Politics

The government is “gripping” the prisons crisis, minister Lisa Nandy told Sky News, as she said it is “unacceptable” the number of prisoners being wrongly released has risen. Ms Nandy, the culture secretary, told Sunday Morning With Trevor Phillips that Justice Secretary David Lammy has made a senior appointment “to make sure we really grip…

Denmark is regularly ranked as one of the happiest countries in the world – with a cosy international reputation as the home of hygge and Lego, the idealistic fictional prime minister Birgitte Nyborg in Borgen and the woolly jumpers of TV detective Sarah Lund.  But that warmth does not extend to asylum seekers – and…

The Home Office is looking at what Denmark is doing to cut illegal migration, Sky News understands. Last month, Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood dispatched officials to the Nordic nation to study its border control and asylum policies, which are considered some of the toughest in Europe. In particular, officials are understood to be looking at…

David Lammy has said he did not know all the details of a prisoner’s mistaken release when repeatedly asked about it. The justice secretary and deputy prime minister was heavily criticised for not revealing on Wednesday that registered Algerian sex offender Brahim Kaddour-Cherif had been released in error last week. The Conservatives used Mr Lammy’s…

Multiple mistaken prisoner releases could actually be an “opportunity” for David Lammy, Harriet Harman has said. Speaking to Sky News’ Electoral Dysfunction podcast with political editor Beth Rigby, the Labour peer said the release errors are a chance for the justice secretary to “roll up his sleeves” and sort out his department. It emerged on…

A cabinet minister has defended Lisa Nandy after the culture secretary apologised for breaching the governance code on public appointments over her choice of the independent football regulator. Ms Nandy has been accused by the Conservatives of “cronyism” after she “unknowingly” broke the code by failing to declare she had received £2,900 in donations from…

👉 Click here to listen to Electoral Dysfunction on your podcast app 👈 Who is to blame for two more inmates being wrongly freed from prison? The Conservatives attempted a mic drop moment with David Lammy this week by trying to get the justice secretary to admit to it live in the House of Commons….

Sir Keir Starmer has said David Lammy “set out the facts” on mistaken prisoner releases “to the best of his knowledge” amid questions over what the justice secretary knew and when. Speaking for the first time since it emerged two prisoners were wrongly freed from HMP Wandsworth, the prime minister also said the situation was…

The highest number of people on record were referred to the UK’s anti-extremism scheme in the year to March – with a 37% rise in right-wing extremism concerns, the latest data shows. A total of 8,778 individuals were referred to the programme, the highest since records began in 2015. That is a 27% increase from…

Police are preparing for a surge in crime if the Labour government’s plans to overhaul prison sentences go ahead – with hundreds of thousands more offences expected in a year. Measures proposed under the Sentencing Bill, intended to ease overcrowding in prisons, include limiting the use of short prison sentences and releasing some convicted criminals…