I live in fear of 1 phone call after finding my son skeletal like a starved dog

A heartbroken mother fears the only way her eldest son will be allowed out of prison will be in a coffin, after being given a jail sentence with no release date. Yusuf Ali was told in 2008 he must serve a minimum of three years behind bars when he was given an imprisonment for public protection sentence (IPP) for seriously injuring another prisoner. But 17 years on, after several failed parole bids, he is still in prison.

IPP sentences were abolished in 2012, but not retrospectively meaning that Mr Ali is one of thousands still serving time as a result. The campaign for the IPP sentence to be fully abolished and for the remaining prisoners to be resentenced has the backing of the family of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who had massive public and political support when she was detained in Iran. And Lord Anthony Woodley has introduced a Bill in Parliament to resentence IPP prisoners.

But Mr Ali's mother, Jacqueline, fears that even if this becomes law, any changes will come too late for her son.

Speaking exclusively to the Daily Express, she said: "I am anxious that the changes they keep talking about will come far too late for Yusuf.

"I worry that he only has days left to live because he's not eating and drinking. He's given up hope of ever being released. I live in fear of getting the call that he has passed away or, due to my ill-health, my body will give up and I will die before him."

The last time she saw her eldest son was when he had been on a hunger strike for two months, and she says the prison only told her about it to see if she could persuade him to eat again.

Mrs Ali said: "When he phones up now, it's so bad. He said to me, Mum, I can't take it anymore. They're pushing me to commit suicide. That's what they want."

Mrs Ali said: "When he went on a 61-day hunger strike, they didn't tell me until the 61st day. I went to the prison.

"I had to see him behind a closed door, and he looked like a skeleton on the floor.

"He was like a starved dog. It took my breath away. I was so hurt. But I could understand because he'd been telling me before what they'd been doing to him.

"I could understand why he did it. And I said to him, I totally understand why you're doing this."

IPP prisoners are supposed to do a series of courses to satisfy the parole board that they aren't a threat to the public and are ready for release.

But Mrs Ali, from Bournemouth, says these courses rarely exist in prisons, and if they do, she says they are oversubscribed, or the teachers don't turn up.

The 66-year-old said: "So it's really hard. It's really difficult. I just would like to know if any of these MPs have children, do they have any empathy? Do they know what it's like? It's not just our children being in prison. It's what they're going through in prison. Every day is a battle."

Mrs Ali had her son when she was 14, and says they both had a troubled time in the care system.

She added: "Both of us were in care. He was actually conceived in care. But I kept him with me. But when he got to 14, he got into trouble."

He was first locked up when he was a teenager for betting shop robberies, using a stick in a bag as an imitation firearm.

In the years after his release, he committed crimes including driving offences, robbery, and burglary.

This led to him being given an automatic "two-strike" life sentence, with a minimum term of five years and seven months. The automatic life sentence came into force in the UK in 1997 and was in force until 2005, when it was replaced by IPP.

Mrs Ali said: "He's been in there 27 years now. He's 15 years over his tariff. It's a long, long time. And that was not only his youth, it's his 20s, his 30s, his 40s. He's been in prison.

"It's heartbreaking. Yusuf has got a son. He thought he would go in for three years and come out and be home for that boy.

"That boy is now a man. It's heartbreaking. My heart is broken. They're never going to be able to put it back together. They're never going to be able to put Yusuf back together.

"They've broken us. But just let us have a little bit of time together on this Earth because I don't know how long I've got.

"How much more punishment can you give him? For what? People who have raped and murdered and cut up their wives or beat people or murdered people, they're getting out in two to three or four years.

"My son hasn't done any of those things. He's never murdered anyone, never raped anyone."

A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: "It is right that IPP sentences were abolished, but public safety must come first.

"Every IPP prisoner is entitled to a parole review at least every two years - and no one is kept in prison unless the independent Parole Board judges they still pose a serious risk."