LibDems quiz government on insensitivity towards trans offenders

Liberal Democrat parlimentarians have been quizzing the government on transgender prisoners, following the news that Tara Hudson has finally been placed in the correct prison. The move follows interventions from a number of senior politicians including LibDem leader Tim Farron to ensure that Tara Hudson, who has lived her entire adult life as a woman, was not placed in a male prison.

Lord Marks argued that the Government should learn from this case and asked the Minister: "How can prison allocation be so insensitive to transgender offenders...Will his department ensure that in future, if a transgender defendant is at risk of a custodial sentence, full and careful thought will be given to allocation before sentence rather than after placement?"

He later said: "Tara Hudson was placed in a hostile male prison, at risk of verbal abuse and perhaps worse. This mishandling of her case has shown up the failures of our criminal justice system and we should act to fix it. The insensitivity towards Tara should act as warning that if we do not act now more people will unnecessarily suffer."

Tim Farron said "The Tara Hudson case shows how the Ministry of Justice need to be dragged kicking into the 21st century. It is welcome news that Tara has been moved to a female prison. But she shouldn't have gone to a male prison to begin with. I urge the Justice Secretary to use this case as an opportunity to fix the system."