Today, new data released by the Ministry of Justice has revealed that almost 3,000 people are victims in the UK of one of the worst systematic errors of justice of the past 50 years as they are still held behind bars in UK prisons, over a decade since ‘indefinite’ sentences were abolished.

The data released today in the Offender Management Statistics Quarterly shows that 2,852 [1] people given ‘Imprisonment for Public Protection’ (IPP) sentences, described as the “single greatest stain” [2] on the UK’s criminal justice system, are still in prison today, despite this type of indefinite sentence being abolished in 2012.

This sentence has killed hundreds, making it one of the most lethal in existence, destroying the lives of thousands; unnecessarily filling prisons; costing taxpayers billions; and breaching British values and standards of law.

IPP was introduced in England and Wales in 2003, as part of the Criminal Justice Act, originally intended to protect the public from dangerous offenders whose crimes did not merit a life sentence. IPP offenders at that time were given indeterminate sentences with a minimum term to serve, after which they could be considered for release by The Parole Board.

However, IPP was overused and eventually handed out to almost ten times the expected number, many of whom were guilty of very minor crimes. As a result, the sentence was ‘abolished’ in 2012. However, this change was not made retrospective, meaning that all existing IPPs were at that time still subject to their sentence and thousands remained in prison. Due to the difficulty for IPP prisoners to satisfy terms to be released and notoriously overbearing recall conditions, the high number of these IPP prisoners in prison has remained.

2,852 of these IPP victims are still in prison today, according to this latest data. 1,227 of these have never been released, and more than half of these have served 10 years over their original sentence, some serving multiples of their original minimum term.

Many IPP prisoners still in prison today are way beyond their minimum terms. These are enough prisoners to fill more than four average-size UK prisons. Adding up the number of years spent by IPPs beyond their minimum term, it equates to over 10,000 years – equivalent to a cost of £500million to the UK taxpayer. With so many in prison now beyond their minimum terms with low prospects of release, the cost of these ‘overspent’ years is estimated to increase to over £1billion by 2028 [3].

As an example, one current IPP victim is Thomas White. He was sentenced in 2012 – just months before IPP was abolished – for stealing a mobile phone and has never been released from prison. In 12 years, Thomas has only met his son, Kayden once, and he has spent much of this time in solitary confinement. Mr White’s sister, Clara – like Kayden and many family members of people given IPPs – has suffered severe emotional strain, witnessing her brother’s mental health deteriorate over the years under the strain of an open-ended sentence with no clear route for release.

As a result of his continued imprisonment, Mr White has developed psychosis, borderline personality disorder, and ADHD. His sister says this is a failure of the state to put right a gross miscarriage of justice: “The saddest thing for IPP families on the outside is that we trusted the Government – they had a duty of care. They had a duty of care to look after my brother and they didn’t, they failed him.”

At least 88 people given IPPs have already committed suicide in prison, with the number feared to be much higher, due to the difficulty of recording how many have killed themselves while on licence in the community [4]. 1,600 additional instances of self-harm by IPP prisoners were recorded in the past 12 months alone [5].

David Blunkett, the former New Labour Home Secretary responsible for implementing the policy in 2003, is one of many voices from across the political divide calling on the Government to fix what he called an “unjust” and “immoral” sentence [6], speaking to a Parliament committee in 2021. International actors are also urging the UK to fix the IPP cycle of suffering – UN Special Rapporteur on Torture, Alice Edwards described the policy as “inhuman” and “degrading” [7], in a public statement in 2023.

In 2017 – before becoming the UK Secretary of State for Justice – Alex Chalk KC described IPPs as “unconscionable” and “one of the greatest stains” on the British justice system; however, he has become the latest in a line of ten justice ministers who have ignored expert advice on how to solve the IPP crisis, including rejecting strong recommendations by a House of Commons Justice Committee Inquiry in 2023 to review IPP sentences.

Henry Rossi, a human rights campaigner and Founder of The Institute of Now, an organisation committed to making change happen for victims of IPP, stated: “IPP is a systematic error and a form of state violence which has no place in a modern society. Far too many people, both prisoners and their families, have been subjected to psychological torture from this wicked sentence, which in so many cases, has led to suicides. Prisons are not the place to manage those that have served their time as punishment. The UK has blood on its hands and the government must urgently relook at this draconian sentence and release post-tariff IPP prisoners with the appropriate support.”

Hamid Sabi, a London-based human rights lawyer who has served on the Iran Tribunal, China Tribunal, and the Uyghur Tribunal, commented: “Political inertia and lack of focus has to date stifled any chance of reform to IPP, as successive governments – despite acknowledging IPP as a mistake – have demonstrated wilful blindness and disproportionate risk aversion when faced with the issue. The UK faces a mass public shaming on the world stage if this issue is not urgently addressed.”