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On April 8, 2011, Keir Starmer joined some of Britain's top legal eagles at a monthly meeting of the Sentencing Council, the ultra-powerful quango that tells judges and magistrates how convicted criminals ought to be punished. It was all in a day's work for our then-Director of Public Prosecutions, who was joined by 12 fellow members of the committee, plus no fewer than 15 officials and observers, around what must have been one of Britain's longest conference tables. Issues they discussed ranged from the 'media coverage' of a recent consultation on drugs sentencing, which had seen members attacked for their alleged liberal bias, to proper tariffs for burglary, assault and anti-social behaviour. But it was the seventh item on the agenda that – for Starmer, at least – would eventually prove the most controversial. Minutes of the gathering, which was chaired by Sir Brian Leveson (of Press inquiry fame), show that Sir Keir and his fellow members were presented with 'initial findings' of a review into 'current sentencing practice for sexual offences'. Minutes of the gathering, which was chaired by Sir Brian Leveson (of Press inquiry fame), show that Sir Keir (pictured) and his fellow members were presented with 'in It was the start of a lengthy process that would end, three years down the line, with a series of dramatic – and some might say woefully misguided – changes to the way in which courts in England and Wales deal with these most heinous of crimes. During that period, Sir Keir attended 21 of 23 meetings at which the Sentencing Council formulated new guidelines related to 50 different sex offences. The crimes that were looked at, during this review, ranged from rape and sexual assault to prostitution, grooming, sex-trafficking, voyeurism, exposure and child pornography. Eventually, the Council decided that 20 of these crimes could, in certain circumstances, be punished via community orders rather than prison sentences. That number include a total of eight offences where the principal victim is a child. They range from 'sexual assault of a child under 13' to 'possession of an indecent photograph of a child' to 'paying for the sexual services of a child' and 'arranging or facilitating the sexual exploitation of a child'. This all happened on Sir Keir's watch and there is absolutely no evidence that he ever objected to these (on paper) remarkably soft sentencing guidelines, which took effect in April 2014. At no point did he publicly voice so much as a flicker of concern about the fact that introducing them could result in significant numbers of child sex offenders being spared prison. And if the earnest Director of Public Prosecutions happened to voice any scepticism in a more private forum – for example during any one of the 21 Sentencing Council meetings listed above – those remarks failed to find their way into any official minutes that were subsequently published, all of which have now been reviewed by the Mail. In other words, one might fairly argue that Starmer bears significant responsibility for the fact that, from 2014 until the present day, it has been possible for child sex offenders who come before the courts in England and Wales to avoid jail. Join this channel to get access to perks:
