Justice Secretary Alex Chalk said that the Government is to make sure that life in prison means life for serious offenders under new measures to be unveiled in the King’s Speech.
He told GB News: “We want to ensure that when a murder takes place and it is a particularly evil murder, they're all incredibly serious, but that's to say there is sexual context or indeed sadism that that individual should expect to spend the rest of their life behind bars.
“Now that's important for public protection so that they're not out in the public can commit that offence again. But also we think that that meets the justice of the case.
“Those who commit those most serious murders can expect for life to mean life and for never them never to be released again.”
In a discussion during Breakfast with Eamonn Holmes and Isabel Webster, he continued: “We want to ensure as I've indicated for those most serious offenders, life means life and until also for rape offenders that they should expect to spend the entirety of that sentence in custody,
“But also this protecting the public also means reducing re-offending. So re-offending has actually come down quite considerably since 2010.
“We also want to ensure that those less serious offenders, those who can be rehabilitated are rehabilitated because ultimately that's what protects the public as well.”
He added: “When we came into government in 2010, all rapists would be automatically released at the halfway mark, halfway through this sentence automatically released. We thought that's not right. Which is why we changed the law so that it's a minimum of two thirds.
“But now under these reforms, people will serve the entirety of that sentence in custody. This is a serious matter."
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