"At my trial Judge Drake gave a minimum tariff, and providing that during your jail you do nothing wrong that is how long you do. I was given 25 years. This was then sent to the Lord Chief Justice to be rubber stamped. Lord Lane said he agreed with the 25 year tariff. 

So as far as I was concerned I had to serve 25 years and I’d be let out on parole to serve my life license outside. Very few lifers are kept in forever. When I got my life sentence most lifers then were serving between 8 and 12 years, so 25 years was massive.

Eleven years into my sentence I was called up to the psychology office in Long Lartin, about 8 different people were there and it was very odd. The number one Governor said ‘I don’t know how to break this to you but Michael Howard, (who was Home Secretary at the time) has ruled that you must die in jail.’

I appealed this ruling last year and I knew that the appeal court would not act on this as it was too political so they kicked it up the line to The European Court who have now agreed to prioritise my case. This ruling will just confirm how cruel the authorities are telling a man he is to die in jail as hope is what keeps the human spirit alive – without hope there is nothing. It is only because I am strong that I can and could see beyond the action of Michael Howard in telling me my last breath would be staring at a prison door".

Convicted murderer Jeremy Bamber has been stabbed in the neck in prison by a fellow inmate.

Bamber was taken to hospital after the attack, at HM Prison Full Sutton near York.

He had been on the telephone at the time of the assault. He needed stitches to the back of his neck, but has now returned to the jail and is recovering in the hospital wing.

Bamber yesterday said that he did not know the prisoner who attacked him, and he had no idea what the reason was. He was convicted in 1986 of killing his adoptive parents June and Nevill Bamber, sister Sheila and her twin six-year-old sons Daniel and Nicholas.

They were all shot dead at White House Farm in Tolleshunt D'Arcy. Bamber has continued to protest his innocence and is currently seeking a fresh appeal against his conviction.

The Criminal Cases Review Commission is currently looking into submissions made by Bamber's legal team, and will be making a decision in due course on whether to send the case back to the Court of Appeal.

Published Monday May 31, 2004