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Life Imprisonment: Prisoners' Release

Asked by Nick TimothyConservativeMinistry of JusticeTabled Answered 23 April 2026UIN 128088

The question

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many prisoners with at least one life sentence have been granted (a) supervised, and (b) unsupervised Release on Temporary Licence in each year since 2020, broken down by offence.

Answered by Jake Richards

Release on Temporary Licence (ROTL) for prisoners serving life sentences is subject to particularly stringent risk assessment and senior decision making, and is granted only in limited circumstances, with public protection as the paramount consideration.

Data on prisoners serving life sentences who are released on ROTL are published regularly in the Offender Management Statistics Quarterly, which include information on the number of individuals serving life sentences released on ROTL, by year: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/offender-management-statistics-quarterly.

Data on supervised ROTL is not included within centrally collated statistical data or published ROTL figures. As a result, a breakdown of life sentence prisoners released on ROTL by supervised / unsupervised ROTL and offence would only be possible to obtain at disproportionate cost.

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