Blair Considers Rethink On Human Rights Law (UK)

Tony Blair is considering an overhaul of human rights law over fears that public safety is being put at risk, according to a leaked letter from No 10.

That could involve new legislation to overrule human rights judgments by the courts. Mr Blair has asked the Home Secretary, John Reid, to "ensure that the law-abiding majority can live without fear".

The move comes after a judge ruled that nine Afghan refugees who hijacked a plane to Britain could not be deported, on human rights grounds.

And an official inquiry found earlier this week that Anthony Rice, a convicted sex offender, was released from prison because the Parole Board and Probation Service feared action against them under the Human Rights Act.

Mr Blair's letter, obtained by The Observer, tells Mr Reid: "We will need to look again at whether primary legislation is needed to address the issue of court rulings which overrule the Government in a way that is inconsistent with other EU countries' interpretation of the European Convention on Human Rights."

The shadow home secretary, David Davis, said the Government was catching up with concerns previously raised by the Tories about the Human Rights Act.

He told BBC1's Sunday AM programme: "In 1998 we raised these questions. Tories are not against human rights but we think the way the Government has done it has led to disasters."

Lord Falconer, the Lord Chancellor, said the Human Rights Act could be amended to ensure it gave proper emphasis to public safety.

He said: "This is not about an attack on the judges, this is about making clear in particular areas - for example, the release of prisoners who might be a danger to society - that public safety comes first."

However, he insisted there could be no withdrawal from the Human Rights Convention because signing it was a condition of EU membership.

Jan Berry, chair of the Police Federation, said the organisation would be calling for action on human rights legislation at its annual conference next week.

Offenders on probation carry out 10,000 crimes a month

By Ben Leapman, Home Affairs Correspondent
(Filed: 14/05/2006)

Ten thousand crimes are being committed every month by offenders still under the "supervision" of the Probation Service, The Sunday Telegraph can reveal. The offences - recorded in internal Home Office documents - cover the whole range of offences, from theft and assault, to rape and murder.

Increasing numbers of serious crimes are being committed by prisoners on probation

It is the first time exact figures have been put on the number committing offences while on probation. Each month, an average of 7,846 criminals on probation are arrested, cautioned or convicted of a new offence - covering a total of 10,206 crimes.

The figures, though shocking, still represent only crimes for which police manage to catch a suspect. Most reported crimes go unsolved; crime experts say that if these were also taken into account, the true scale of on-probation offending would be far higher.

The revelation will come as a significant blow to the Government and further dent confidence in its ability to protect the public from dangerous offenders.

It demonstrates that recent high-profile cases, such as the murders of the banker John Monckton and the mother Naomi Bryant, both killed by prisoners freed on probation, could be the tip of the iceberg.

The Government has admitted that more than 200 murders were committed by criminals under probation supervision between 1998 and 2004. Last week, Andrew Bridges, HM Chief Inspector of Probation, pointed to "substantial deficiencies" in the supervision of Ms Bryant's killer, Anthony Rice, complaining that his human rights had been put before her life.

Mr Bridges also found that the handling of the case of Damien Hanson by the Probation Service and the Parole Board, before the murder of Mr Monckton in 2004, amounted to "the exact opposite of effective offender management".

Similar cases included the four members of the gang who raped and murdered 16-year-old Mary-Ann Leneghan in Reading last year, who were on probation at the time. Yousef Bouhaddaou, a crack addict, was also on probation when he murdered the teacher Robert Symons at his home in Chiswick, west London, in 2004, while a cocaine addict, Peter Williams, was on probation and wearing a tag when he shot dead Marian Bates, a jeweller, in Nottingham in 2003.

Last night, critics accused the Government of still failing to protect the public and demanded to know what was being done. David Davis, the shadow home secretary, said: "These new figures demonstrate the danger of non-custodial sentences. Whatever the level of supervision on probation, it clearly cannot provide anything like the level required to prevent crimes from re-occurring."

David Fraser, a retired senior probation officer, said: "These appalling statistics are a dreadful indictment of the probation system. The service is supervising offenders who are engaged in a constant orgy of reoffending. The real question is, why does the Government allow this to continue?"

Mr Fraser, who analysed probation reoffending in his book, A Land Fit For Criminals, said the decision to calculate the figures, even though they were only intended for internal circulation, reflected a "sea change" after years in which the service refused to admit the number of people who reoffended under its supervision. "For years they have been in denial," he said. "Finally they are realising that they have got to drag themselves into the real world."

Offenders monitored by the Probation Service include those released early from jail and less serious offenders who are sentenced to probation - sometimes combined with unpaid work in the community - as an alternative to custody.

Some of the most dangerous individuals are subject to 24-hour surveillance and thousands wear electronic tags under curfew, although watchdogs have complained of lax enforcement.

In the past, the Probation Service has published figures that show 60 per cent of those who come under its supervision reoffend within two years; but it has refused to say exactly how many of the further offences were committed during the period of supervision, and how many took place once supervision had ended.

The figures emerged in documents produced by the National Probation Directorate to highlight the problem of reoffending, which were circulated among senior Probation Service staff. They represent the "best estimate" by Home Office statisticians for the number of people arrested, cautioned or convicted while on probation, and the number of crimes they committed.

The survey covers the period of October and November last year, the first two months for which the totals were calculated. Accurate data was only available for some regions, so statisticians extrapolated to produce a nationwide estimate.

A Home Office spokesman said: "The purpose of releasing these experimental statistics is to determine their accuracy throughout the year in consultation with users." She pointed out that the Probation Service supervises 150,000 offenders at any time. "These offenders are properly and effectively supervised to national standards. But we can never entirely eliminate risk." Officials said that the figures included people who were arrested for an offence but never charged.

The service points out that only 0.6 per cent of offenders in the highest risk category go on to commit such serious offences as rape, murder, armed robbery and arson.

The Sunday Telegraph previously revealed that the service scrapped its regular jail visits to 15,000 serious offenders on cost grounds. Staff fear the situation will get worse with the launch in November of the Government's Custody Plus scheme, which will increase workloads by 25 per cent.

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