Wayne Bell — from parliamentary concern in 2019 to international human-rights scrutiny in 2026
Open Letter — 25th September 2026
To:
The Secretary of State for Justice, Alex Norris
Prisons Minister, Catherine McKinnell
Head of Public Protection Casework Section, Gordon Davison
Executive Director of HMPPS, Chris Jennings
Wayne Bell — from parliamentary concern in 2019 to international human-rights scrutiny in 2026
Wayne Bell’s case was raised in Parliament in 2019. His MP, Jeff Smith, told the House of Commons that Wayne was in the 12th year of a sentence with an original two-year tariff and that his significant mentalhealth illness had become so serious that he was unable to engage with the parole and review processes. Mr Smith specifically warned that prisoners with mental-health problems could become trapped in a vicious cycle in which their mental health deteriorated and they became increasingly unable to progress towards release.
Imprisonment for Public Protection Volume 658: debated on Tuesday 23 April 2019
The Government responded by referring to the IPP Action Plan, including psychological case reviews, specialist progression regimes and improved access to rehabilitative programmes.
In June 2019, the Minister also acknowledged that Wayne’s case was concerning and said that he was receiving mental-health treatment in an appropriate setting.
Imprisonment for Public Protection Volume 661: debated on Tuesday 11 June 2019
Seven years later, Wayne’s current circumstances raise the question of what has actually changed.
Wayne has spent years affected by serious mental-health difficulties. His family have described the devastating impact this has had, including the period of five years when he was in a mental-health hospital and his mother, Diane Bell, says that she was denied access and contact with her son. She was told by medical staff that Wayne didn’t want to see her, but Diane disputes this, as she says Wayne would not have had the mental capacity to make such a decision. The last time she saw Wayne was from the outside of the hospital, looking in at the window to Wayne, they both touched hands either side of the glass window. A tear ran down Wayne’s face and Diane his mum described him as someone who looked so thin and frail as someone who was in a Nazi concentration camp.
Despite years of mental-health treatment including Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT for short, is a treatment that involves sending an electric current through your brain. This causes a brief surge of electrical activity within your brain (also known as a seizure). The aim is to relieve severe symptoms of some mental health problem). Wayne has now ended up back in prison and, according to his family, is once again living within the general prison population while still suffering from serious mental-health illness.
That is why Wayne’s case cannot simply be treated as an old individual case from 2019.
It is a case that allows us to examine whether the promises made about the IPP Action Plan and the treatment of mentally ill IPP prisoners have actually translated into lasting change.
The issue has now also moved into the international human-rights arena.
The UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention (WGAD) has found, in its 2026 opinion concerning a number of IPP prisoners, that the detention complained of was arbitrary and has called for urgent steps in relation to named individuals.
Wayne Bell’s circumstances form part of the wider evidence we are bringing forward about the continuing impact of the IPP system.
In addition, the Habeas Corpus proceedings now being pursued in the High Court provide another important legal route through which the lawfulness of continued detention under the IPP system is being challenged.
I have also now brought Wayne Bell’s case directly to the attention of the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture, Mr Pau Pérez-Sales, following my correspondence with Dr Alice Edwards, the former Special Rapporteur on Torture. Dr Alice Edwards confirmed that she had asked the OHCHR secretariat to pass my messages concerning these issues to the new Special Rapporteur on Torture, Mr Pau Pérez-Sales.
This means that Wayne’s case is no longer simply a matter being raised by his family and campaigners with successive Ministers and prison authorities. It has been raised in Parliament through the IPP Action Plan and Government policy; and now directly with the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture.
The question that therefore needs answering is simple but profound:
How can Wayne Bell have been identified in Parliament as a seriously mentally ill IPP prisoner trapped by the very system that was supposed to provide a route towards release, yet seven years later still be suffering the consequences of that system and be back in prison?
Wayne’s case is particularly important because it demonstrates why the Government cannot simply point to the existence of an IPP Action Plan as evidence that the problem has been resolved.
If the IPP Action Plan is presented by the Ministry of Justice as evidence of progress, how can Wayne Bell’s continuing circumstances be explained?
The Government cannot reasonably point simply to the existence of an Action Plan as proof that the underlying problem has been solved. What matters is whether those measures have produced meaningful outcomes for individual prisoners, particularly those whose mental illness prevents them from engaging with the conventional progression and parole system.
The Government itself acknowledged in 2019 that IPP prisoners with mental-health difficulties could become trapped in a vicious cycle. The then Minister later acknowledged in Parliament that Wayne Bell’s case was concerning and said he understood that Wayne was receiving treatment in an appropriate setting.
Yet Wayne's subsequent return to prison raises the question of what happened after that intervention, whether his treatment and progression were sustained, and why a prisoner whose mental-health difficulties had already been identified years earlier remains caught within the IPP system in 2026.
This is particularly significant because the current IPP Action Plan continues to describe measures intended to support prisoners towards safe release, including psychological support, progression and getting prisoners into the appropriate establishments to access rehabilitation.
The Government's 2024–25 annual report describes the refreshed Action Plan as containing measurable targets and actions intended to produce changes in the IPP population.
Wayne Bell’s case therefore should not simply be treated as an isolated historical case. It should be examined as a test of whether the policy framework has actually worked for mentally ill IPP prisoners over the period in which the Government has repeatedly relied upon the Action Plan.
The British Psychological Society has republished material reinforcing the position that IPP sentences are psychologically harmful. If the sentence itself is capable of causing significant psychological harm, how can a prisoner be expected to effectively engage in treatment, rehabilitation and programmes where the psychological impact of the sentence is itself contributing to the very presentation or needs that those interventions are intended to address?
While the Government considers what it is doing to address the ongoing position of people serving IPP
sentences, the current action plan does not appear capable of reaching people in Mr Bell’s position, nor those who are Category A, or those in secure hospitals.
There is therefore a serious question as to whether the current approach has a discriminatory effect on people whose mental health, disability or particular custodial circumstances prevent them from accessing the very pathways upon which progression and release depend.
If, after seven years of repeated Government assurances, a seriously mentally ill IPP prisoner can spend years in psychiatric care, lose meaningful family contact, remain unable to progress through the ordinary parole process and ultimately find himself back in prison with the general population, then the Government needs to explain precisely what the Action Plan has achieved in his case.
An Action Plan cannot be regarded as successful merely because actions have been written into a policy document. Its success must ultimately be measured by what happens to the people it was created to help. Wayne Bell's case raises serious questions about whether that test has been met.
For Wayne and his family, the issue is not an action plan on paper. It is whether a seriously mentally ill man, whose situation was known to Government seven years ago, has actually been given a safe, lawful and humane route out of indefinite imprisonment.
Shirley Debono
IPP Committee in Action
https://ippcommitteeinaction.com