South Norfolk MP Richard Bacon has said the Parole Board is being left in the dark over whether prisoners on life sentences are still dangerous, as a new report finds that, in a third of cases, important documents relating to the risks posed by offenders were not included in their files.

Mr Bacon said: “The Parole Board’s primary responsibility is to protect the public. Yet it is not always told whether prisoners serving life sentences are still dangerous”. 

You would have thought that prisoners who pose a risk to the public would have that fact running through their files like a stick of rock”.

Mr Bacon, MP for South Norfolk, was speaking as the National Audit Office (NAO) published its report on the work of the Parole Board. The report finds that in 35 per cent of life sentence cases reviewed by the NAO, important documents relating to the risks posed by offenders were not included on the file. A third of parole hearings for prisoners serving life sentences were deferred because the prisoner’s dossier was incomplete.
 

5 March 2008
 

See also:
NAO REPORT: The work of the Parole Board