Jailhouselawyer's Blog

More people in UK prisons than ever before, states the Daily Torygraph headline, 29/11/2006. It makes a refreshing change to see prisoners referred to as people. They are precisely that, every one of them is someone's grandfather, grandmother, father, mother, brother, sister, son or daughter. They are not scum, or whatever some newspapers and some people prefer to call them. They are, bottom line, human beings. And, as such, are entitled not to be treated as sardines in a can. The system cannot cope with 80,000 prisoners. The prisons in the system were not designed or built to house 2 or 3 inmates in a space only fit to house one person. What we have at present is large scale inhumanity towards man. The public should be screaming out, not in our name. But, the public voice is mute on this issue. However, I have heard the welcome voice of Rachel from North London speaking out about this disgrace.

What has the government done about the impending crises. Nothing, until it was too late. Then the Home Secretary, John Reid, belatedly decides to act. He does not release from prison all those who do not need or deserve to be there, rather, he decides to use police cells to house the over flow. This means that the police do not have the cell spaces available to house those who might need locking up until they go through the due process, so the police do not police and some people who deserve to be arrested do not get arrested. I fail to see how this equates with public protection. The Torygraph reports that John Reid has met with penal experts and criminologists from Britain and Europe to discuss the way forward for prison policy. He has not met with me, bigger fool him, as I do have expertise in this area, and his going around in circles is not the best way forward. It is ironic that prisoners walk around in circles on the prison exercise yard. John Reid is a prisoner of his own stupidity. What is needed is a radical approach.

The government has rightly diagnosed that the general public has lost confidence in the Criminal Justice System. So, the government is thinking up ways to deceive the general public into having more confidence in the system. There is that old saying that you can fool some of the people all of the time but not all of the people all of the time. Community penalties are a good thing, but the government PR scheme appears to be in tatters. The public has been lied to too often to trust in what the government has to say. Iraq is just one example. Whenever I hear John Reid speak about policies designed to protect the public, I cringe because if you look closely you will see that what he advocates is not protecting the public, rather, the policy is about depriving the public of civil liberties.

John Reid is asking the question, how can we reduce reoffending. Well, John, for a starters, I would reduce the prison population to a manageable size. Face it, its unmanageable in its present state. By adopting a reductionist policy instead of expansionism, this breathing space will allow prison officers and professionals to work with prisoners on a one to one basis and in small groups. This works better than just locking them up and throwing away the key until it is time to release them. You need to win the hearts and minds of the public not at large, you cannot do this by ignoring them except to treat them as being less than human beings.

Another question John Reid is asking is how the system can control the most dangerous offenders. My experience is that the situation is usually dangerous and not the offender. For example, a car with no brakes parked on a hill is safe enough whilstever the brick is underneath the front tyre. Remove the brick and the situation then becomes dangerous because the car is now out of control. There are some people for whom prison is the only safe place available. This is an inescapable fact. However, the number who cannot ever be released is small and managable. So is the number who must serve a very long time before they may be deemed acceptably safe to be released. As each individual is precisely that, it is pointless having a regime which, in effect, says one size must fit all. I recall being asked which route I wished to take through my life sentence, and when I replied the education route, the Prison Service spent the next 10 years denying me education, as a result they had a control problem for those 10 years. I was right all along, had I been listened to, both sides could have saved having to do battle, as the price of my not being a control problem was to better myself by education. I do not believe that I asked too much and that the price was too high to pay. I proved that reform can work if you give it a chance and take the rehabilitation issue seriously. The punishment is the sentence handed down in court, not what people feel should be inflicted upon prisoners who are at their mercy and are at the mercy of the State.

John Reid is also looking for answers to how they can balance the need to deter with the necessity to punish. There is general and individual deterrence. Most people are deterred by the law, it is usually the individual deterrence which needs to be examined. Having the desire to be too punitive, in the first instance, instead of using prison as a last resort, tends to be counter productive. The going off the rails tends to be in early childhood and schooling. By the time one is caught in the Criminal Justice trap it is often too late. The person has already suffered and the punishment only serves to make the person worse. I recall my barrister in 1971, telling the trial judge that I needed help, to which the judge replied, he will get all the help he needs in prison. The judge was wrong, as the help was not available and I got worse over the years. Luckily, it was not too late for me, but most offenders give up hope that they will receive the help they need. There needs to be individual treatment for individual cases.

The public has to make up its mind. Do they wish to continue being vindictive and losing out, or do they want a system that works and benefits all?