It comes to something when a senior member of a recent government – the former justice secretary, no less – describes actions by the state that were part of his remit as “overbearing, unfair and almost totalitarian”. Yet this is how Alex Chalk KC, who held that office for 14 months in the government of Rishi Sunak, describes imprisonment for public protection (IPP) orders – which can keep someone in prison indefinitely after conviction for a relatively minor crime.
Ousted from government by his party’s defeat at the last election, and also from his parliamentary seat, Mr Chalk has returned to his legal practice. It is from this perch that he is now asking his successor, Shabana Mahmood, to consider new proposals – from the Howard League and a former lord chief justice, Lord Thomas – with a view to righting this now longstanding wrong.
