Hundreds of prisoners released early in England and Wales, including stalkers and violent offenders, are not being electronically tagged despite government promises of strict supervision, according to MPs.
The monitoring company Serco has failed to source enough tags to track the released offenders, MP Clive Efford said. Police and probation officers report struggling to manage the influx of newly freed prisoners in their communities.
The government is releasing a second batch of 650 offenders as part of efforts to ease prison overcrowding. The early-release scheme was presented as delivering what ministers called "the toughest supervision in British history".
The shortfall in electronic monitoring equipment represents a significant gap between policy commitments and operational capacity. Probation and police services, already strained, now face the challenge of supervising offenders without one of the primary tools designed for that purpose.