‑and‑a‑half years, rather than the 2030 date he would have reached under the two‑thirds rule. She is launching a parliamentary petition to reverse the changes, arguing that “it is set up to help perpetrators rather than victims”.

To mitigate concerns, the government has moved to tighten post‑release supervision. A parliamentary order this week increased the time that can be added to a prisoner’s sentence for “serious rule breaches” from 42 to 84 weeks. The same order creates a presumption that every prisoner freed early will be automatically GPS‑tagged, with curfews and geographical restrictions. A pilot scheme at six prisons is set to begin next month, aiming to tag prisoners before they leave jail to avoid any monitoring gap.

What the reforms change

Offence type	Current rule	New rule
Violent & sexual offences (e.g., manslaughter, rape, GBH)	Two‑thirds of sentence	Half of sentence (if behaviour good)
Burglary, theft, assault, repeated shop‑lifting	40 % of sentence	One‑third of sentence (if behaviour good)
Child grooming offences	Varied	More than 90 % will be eligible for early release
Rape offences	Varied	More than 60 % will be eligible for early release