Malta was adopting the mixed system of parole used in England and Wales, Parliamentary Secretary Jason Azzopardi pointed out yesterday. France applied a discretionary parole system Scandinavia adopted an onerous one.

The offender had a right to request parole but granting it was not a right. The Parole Board had to be convinced that the offender had changed his ways.

Society was founded on justice and the rule of law. The government was making a courageous step in introducing parole and it was right that this found the support of the whole House.

The Bill was a step in the right direction. Parole was in the interest of society. It was important for society that offenders were reformed. The parole system, if wisely adopted, would benefit society.

Legal experts contended that alternatives to prison, such as community service, would benefit society and cost less. The parole system was to be established through supervision and reform of the offender and through restorative justice.

The Bill envisaged that remission had to be earned by the offender if he behaved well and worked for it. This surely helped in the reformation of the offender.

The board could suspend the parole, if the person on parole did not observe the stiff conditions related to it.

Nationalist back-bencher Beppe Fenech Adami (PN) said that with the introduction of the parole system, prisoners would be helped to reintegrate in society, has yesterday. However, in certain cases, it would be in the prisoner’s interest not to be granted parole.

He said that under the Restorative Justice Bill, the right for parole would not be automatic: a prisoner would have to “sit for an exam” to determine whether he would be eligible.

Dr Fenech Adami said that the Parole Board would decide whether to grant parole while it would also be able to retract such right where persons on parole did not adhere to conditions. The board would be able to impose conditions on the offender to compensate the victim, to take part in community services or to be electronically-tagged.

While offenders should be held responsible, it was at society’s interest to reform and rehabilitate them. Yet, victims should be compensated.

Earlier, Dr Fenech Adami traced the continuous development that had taken place in Malta from ensuring that offenders were penalized to the shift to reform and reintegrate them. In the past, a person was either sent to prison or not. At present, the court was able to consider the facts of the case and had down the most proper sentence.

With the introduction of the suspended sentence, an offender would be found guilty, condemned to imprisonment yet he would be given another chance and not serve the sentence if he did not relapse.

The Probation Act had had also left a positive impact. After a White Paper in February 2009, this Bill ensured reparative justice.

The Bill also introduced mediation, which could also serve as a means of compensation to the victims. The offender would also be encouraged to compensate the victim as the mediator’s report could be considered by the court when delivering its judgment.

Franco Debono (PN) said that the parole was one of the different measures that were being taken to encourage rehabilitation of prisoners. Criminal justice was a very sensitive issue and he agreed with Dr Herrera (PL) that this should be governed by balance and moderation.

The Bill stated that to be eligible for parole, a prisoner had to serve a part of his sentence, after which he could apply.

It acknowledged that if a person was under 16 years of age or in other specific cases such as terminal illness, the court could decide that the percentages did not apply and the parole board would then choose the relevant conditions to apply to that case.

It was important to note that the parole was not an automatic system but one had to work hard for it.

Dr Debono said the Bill was an important leap forward with regards to restorative justice. Not only did it ensure that criminals rehabilitated themselves, but it also ensured that they paid for their actions. The Bill included a number of measures which helped victims, one of which was mediation between them and the offender.

The government had taken various measures to protect vulnerable persons. He saw the Bill as a fine tuning of remission: it targeted recidivism and through the parole it ensured that criminals did not relapse.

Often criminals resorted to crime as the result of social problems. The parole, through the necessary supervision, offered criminals the chance to reform themselves.

He said that it should consider debating the issue of reducing the age of defilement of minors.

Concluding, Dr Debono said that plea bargaining, which was currently limited to the criminal courts, should be extended to the magisterial court.