Earlier this year, the UK Government announced prospective plans to expand the provision of whole life sentences for murders that involve a sexual or sadistic nature. This commitment was reaffirmed by Secretary of State for Justice and Lord Chancellor, Alex Chalk MP, in his speech to Conservative Party Conference who stressed that the Government wants to ensure that ‘in more cases life really does mean life’. This proposal builds upon the 2003 Criminal Justice Act which, among other changes, introduced whole life sentence for the most serious cases of murder. For the sake of context, there are 65 life prisoners in the UK, as of July 2023. 

The moral rational behind whole life sentence is clear and seemingly pretty intuitive: some crimes are so grotesque and morally degrading to the victim that the perpetrator should never been assimilated back into society. This serves to punish the perpetrator but also to deter others from committing these crimes. The recent case of former nurse, Lucy Letby, explains this argument as she was charged with 7 counts of murder and 7 counts of attempted murder. She was later given 14 whole life orders for these charges. 

It seems hard at first to argue against the use or expansion of whole life sentences; testament to this, when the Conservatives announced their plans to expand the use of whole life sentences, Labour’s response was to reassert their place as the party of ‘law and order’ and affirm that the Conservatives are ‘soft on crime’. Nevertheless, it was a rather disappointing response with little critical reflexivity. 

The Objections

There are two possible issues with whole life sentences: 1) an intrinsic issue, whole life sentences are wrong in and of themselves; and 2) an instrumental issue, whole life sentences may be wrong as they lead to bad outcomes. 

1) The intrinsic issue

The intrinsic issue stresses that, regardless of what someone has done, it’s unfair to not offer people a chance of rehabilitation and personal development- it is a death penalty with a figurative death. There is something wrong with this in and of itself. 

To illustrate this point, an exercise in alternate history in 1945 is useful: Japan and Germany have surrendered, and the Allies are considering their plans for reconstructing these countries. In this alternate timeline, their plans to reconstruct these countries involve the USA having the final say in all their political, economic, social and legal decision making for the foreseeable future. The USA and Allies justify this because the actions these states have committed were so grotesque and degrading that they must be punished and to dissuade other states from similar actions. This basically amounts to a de facto life imprisonment for these states, they have no chance of true sovereignty or equal status in the future- in this sense, they will never be accepted as a respected member of the international community. 

While this scenario shares some similarities with our actual historical timeline as the US were heavily involved in shaping Germany and Japan after the Second World War, they did not exert as much control as this alternate timeline. Moreover, in our historical timeline, Germany and Japan have been assimilated back into the international community as equal and respected members. This alternate timeline seems rather questionable to argue that the USA should have exerted a final say on Japan and Germany decision making for the foreseeable future, with no chance of rehabilitation for these countries. 

However, who is to say that the Japan and Germany case is even comparable to an individual committing an egregious crime. Nevertheless, the point was more to show that the principle of no rehabilitation may be dubious sometimes, not to say that state crimes are the same as individual crimes.

2) The instrumental issue  

Someone may respond to that above argument and double down; they may contend that the figurative death of prisoners in whole life sentences is still justifiable as they deserve it for what they have done wrong. This may represent an impasse in the debate but to return to the case of Lucy Letby. 

She has just been given 14 whole life orders- she will never leave prison. By imprisoning Letby with no chance of parole, she has absolutely no chance of retribution or redemption, if that’s case then why should she behave in prison? Why should she be polite to prison guards or her fellow prisoners? If we are imprisoning people for life without parole, are we not increasing the likelihood that prisons are a hotspot for misbehaviour, drug use and hostile conditions. We are giving prisoners absolutely no incentive to behave themselves or change themselves- they will always be a convict and they shouldn’t stop acting like that. Put yourself in the position of a whole life prisoner, could you really be bothered to obey if things literally cannot get worse? This may seem a very hypothetical and slippery slope style argument but there is evidence that some whole life prisoners feel this way, see an extract from a letter from Douglas Vinter, a whole life prisoner in the UK, below: 

‘I am sitting in the segregation unit and have been for a number of weeks. I was involved in a stabbing (not fatal) on the wing. You see how I can admit in a letter to an offence as serious as that. It’s because the judge when he sentenced me to natural life gave me an invisible licence that said that I can breach any laws I want, no matter how serious, and the law can’t touch me. I’m above the law. I said to the governor, don’t waste any money on investigations, just give me another life sentence for my collection. They don’t mean anything anymore.’

Another instrumental concern is the current state of prisons in UK, with massive overcrowding, underfunding and understaffing. This begs the question, should we really be locking up more and more people for life considering our prisons cannot cope? Now, maybe an expansion of whole life sentences wouldn’t ruin our prisons and cause them to collapse but it’s still an important practical concern to consider. 

Political ramifications 

All of the above is not to say that whole life sentences are wrong in all cases- there are some cases where their use is absolutely justifiable, see the example of Lucy Letby. However, the point was more to show that race to the bottom ‘who can be harder’ narratives on crime are not infinitely better. This could raise theoretical questions for Labour and Conservatives, who are both currently engaged in their own battle of who can be ‘tougher’ on criminals. Moreover, it was only just under 25 years ago that New Labour took on a similar battle with John Major’s Conservatives. This has meant that it’s often accepted that prioritising ‘tougher’ and ‘longer’ sentences equals better- perhaps this may not always be the case.