| | | Books and arts | | | | | mere £3.5m a year from a budget of £2.8 |
| | | British prisons | | | | | billion. |
| | | Rambo’s lament | | 4 | | | Over and over again, Sir David lays the |
| | | Prisongate: The Shocking State of Britain’s | | | | | blame for the miserable performance of |
| | | Prisons and the Need for Visionary Change. | | | 50 | | the Prison Service not so much on those at |
| | | By David Ramsbotham. Free Press; 272 pages; | | | | | the bottom of the hierarchy as on those at |
| | | £20 | | | | | the top - the area managers, their |
| 1 | | | GOOD prisons, reformed prisoners, | | | | | superiors, the top civil servants and, not |
| | | dedicated prison officers, one honest | | | | | least, the ministers. These are the people |
| | | head of the prison service and a couple of | | | 55 | | who have read, or should have read, |
| | | decent prison ministers: all existed in the | | | | | report after report, study after study, all |
| 5 | | five years 5 up to July 2001 when Sir David | | | | | showing that you cannot cut reoffending |
| | | Ramsbotham was the chief inspector of | | | | | rates, let alone suicides, if you cram more |
| | | prisons for England, Wales and Northern | | | | | and more prisoners into understaffed jails |
| | | Ireland, and all receive his tribute in this | | | 60 | | designed (often 100 years or more ago) to |
| | | account of his experiences. But they were | | | | | hold a fraction of their present number |
| 10 | | the exceptions. The bulk of what this | | | | | and, more fundamentally, if you refuse to |
| | | former general found in the course of his | | | | | treat prisoners as human beings. The |
| | | 237 inspections was simply shameful. | | | | | upshot is hugely overcrowded prisons |
| 2 | | | Inevitably, the horror stories stand out: | | | 65 | | which allow fewer and fewer |
| | | the women who have to attend antenatal | | | | | opportunities for education, exercise or |
| 15 | | clinics in chains; the “cells little better | | | | | any other purposeful activity - the |
| | | than lavatories”; the 50% of children in | | | | | absolute prerequisite for any kind of |
| | | one institution who were released without | | | | | rehabilitation and thus for the claim that |
| | | knowing where they would spend their | | | 70 | | “prison works”. |
| | | first night of freedom. Tales of bullying, | | 5 | | | If only it did. The Home Office expects |
| 20 | | vindictiveness and inhumanity abound. | | | | | the prison population to rise to between |
| 3 | | | In some ways, though, the most | | | | | 91,400 and 109,600 by the end of the |
| | | depressing facts presented are the less | | | | | decade, compared with 44,566 ten years |
| | | eye-catching ones. Here is an example. | | | 75 | | ago. Since the cost of one new prison place |
| | | Clinical studies in many countries, reports | | | | | is now £100,000, the policy is sure to |
| 25 | | Sir David, have proved that correct | | | | | involve even more overcrowding, neglect, |
| | | nutrition is a cheap, humane and highly | | | | | degrading treatment - and crime. |
| | | effective way of reducing anti-social | | 6 | | | It would be nice to think that books like |
| | | behaviour. This was proved yet again in a | | | 80 | | Sir David’s might help avert this dismal |
| | | trial conducted with over 400 young | | | | | outcome. All past evidence suggests, |
| 30 | | offenders at an institution in Aylesbury. | | | | | however, that ministers will simply try to |
| | | Half were given a daily food supplement | | | | | cover up their failures by imposing |
| | | containing vitamins, minerals and fatty | | | | | meaningless targets and comparing the |
| | | acids, and the other half were not. Over | | | 85 | | quality of prisons on the basis of |
| | | the time of the trial, there was a 37% | | | | | procedures, not results. And it is a racing |
| 35 | | reduction in serious offences such as | | | | | certainty that they will not appoint as |
| | | violence in the group taking the | | | | | chief inspector another person, let alone a |
| | | supplement. “The Home Office response | | | | | general, so outspoken in the face of the |
| | | was to insist that its nominated expert | | | 90 | | waste, pointlessness and inhumanity that |
| | | should examine the result. He reported | | | | | seem to come with the job. Too bad - not |
| 40 | | that the data were 92% statistically pure, | | | | | least because the Prison Service has lots to |
| | | an almost unheard of score. However ... | | | | | learn from the army, which knows how to |
| | | both Home Office and Prison Service | | | | | turn immature young men into useful |
| | | remain obstinately opposed to accepting | | | 95 | | citizens, by building their self-confidence |
| | | the results or adopting the process more | | | | | through education, training and respect. |
| 45 | | widely” - though the cost would be a | | | | | The Economist |
