Prison and the Feminine Touch

It's always interesting when the prison crisis features in the financial press. This from the FT:- 

Jailers and reformers at odds over cash cure for prison chaos

Austerity has left institutions understaffed, overcrowded and beset by drug problems

When inspectors visited Bedford prison last month, the conditions took them by surprise. Rats and cockroaches scuttled through cells and corridors, while smoke from drug consumption pervaded the wings. There was a “dangerous lack of control” and the number of assaults by inmates on staff was higher than at any other jail in England and Wales. 

For the fourth time in less than a year, the inspectorate invoked an emergency protocol requiring an urgent response from the justice secretary on what steps he would take to stabilise the prison. The rapid decline in standards at facilities such as Bedford has fuelled calls for help for prisons in next week’s Budget. Between 2010 and 2015, the peak years of austerity, the Prison Service lost a quarter of its budget and nearly 30 per cent of its staff. A drive to recruit more officers is boosting numbers again, but the loss of veteran staff has left newer hires struggling to control increased violence and drug-taking.

Persistently high inmate populations mean that well over half of jails in England and Wales are overcrowded. Meanwhile, physical conditions have deteriorated to the extent that inspectors at Bedford logged 600 outstanding repairs. The question now for ministers is whether putting cash back into the system will help undo the damage — and if so, where new resources should be focused. The most obvious priority for investment is staff. Ministers passed their target in April to recruit 2,500 new prison officers, but as even more are recruited, plunging morale is driving experienced employees from the service. According to the Ministry of Justice, the number of middle-ranking prison officers who left in the year to June was up by 10 per cent on the previous 12 months, and of these, a higher proportion were resignations than the year before.

One prison officer told the Financial Times that the flood of young recruits, and particularly women, had transformed the composition of staff so dramatically that jails “now look more like nightclubs”. Inspectors noted that 77 per cent of prison officers at Bedford had less than one year’s service. The answer, according to the unions, is to divert funds towards retention. Mark Fairhurst, national chair of the POA, the prison officers’ association, said that if ministers wanted better results from prison officers “they need to pay them more at all levels, and return the pension age to 60, from 68”, he said. “There need to be proper incentives to go into the prison service and stay there.” Frances Crook, chief executive of the Howard League for Penal Reform, agreed. “What’s missing at the moment is those well-remunerated middle-managers, many of whom were lost in the early round of cuts,” she said.

Another key area for investment is physical infrastructure. Prisons minister Rory Stewart has already announced a £10m programme to introduce airport-style body scanners and sniffer dogs to prevent drugs being smuggled into 10 jails in England and Wales with some of the most acute problems. But the prison officers union argued that if the government was serious about stopping drugs, it had to go further, extending the rollout of body scanners to all adult male prisons and bringing in technology to block signals from mobile phones and drones, which are essential to maintaining drugs supply. The Howard League, however, is wary of such spending. “Do you need to spend money on all this security? Or do you just get prisoners out of their cells and give them something to do all day?,” asked Ms Crook. “Young men who are locked in their cells doing nothing except watching daytime television are going to get angry and are more likely to take drugs . . . the devil makes work for idle hands.”

At Bedford, some prisoners are allowed access to education and work activities, but nearly 40 per cent of inmates are locked up during the working day. Ms Crook suggested that providing better conditions for prisoners — such as clean toilets, in-cell phones to call their families, and purposeful activities — would be better solutions to drug-taking than expensive deterrent tactics. 

Neither the Treasury nor the justice ministry would comment on the Budget. However, Ms Crook added that while investment might ameliorate some of the problems in prisons, “it won’t solve them”. The more intractable issue is the high prison population, which stands just above 83,000, having risen by a third in the past two decades. Ken Clarke — the justice secretary who oversaw the first round of budget cuts in 2010 — agreed to significant cost savings partly because he intended to bring down the number of people in jail. Subsequent Conservative justice secretaries have continued the austerity regime, but without the same drive to cut the population.

While the easiest solution politically would be to reduce the number of inmates on short sentences, this is unlikely to have much of an effect because the population growth has been driven by a 40 per cent increase in those on longer sentences of four years or more since austerity began. This could be tackled by changes to future sentencing policy — which would take several years to show results — or changes to existing sentences, which would prove much more contentious. Nick Hardwick, the former chief inspector of prisons, said it was “critical” that ministers combined any new spending with finding a way round the population deadlock if prisons were to start functioning. “We need to get the finances right and achieve a sustainable population,” he said. “We have to find a way of creating some space in the system again.”

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I notice BBC Radio 4 Woman's Hour has recently covered the subject of prison and female staff:- 

The women who want to work in a male prison

The prison service in England and Wales is in crisis, amid reports of widespread problems with drugs and violence in numerous jails. Three women explain why they want a job working behind bars in a men-only prison.

The word "misunderstood" is tattooed in pink along Charmaine's arm. It's in memory of her friend who was murdered. Her friend had the same tattoo done before she was killed. "I can't really say what it means," admits Charmaine. "Some people think it's from a song, but I think it's more to do with how my friend saw herself as a person." She describes her as being like a sister. "We did everything together. She was my world."

The tattoo is now motivating Charmaine in her new career. She's just become a prison officer. "If my friend knew I would eventually become a prison officer, she would have told me I was mad and needed my head testing." But it was something Charmaine's mother said that stayed with her. "After my friend's death it took me some time to really think straight but my mother told me once that everyone deserves a second chance. I couldn't think about anything else except how much I hated my friend's attacker, but after a year or so I started to think about what my mother said. I decided I would try and make a difference and become a prison officer."

We have agreed not to use Charmaine's surname - or the surnames of the other women featured in this piece - for security reasons. I met Charmaine when she was in training at Newbold Revel, an 18th Century, Grade II listed country house in Warwickshire. She's 50 years old and a mother and grandmother and used to be a painter and decorator on building sites, where she was the only woman. Charmaine decided she wanted to try something new after having one too many accidents while painting, so recently she's been working in a prison to get the feel of it, before committing to it completely.

She says she's ready for the challenge and feels confident that she can cope with violence or incidents of self-harm, partly because she's already had some personal experience of it. "My brother and nephew took their own lives. It's not something I'm scared of. I know I can deal with it and be sympathetic and compassionate to the family, but it's hard."

She says her life experience will definitely play a part in her new role. "You're seeing youngsters come into the prison for the first time and it's nerve-wracking for them. You need someone with motherly instincts who can pick up if someone's upset." Charmaine has been a victim of crime. She was also in an abusive relationship and ended up at a refuge. Even so, she prefers to think about prison as a place of rehabilitation rather than punishment. "Prison teaches them not to go back out and reoffend. We try and teach them that what they've done is not a good thing, and then help them go back into society and be a better person."

Training alongside Charmaine is Sally, 49, and Calypso, 24. Sally had a career in banking and then local government, while Calypso has been doing bar work as well as an Open University forensic psychology degree. As trainees, they all spend 10 weeks at Newbold Revel, although the full training is 12 weeks long. It's a mixture of classroom theory and practical exercises using role play. Recruits learn cuffing, cell-searching, locking and unlocking doors, as well as how to deal with confrontation and communicate well.

Charmaine, Sally and Calypso start their new careers at a point when prisons are feeling the strain. There's evidence of an increase in sexual violence between inmates and there have been stark warnings about rising violence and drug use behind bars. Because of the number of people leaving the service, the government aims to train 5,200 new prison officers this year and says it is on track to meet the target. The trio are also joining a male-dominated industry. According to the latest figures, there are about 21,600 prison officers in England and Wales. Just over a quarter of those are women.

Despite the challenges, all three women say they're positive about their next step, insisting they're not naïve. "I really believe in what I'm doing," Sally says. "For me, there are no rose-tinted glasses. I'm excited because I know there's a rehabilitation culture in prison. That's what brings change and that excites me. Yes, there'll be challenges, but those challenges are opportunities."

"It is risky," admits Calypso, "but that doesn't put me off because a lot of it is to do with your interpersonal skills. "It's not about how big and tough you are. If I can help just one person, I've done my job in life."