North West Norfolk MP James Wild said: “I share your concerns that early releases from prisons are a cover for lighter sentences.”

MP James Wild talks about prison sentences in his weekly column…

The first duty of every government is to protect the people. Each week this newspaper contains reports from the local magistrates and crown courts on criminal offenses arising from domestic abuse, driving offences, illegal drugs or other offences. People rightly expect those who commit serious crimes or re-offend to be jailed.

Sadly this week a further 1,100 prisoners, including people convicted of violent crimes, county drug dealers and fraudsters, all sentenced to more than four years in prison, were released early by the Labor government.

Depriving someone of their freedom reflects the seriousness of the crimes. Prison is about punishment, it is about preventing crime by getting someone off the streets, and it is about helping rehabilitate criminals to reduce the likelihood of them reoffending. On the second point, much more could be done, especially to improve education and training in prisons.

There are undoubtedly challenges to prison capacity, but when riots occurred in the summer the government managed to create additional prison places and the courts began working quickly to hear cases. Instead of developing this approach, the government chose to release people early and launched a sentencing review to provide a long-term solution to the prison population.

There are concerns, which I share, that this is a cover that, while increasing capacity, introducing lighter sentences, removing more of the 10,000 foreign criminals in prison and tackling the backlog of court cases and remand prisoners will free up capacity.

One area the review will examine, and which I support, is the potential greater use of tagging. For example, the last government expanded the rollout of alcohol labels; this was effective and showed very high levels of sobriety in situations where individuals were required to abstain from alcohol. Similar labels for drug testing would be a game changer.

When Parliament passes legislation that increases the maximum penalty for crimes, the courts must punish people accordingly. That is why I urged the Lord Chancellor to use the review to look at why maximum sentences have not yet been imposed, including for causing death by dangerous driving. He confirmed that this was within the terms of reference.

Another area of ​​the agreement is the bringing of criminals to court for sentencing hearings. I successfully persuaded the last government to give judges the power to force offenders to go to court for crimes that carry a maximum prison sentence of 14 years or more, rather than just life imprisonment as originally planned.

My motivation was a case locally where a criminal was convicted of sexually assaulting a girl under the age of 13 but refused to attend the sentencing hearing. Unfortunately, the general election meant that the bill was not passed, but I am pleased that the government has indicated that it will legislate for this change and I will continue to press for it.

Public trust requires that people see a justice system with more police that protects them, reduces recidivism rates, and reduces crime overall. This is the test by which the government’s actions will be evaluated.