Jail chiefs have slammed a new Labour scheme which will allow serious criminals to be transferred to open prison after serving just two weeks behind bars.
The Prison Governors’ Association (PGA) warned the move would ‘potentially place the public at greater risk’.
It is the first time the association has expressed concern over a series of soft-justice measures introduced since the general election by Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood.
In a bid to free up space in overcrowded jails Ms Mahmood brought in a scheme last autumn which allows most criminals to be freed after serving just 40 per cent of their sentence.
And last month Ms Mahmood indicated she would go ahead with a wholesale reform of court punishments which will see tens of thousands of criminals a year dodge jail, or be freed after serving just a third of their sentence.
The new measures allow prisoners to be transferred to open jails three years before their normal release date.
Crucially, governors will have ‘only limited discretion in exceptional circumstances’ to reject the transfers, the PGA said.
The rules come into force on Monday. It means, for example, that criminals sentenced to seven and a half years’ imprisonment on Tuesday last week, just after the bank holiday, will become eligible for open prison during the course of next week.
Under the scheme, governors will be able to delay the moves if they assess a move to open jail would pose a ‘wholly unacceptable risk’.
But they will not have enough time to make proper assessments during the two-week run-up, the PGA warned.
Its president Tom Wheatley said: ‘Without the ability to properly consider a prisoner’s behaviour during those two weeks we have concerns our members will be required to take decisions that potentially place the public at greater risk.
‘There has not been sufficient clarity from the Government that this does come with increased risk.’
He added: ‘Open prisons are not a suitable place to house men that have been very recently sentenced for serious offences without any risk assessment.
‘To ask the governor to decide that such risk is “wholly unacceptable”, given eligibility after just 14 days, is too short a time to make any such assessment and therefore to protect the public.
‘It is also not what victims of crime expect, nor what the courts intend.
‘This is simply a scheme to manage the lack of suitable prison capacity and having already released many low-risk offenders, it is becoming difficult to use the capacity in open prisons.’
He said that without the new policy ‘many of these men would remain in the closed prison estate safely behind walls and fences’.
Terrorists, some sex offenders and those jailed for more than four years for violent crimes will not be eligible.
But among those who could be transferred immediately include those handed long jail terms for crimes including possession of a firearm, rioting or violent disorder, drug trafficking and dealing, causing serious injury by dangerous driving, and human trafficking.
On a seven and a half year sentence they will eligible for release after serving 40 per cent, or 36 months, which is the point at which transfer to open conditions can now kick in.
A PGA spokesman said: ‘This would still mean that after just two weeks in prison a man serving a seven and a half year prison sentence could be moved to an open prison, where there are no physical barriers like high walls, fences, secure gates and minimal staff supervision that could prevent prisoners from simply walking out.’
There are also fears the scheme could damage rehabilitation schemes in open jails.
Mr Wheatley said: ‘Governors of open prisons are concerned that that valuable work those jails do – including with some life sentenced prisoners who have already served decades – could be undermined by a large number of new inmates turning up who have done nothing to earn the right to be in open prison.’
There are 14 open jails in England and Wales, with the best known including HMP Ford in West Sussex and HMP North Sea Camp in Lincs.
They are designed for criminals deemed to be very low risk or who are coming to the end of very long sentences.
Ms Mahmood’s early prison release scheme saw 16,231 prisoners let out between its launch in September and the end of last year.
Updated figures have not been published but the total is now thought to be between 30,000 and 40,000.
A Ministry of Justice spokesman said: ‘Only certain thoroughly risk-assessed offenders are eligible for moves to open prison and anyone found breaching the rules can be immediately returned to a closed prison.
‘We are building new prisons and are on track for 14,000 places by 2031 – the largest expansion since the Victorians.
‘Our sentencing reforms will also force prisoners to earn their way to release or face longer in jail for bad behaviour, while ensuring the most dangerous offenders can be kept off the streets.’