Ripon Uddin, R (on the application of) v Secretary of State for Justice

When the Secretary of State departs from a Parole Board recommendation about transfer to open prison conditions, the court reviews the Secretary of State’s decision for Wednesbury irrationality, not the rationality of the Parole Board’s recommendation. The Secretary of State must identify precisely the conclusion or proposition with which he disagrees and give responsive reasons. The required quality of reasoning depends on the Parole Board’s comparative advantage. Greater cogency is required for conclusions closely connected with facts assessed after an oral hearing. Less intensive, but still reasoned, evaluation is required for predictive or public-interest judgments where the Secretary of State may form his own view. Open conditions must be essential to inform release decisions and prepare for release; it is insufficient that risk-reduction work could be undertaken there. Public confidence is a separate criterion.

The claimant, an indeterminate sentence prisoner, challenged the Secretary of State’s decision of 13 December 2022 rejecting the Parole Board’s recommendation of 30 September 2022 that he be transferred to open prison conditions. The Parole Board considered that his risk had reduced sufficiently for closed conditions to be unnecessary, but that a period in open conditions was needed before release could safely be contemplated. The Secretary of State accepted that the claimant was a low absconding risk but concluded that open conditions were not essential and that transfer could undermine public confidence in the criminal justice system. The issue was whether that departure was irrational or Wednesbury unreasonable.

1. Claim dismissed. The Secretary of State was the primary decision-maker on transfer to open conditions. The court therefore examined the rationality of his decision, rather than re-evaluating whether the Parole Board’s recommendation was rational.
2. The court had to identify precisely the conclusion or proposition rejected by the Secretary of State and ask whether the Parole Board enjoyed a particular advantage in relation to it. Greater cogency was required for conclusions closely connected with credibility or facts assessed after an oral hearing. For predictive assessments and judgments balancing the prisoner’s interests against public interests, the Secretary of State could reach a different view after according appropriate respect to the Parole Board.
3. The criterion that a period in open conditions be essential to inform future release decisions and prepare for possible release required more than showing that risk-reduction work could be done in open conditions. The claimant had to show that open conditions were necessary at that stage and that the work could not adequately be undertaken in closed conditions. The Parole Board had not explained why transfer was essential.
4. The Secretary of State gave cogent reasons for rejecting the recommendation, relying on outstanding risk-reduction work, expert evidence, social-services concerns, risk assessments and the need to sequence reintegration. His conclusion on the essentiality criterion was rational.
5. Public confidence was a separate criterion for the Secretary of State. In light of the claimant’s assessed risk to known adults and the public, it was rational to conclude that transfer to an unfenced open prison, with the prospect of temporary release into the community, could undermine public confidence.

The challenge to the December 2022 determination therefore failed.