In 2008, although I had never previously written about sentencing, I did my best to help derail proposals for reform of sentencing put forward by Lord Carter of Coles in his report, ‘Securing the Future— Proposals for the Efficient and Sustainable Use of Custody in England and Wales’ (December 2007), which I described in print as ‘a contender for the title of Worst Report of Recent Years’ (‘Which way to go?’, 158 NLJ 869).
Carter’s report recommended the introduction of a US-style structured sentencing framework based on a grid aimed at a drastic reduction of judicial discretion. There had been no call for evidence, no consultation paper and the report made no reference to the considerable literature on the subject. No one on the Sentencing Advisory Panel or the Sentencing Guidelines Council had been asked for their opinion. There was no list of those who had been consulted.
Carter’s report recommended the setting up
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