The charitable view of the latest prison release blunder that has plunged the government into another political crisis is that it’s extremely bad luck rather than an act of incompetence by ministers.Â
But the more we learn about the shocking details of what happened and what looks like a cynical attempt at a cover-up by the hapless David Lammy, the more the blame can be laid at the government’s door.
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Critics of the justice secretary and deputy prime minister, standing in for Sir Keir Starmer at PMQs, claim this sorry episode reveals his pomposity, inability to think on his feet and a tendency to blame others for a fiasco.
And it’s not as if the accidental prison releases that have shocked the nation and outraged public opinion in recent weeks are the only fiascos on the government’s watch. For example:
The asylum seeker deported on the government’s one in, one out deal with France who then returned to the UK on a small boat across the Channel was another case of a policy that critics claim isn’t working.
The furore over the tax rises expected in Rachel Reeves’ budget can be attributed to what now looks like a strategic error in promising no rises in income, VAT or national insurance in Labour’s election manifesto.
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The chancellor’s failure to apply for a local authority licence to rent out her home in London’s leafy suburbs revealed a lack of judgment on her part, on top of her dodgy CV about her jobs before becoming an MP.
Angela Rayner’s careless approach to stamp duty requirements on her luxury beachfront flat that forced her resignation triggered a botched reshuffle that caused resentment among ministers and MPs.
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The appointment of Peter Mandelson as US ambassador – described by ministers as “a risk worth taking” – despite his links to paedophile Jeffrey Epstein, always looked like an accident waiting to happen.
The list goes on.
But Mr Lammy’s handling of the Wandsworth prison releases (another was revealed hours after PMQs) has been chaotic, shifty and made a bad situation worse. It couldn’t have come at a worse time, of course, when he was deputising at PMQs.
We now know that he was told about the release blunder overnight. His excuse for dodging James Cartlidge’s questions in PMQs about another release was that information was still emerging and the case was complicated.
Feeble! And inept.
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A tougher law and order minister in the mould of David Blunkett, John Reid, Michael Howard or – dare one say – his predecessor as justice secretary, Shabana Mahmood – would have demanded the full facts on his desk first thing in the morning.
Was Mr Lammy guilty of a deliberate cover-up or was he just incompetent, with no grip over his department and the increasingly accident-prone prison service? Either is bad and damaging for the government’s credibility.
We also know that the Conservatives found out about the mistaken release 15 minutes before PMQs. Tory stand-in Mr Cartlidge doggedly asked him no fewer than five times if there had been any more accidental releases.
Mr Lammy floundered and, in what was a very bad look, lost his temper. That was a bad mistake. His tactics backfired spectacularly.
When Mr Cartlidge rose at the end of PMQs and told MPs another prisoner had indeed been mistakenly released, Mr Lammy fled the chamber in indecent haste, ignoring the Speaker’s offer of a response.
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It was, or course, Angela Rayner’s resignation over her stamp duty blunder that brought about Mr Lammy’s elevation to deputy prime minister. And that, of course, was a sop to compensate him for losing the Foreign Office brief.
His critics claim Mr Lammy was over-promoted when he was appointed shadow foreign secretary. But then he did co-chair Sir Keir’s 2020 leadership campaign. And, like the PM, he’s a barrister.
Elected MP for Tottenham in a by-election in 2000, he held a number of junior and middle-ranking ministerial posts under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown.
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And in a humiliating appearance on TV’s Celebrity Mastermind in 2009, he said in one answer during a general knowledge round that Henry VII acceded the English throne after the death of Henry VIII.
But the minister now dubbed “Calamity Lammy” by his Tory opponent Robert Jenrick isn’t the only minister guilty of blunders. Top of that list must be the prime minister himself.
Sir Keir makes the appointments, controls policy from No 10, overrules ministers and – when it comes to the economy – is, after all, the First Lord of the Treasury.
Yes, some of the government’s political problems are down to bad luck. But not all, by any means.
To misquote Oscar Wilde, the most famous prisoner held in another prison, Reading Gaol: “To lose one prisoner may be regarded as a misfortune. To lose two looks like carelessness.”
