Past their shelf life

Past their shelf life



By: Charles Hanson - HMP Blantyre House

Lifer Charles Hanson questions why the Prison Service has no coherent national policy or strategy for dealing with elderly prisoners.

In its obsessive and compulsive drive to promote notions of diversity, embracing and so-called ‘celebrating’ different needs and inclusion which, in its usual knee-jerk responses to specific minority interests always seems to place race, religion and sexual orientation above all else, the Prison Service has continually failed to recognise any other special needs group, and by far the most neglected has been the aged and disabled prisoner population.

For them, unless they fit nicely into a racial, religious or sexual orientation group, the best they can hope for is that they won’t be treated any less favourably than any group, and yet with age and disability cutting across all social and minority spheres and interests, the aged and disabled prisoners’ needs go largely unrecognised.

In fact by its own admissions and lack of a coherent national policy and strategy, within the Prison Service there are no special provisions for the aged prisoners, who are by far the fastest growing group of all offenders and in line with the current Home Office criteria on what defines an older prisoner, I refer to those over the age of fifty years.

Although fifty might seem a relatively young age, in current terms there are perhaps sound reasons why that should be the starting point, especially for prisoners; although a significantly number of the elderly prisoner group are over the age of sixty.

The reason for the increase in the number of elderly prisoners is the introduction of laws that require mandatory minimum or maximum sentences and prisoners in general serving longer terms. Thus they are remaining in prison longer and aging whilst in the system, and although the prison system is based on managing prisoners who are young when they enter that system and will still be young when released, elderly prisoners do not fit this model.

In 1971, a quarter of the nation was under the age of 16 whilst only 15 per cent were of pensionable age. Today, almost 12 million are of retirement age – representing some 20 per cent of the population and as special advisor at Help the Aged Mervyn Kohler said, “an ageing society is a fact of life which should be welcomed and embraced, not treated with concern”. In fact the Prison Service recognises neither the different needs of elderly prisoners, many who suffer from disability, or that there is a problem. It is very much a ‘bury one’s head in the sand’ approach, amounting to what one might argue is neglect.

Equality, inclusion and diversity for the elderly prisoner are meaningless concepts, for they don’t exist and the Prison Service has no idea how to formulate them.

The Department of Health National Service Framework for the care of older prisoners (2001) specifically refers to the wide range of health and social care needs, both whilst in prison and on release. Yet by 2004, the Framework had still not been adopted and older prisoners were being discharged into the community who did not appear to be subject to the single assessment process which is meant to identify their specific needs as recommended within that National Service Framework. Nothing has changed and perhaps nothing will until some years hence when the older prisoner population will rise to levels where policies to deal with them will be conveniently accelerated.

Although the UK is apt to follow the worst of US prison practices in sentencing policy and other practices, perhaps we can actually learn something from them in the treatment of older or disabled prisoners. For example, the Hocking Correctional facility in Ohio, formerly a hospital, houses the country’s oldest prison population. The establishment holds some 400 older medium to low risk offenders whose average age is 56.

The prison has a two-part pre-release programme specific to older prisoners, for those returning to the workforce, and those who will retire. Especially trained staff deal with the special needs of the elderly and the often feeble, hard of hearing and disabled prisoners; with local senior volunteer organisations working closely within the prison. Other states have similar regimes with wide-ranging activities for the elderly and infirm prisoner that are specific to this aged group.

Given the Prison Service’s apathy and concentration on that which does not extend to the relatively compliant aged prisoner group, the elderly prisoner might not have such longevity of life to witness the change so urgently needed to provide at least for some meaningful quality of life and the diversity which it so actively encourages for other groups.

The fact that it disregards the needs of the older and disabled prisoner, who is often regarded as having no ‘shelf life’ and unworthy of consideration, is a sad indictment of what one should come to expect in a civilised and humane society and that is perhaps no more than one should come to expect from a chaotic prison system which is more used to recycling and warehousing offenders through a revolving door so that they too might one day fall into the category of the aged offender.