Another 650 prisoners are freed as the second phase of early release begins
The second phase of the early release scheme began on Tuesday, with about 650 prisoners freed across England and Wales, the BBC, Evening Standard and Daily Mail reported. The Standard said about 5,000 are due out in stages over the next year. The Daily Mail said the scheme lets some offenders leave after serving as little as a third of their sentence. The Guardian reported that MPs say hundreds of those released early, including stalkers and violent offenders, are not being tagged, and quoted MP Clive Efford as saying the contractor Serco has not found enough tags. The Standard and the Mail quoted Conservatives saying reoffending is 'off the charts'.
Early release moves people out of prison faster than usual, so police and probation must manage more of them at once. Tagging is one of the main tools for watching them, so a shortage of tags would weaken that supervision.
If you live near a prison, expect more people returning to your area. Victims registered with the probation service's victim contact scheme are normally told of a release.
Supporters say early release relieves pressure on crowded prisons and keeps them running safely.
Critics say the scheme puts the public at risk and that the monitoring is not in place to support it.
The numbers to watch are not the headline releases but the tag count, recall rates and reoffending data. The Guardian's tagging claim is attributed to MPs; we have not seen the government's figures.
DailyDrop U.K. edition No. 10 · Morning · WED., OCT. 14, 2026