GB News was interrupted for a breaking announcement on the illegal migration crisis, with presenter Bev Turner revealing that a record number of foreign criminals remain on the streets in Britain. The figure showed that 21,294 foreign criminals are not currently in prison, while Labour is considering reviving the 'house arrest' scheme, under which offenders could serve most of their sentences at home while wearing electronic tracking tags to ease severe overcrowding in prisons.
Former MP slams Labour's proposal
Former Conservative MP Louise Mensch slammed the prospect, questioning why Labour are not converting abandoned army barracks – used to house asylum seekers – into prisons to help ease overcrowding. She fumed: "Just imagine that somebody had gone into your house and burgled it, they'd get a year in jail. Under this, he could be out in two months, sitting at home and it's like his mum has sent him to bed with no supper. That's all that Labour have got to offer."
She agreed with Conservative spokesperson Nick Timothy, who described the update as "outrageous". "If they need capacity, why don’t they convert these abandoned army barracks instead of filling them with migrants and then giving the migrants benefits? It makes no sense whatsoever," she said.
Curfew details and criticism
Turner pressed her further on the curfew, asking whether it was true that the offenders would be free to roam during the day but required to remain at home between 7pm and 7am. "It's like your mum has grounded you. That's what it's come to, we've got to ground prisoners. Labour have got themselves into such a pickle by not increasing the capacity in the prison estate that they have to let some people out early," Mensch said.
She agreed that it's better to let "white collar criminals" out as opposed to murderers and rapists, but argued there is plenty more Labour could be doing. "There's plenty of capacity in the women's estate that could be converted to house men. There's plenty of capacity in the junior estate, ditto," the 55-year-old suggested, arguing that Labour’s lack of action could be creating an incentive for people to commit crimes.
Incentive to commit crime
She added: "But what they're not doing is biting the bullet and saying we'll give you more prison places. Unless they do that, criminals are going to get the message that unless you actually murder somebody, or stab them, or rape them, if you do any other minor crime, you're going to be out of jail in a couple of months."
"They really haven't considered that this is an incentive to commit crime." The former MP went on to criticise the Labour government for refusing to cut the benefits bill while being willing to release criminals from prison early.
