Justice Secretary: Prisoners need to earn privileges
Prisoners need to earn privileges, not simply through the avoidance of bad behaviour but also by working, taking part in education or accepting the opportunities to rehabilitate themselves.
We have reviewed the scheme fully, and I believe it is now something the public can have confidence in.
Only by tackling bad behaviour and taking part in education or work programmes as well as addressing any alcohol or drug issues can we cut [rates of] reoffending.
Inmates will have to 'earn' perks in new prison scheme
Prisoners will have to "earn the right" to certain privileges behind bars under new plans being unveiled by the Justice Secretary Chris Grayling today.
Subscription channels will be banned from private prisons Credit: Matthew Fearn/PA Archive/Press Association Images
The new measures will include bans on 18-rated films and subscription channels as well as a new "entry" level for all new prisoners.
Mr Grayling said that "for too long, there has been an expectation that privileges are an automatic right, given simply as a reward for staying out of trouble".
Justice Secretary Chris Grayling will today say that criminals should pay for the cost of running courts out of their future earnings. He is expected to say:
Why should the law-abiding, hard-working majority pay for a court service for the minority who break the law?
Those who live outside the law should pay the consequences both through being punished and bearing more of the costs they impose on society. That is why we are exploring ways to make criminals pay towards the cost of their prosecution to the court.
Consultation into legal aid to cut bill by £300 million
The Justice Secretary will today publish a consultation into legal aid in a bid to cut the annual £1.7 billion legal aid bill by £300 million.
Justice Secretary Chris Grayling Credit: Sean Dempsey/PA Wire
The consultation published today puts forward proposals to make the criminal legal aid system operate more efficiently.
Key groups that could be affected by Chris Grayling's plans include illegal immigrants, failed asylum seekers and those visiting the country on tourist visas.
Report: Review to be launched into 'cautions culture'
A review into the police "cautions culture" will be launched by the Justice Secretary to ensure more criminals are brought before a court, it has been reported.
Chris Grayling will investigate the use of cautions against people who commit serious crimes, including sexual offences, The Sun has said.
A review is to be launched into the use of cautions, The Sun reports. Credit: Press Association
The Tory MP said the number of cautions being handed out by officers has "spiralled out of control" and varies between different forces.
He told The Sun: "I am worried about some recent cases where cautions have been given to criminals who have committed multiple crimes.
"The number of cautions given for sexual offences is going in the right direction - down - but we need this review to make sure they are only given where truly appropriate."
He added that although officers should use their discretion, the public and victims "have a right to expect people who commit serious crimes to be brought before a court".
Police handed out 205,700 cautions in the 12 months ending to September 2012, according to the latest figures from the Ministry of Justice.
The Justice Secretary Chris Grayling has said that his remarks about scrapping the Human Rights Act were not off-message, despite David Cameron saying there would be no "lurch to the right" in the Conservative Party.
The Justice Secretary insists his comments about the Human Rights Act were "not off-message" Credit: ITV News
Mr Grayling said: "What I've set out in the last few days is the same approach that I set out at the party conference last year.
"The Conservative Party will go in to the next election with a plan to tackle the frustrations on human rights, which are shared by people across our society - not by those on the right but the public as a whole."
His remarks come as cracks over immigration and the Human Rights Act appear to be splitting the party after the poor Eastleigh by-election results, which saw the Conservative fall to third place behind UKIP.
Chris Grayling became Justice Secretary in September last year. Credit: Lewis Whyld/PA Wire
The Justice Secretary Chris Grayling has defended his announcement that the Conservatives would pull out of the European Convention on Human Rights if they won a majority in 2015.
He said that "If anyone sits down and reads it (the convention) as a document (they) would struggle to find a word they disagreed with. It was written in the aftermath of the Second World War, the Holocaust, all the issues in the eastern bloc."
"What's happened since then, the decision-making in the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, has moved I think that convention further and further away from the original intentions of its authors."
He added: "To my mind human rights is about some of the appalling things happening around the world, people being brutalised for their political views, people being put in jail. It's not about saying a prisoner has a right to artificial insemination while they're in jail."
Home Office: 'No immediate plans to withdraw' from ECHR
Following report in the Mail on Sunday that Britain is set to pull out of the European Convention on Human Rights in a move to be announced by the Home Secretary Theresa May, a home office spokesman said
The government has no immediate plans to withdraw from the European Convention on Human Rights.
'Tories should scrap Human Rights Act,' says Grayling
The Justice Secretary said a Conservative majority would repeal the Human Rights Act, which the Liberal Democrats are pledged to defend.
In comments made to The Sunday Telegraph, Chris Grayling said his party needs to be “clear” ahead general election that it would “start again” after abolishing the Act, which enshrines the European Convention on Human Rights in domestic law.
I cannot conceive of a situation where we could put forward a serious reform without scrapping Labour’s Human Rights Act and starting again.
We cannot go on with a situation where people who are a threat to our national security, or who come to Britain and commit serious crimes, are able to cite their human rights when they are clearly wholly unconcerned for the human rights of others.
We need a dramatically curtailed role for the European Court of Human Rights in the UK.
