Building prisons in England and Wales the bigger the better?

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Number 05646, 12 February 2016 10 The reaction to David Cameron’s speech was generally positive, although some commentators pointed to potential pitfalls and problems to be overcome. Frances Crook, the chief executive of the Howard League for Penal Reform, welcomed the speech, saying that it created an opportunity for “radical and rational thinking”, although prison reform was the tip of the iceberg and issues such as sentence inflation and overuse of prison needed urgent action: 18 "Prisons are currently violent and overcrowded. As such, they fail everyone: victims, the public, staff and prisoners themselves. "Prison reform, however, is the tip of the iceberg. Improved education and increased autonomy for governors will not work if there are people crammed into filthy institutions with no staff to open the cell doors. We need action now to tackle sentence inflation and the profligate use of prison. Then the Prime Minister's vision can become a reality.” 19 The Roman Catholic bishop of Arundel and Brighton, the church’s lead bishop for prisons in England and Wales, also welcomed the speech, describing the treatment of prisoners as a “pressing moral challenge”: In a statement, Bishop Richard Moth of Arundel and Brighton said he was “very encouraged by the Prime Minister’s commitment to reforming our prison system and his recognition that prisoners should be treated as assets to our society rather than liabilities to be managed. How we treat prisoners is one of the most pressing moral challenges today and something that none of us should ignore.” 20 Writing on the Conservative Home website, the associate director for public services at the Institute for Public Policy Research, Jonathan Clifton, agreed that prisons were currently not providing an effective service, but argued that league tables and the like could only go so far in raising standards, because so many factors – such as sentencing decisions – were outside prison governors’ control: [The reforms] all hold much promise for the prison system – giving governors stronger incentives and more freedom to tailor their prison regimes towards rehabilitation can only be a good thing. Anything that promotes transparency in our closed prison system should be welcomed. But as Gove discovered with his school reforms, autonomy and league tables can only go so far in the face of major structural challenges. Many of the problems facing our prison system are linked to factors that lie outside of the control of prison governors – such as the sentencing decisions made by courts, funding cuts to the 18 The issue of ratcheting-up of sentences is discussed in the Commons Library briefing Reducing reoffending: the “what works” debate (RP12/73, 23 November 2012): see in particular chapter 3 on the competing views of prison, influences on sentencing decisions and whether reducing the prison population could be a matter of political will. 19 Howard League for Penal Reform media release, Howard League responds to Prime Minister’s prison reform proposals, 8 February 2016 20 “Bishop ‘encouraged’ by David Cameron’s plan for prison reform”, Catholic Herald online, 9 February 2016
11 Building prisons in England and Wales: the bigger, the better? ministry of justice, and the quality of probation and community services that could tackle the underlying causes of crime. 21 Some commentators were more sceptical about the Prime Minister’s commitment to reform. An article on the Spectator’s blog questioned David Cameron’s commitment to prison reform and quoted the views of the director of the Prison Reform Trust: His motives may seem worthy but it’s arguable he is merely paying lip service to an issue which has been bubbling along under his watch for years. That much appeared to be the view of the Prison Reform Trust’s Juliet Lyon. Speaking on Today, Lyon criticised the PM for turning late to the issue. (…) Juliet Lyon was then asked what she made of the reforms. She said: ‘If it is genuinely part of a social legacy programme then it is welcome.’ (…) But as with his criticism of Oxford [for not admitting more students from black and minority ethnic backgrounds], which seemed to spring out of nowhere, so, too, his labelling of the state of prisons as ‘scandalous’ looks like a nod to legacy rather than a view based on genuine desire to reform. The Prison Officers’ Association warned in 2012 that jails were in a state of ‘crisis’. Four years on, without another election to fight, the PM says he keen to do something about it. But is it too late to take him seriously? 22 Laura Bates of the Everyday Sexism project, argued that David Cameron’s planned reforms, to take mothers and babies out of the prison environment, did not go far enough and more would need to be done, to provide both preventative work and suitable alterative provision for mothers who offend. 23 21 Jonathan Clifton: How progressive are the Prime Minister’s prison reforms?, Conservative Home, 8 February 2016 22 Tom Goodenough, “Are we really supposed to believe David Cameron cares about reforming prisons?”, Spectator blog online, 8 February 2016 23 Laura Bates, “Babies behind bars: why Cameron’s support of prison reform falls short”, Guardian online, 11 February 2016
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