The Government has announced it will appeal the release of Baby P’s mother. Justice Secretary Dominic Raab told the House of Commons this afternoon:
“In light of the Parole Board’s direction to release Tracey Connelly, I should inform the House that having carefully read the decision, I have decided to apply to the Parole Board to seek their reconsideration.”
Peter Connelly died in August 2007 at the hands of Connelly, 40, her boyfriend, Steven Barker, and their lodger Jason Owen at their home in Tottenham. Connolly was jailed in 2009 and released on licence in 2013, but was recalled to prison in 2015 for breaching her parole conditions.
As our Political Editor Nicholas Cecil and Political Reporter Rachel Burford report, Raab also unveiled a crackdown on dangerous criminals in a “root-and-branch” review of the parole system, setting out how certain criminals will face ministerial scrutiny. The reforms will enable the government to apply to override the Parole Board when it comes to the release of dangerous criminals.
Elsewhere in the paper, despite talk of Russian withdrawals, their forces are continuing attacks across Ukraine. President Volodymyr Zelensky has warned against reading too much into Vladimir Putin’s words.
“Ukrainians are not naive people,” he said late on Tuesday. “Ukrainians have already learned during these 34 days of invasion, and over the past eight years of the war in Donbass, that the only thing they can trust is a concrete result.”
Boris Johnson urged the west not to “backslide” on sanctions imposed. At PMQs, he also emphasised that no sanctions should be lifted just because Putin agrees to a ceasefire.
For more on that and Keir Starmer’s call for Johnson to resign, check out Deputy Political Editor David Bond’s must-read PMQs review.
In the comment pages, Ayesha Hazarika says the Queen ties us together but wonders will the royals unravel without her? She was also surprised to see Prince Andrew front and centre at the service.
Jonathan Hall QC, the government’s independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, writes that we need to do more to save our children from clunking fist of terror laws.
And City Editor Oscar Williams-Grut says Britain’s chief execs are just like you and me, worried as they are about energy bills.
Finally, it’s so American one might briefly wonder if it’s a send-up. Reveller Editor David Ellis reviews Passunk Avenue in Waterloo, and concludes this dive bar-cum-diner is a hoot and a half.
