Robert Buckland – 2020 Comments on Pausing the Prisoner Early Release Programme

The comments made by Robert Buckland, the Secretary of State for Justice, on 19 August 2020.

This has been an unprecedented situation but thanks to the hard work and dedication of our staff we have stopped coronavirus taking hold in prisons, which means we can now pause the early release scheme.

We continue to keep this decision under review, but independent public health experts have judged our approach effective and we continue to do all we can to help the NHS and prevent our staff and prisoners from being at risk.