We believe IPP is inhumane & against human rights breaching Human Rights Act 1998 Article 3 Prohibition of Torture "No one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment"
IPP stands for Indeterminate sentence for Public Protection - What this actually means is if you were to go to court and receive a 2 year tariff, 3 years, 4 years, usually you would serve 1/2 in prison and 1/2 on licence in the community - but with IPP you could be imprisoned for up to 99 years.
At present it's still up to the prisoner to prove that they are safe for release by completing various courses which is what makes it impossible as courses are extremely limited & you cannot prove you are safe to release as you are in prison. It is then up to a parole board to decide if they feel you are ready to be released back in to society, prisoners and their families do not know IF or WHEN they'll EVER be released, this in itself is mental TORTURE, DEGRADING & INHUMANE. There are currently over 3,490 prisoners that are over their tariff which costs £41,000 each year to keep 1 prisoner incarcerated. For 3,490 prisoners this equals £143,000,000 every year paid by tax payers. 88,000 prisoners incarcerated in the UK. The purpose of our campaign isn't to argue whether or not the prisoners deserved to go to prison - The fact of the matter is that even if it means that prisoners are given longer sentences - 2, 3, 5, 10, or even 25 years, every human on this planet deserves to know when they will be home with their children / families again & know what time they have to serve.
Improve the system for existing IPP sentence prisoners, we demand an effective system in place that works. Excercise your power to change the release test with more regular assessments on dangerousness, only IF it can be proved that they pose a high risk then not to release upon tariff expiry but make provisions for those of high risk to reduce their risk / reform. Those who are of low to medium risk to be released upon tariff expiry, thus releasing those who meet this criteria who are over tariff.
We the undersigned request that you review IPP, thus abolishing IPP in its entirety replacing IPP with an effective system that works releasing all who are over tariff unless it can be proven that they are of high risk of re-offending & make provisions for those of high risk to reduce their risk/reform.
The reasons are set out in the petition itself. IPP is inhumane, unjust and clearly is not working. IPP is causing nothing but anguish, frustration & suicide.We believe It is a breach of The Human Rights Act 1998 Article 3 Prohibition of Torture - No one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.
I would like to thank you for taking the time to read our letter.
