PRIVATE PRISON COMPANIES MERGE
According to the Financial Times, tow of the world's largest private prison operators, GEO Group and Cornell Companies have agreed to merge. GEO, which runs about 60 prisons, detention centres and secure mental health facilities worldwide, including Harmondsworth and Campsfield IRCs in the UK, have offered $385m for Cornell, which operates 68 facilities across the States, and take on $300m of Cornell's debts. The resulting company will manage and/or own 97 prisons and detention facilities with a total of approximately 76,000 beds and 32 'behavioural health' facilities, totaling approximately 5,000 beds, and GEO's annual revenues are slated to increase by $400m to more than $1.5bn. [21/04/10]
THE NON-SCANDAL OF 'STATE-SPONSORED DRUG DEALING'
Home Office research has shown that the risk of death amongst ex-prisoners during their first week of freedom is 40 times higher than the general population. This is believed to be largely down to drug-related deaths, people hitting the streets with a lowered tolerance and going back to using the amount of drugs they were previously used to. Of course we are talking about things like heroin and crack here, not the previous drug of choice in UK prisons cannabis. The reason why cons plumped for dope was because it chilled you out and made the interminable hours banged up in your cell seem much shorter. Plus of course there was the whole social thing of getting stoned together and laughing insanely at the same apparently unfunny situations, a definite icebreaker in a situation where the tensions of close confinement with loads of unfamiliar faces and general clashes of personality could result in serious consequences.
Then came the introduction of (not-so) voluntary and mandatory drug testing regimes (VDT & MDT) and, because of the happenstance of heroin passing through the body much faster than cannabis and therefore being less likely to be detected, smack becoming the prisoners' drug of choice. This move towards heroin use was also assisted by a number of other factors: the fact that smack was weigh-for-weight more valuable than the dope it replaced; the increasing crackdowns on drugs being smuggled into prisoners by visitors and the resulting scarcity inside prison walls, which in turn allowed the trade to be cornered by the more ruthless prisoners, massively increasing drug-related 'taxing', bullying and violence.
The end result helped speed a parallel breakdown in general prisoner solidarity that occurred post-Woolf and with the ensuing introduction of the Incentives and Earned Privileges Scheme. That, and the increase in the number of people going into prison straight and coming out fully fledged junkies, together with the high number of prisoners already on methadone replacement programmes entering prison and being kept on a maintenance dose and the stark absence of coherent treatment programmes across the prison estate, have all resulted in widespread confusion amongst prisons and prisoner advocates alike about how to tackle the prisons' 'drugs problem'.
For most of the past decade, the Scottish Prison Service has been operating a 'retoxification' programme for selected prisoners using methadone to try and reduce the numbers of drug-related deaths amongst newly released prisoners. This has operated against a background where 55% of people entering prisons in the UK are generally classed as problematic drug users, where 69% of prisoners in Scottish prisons admit to having used drugs in the 12 months previous to being imprisoned and where a 2008 survey found that 28% of serving prisoners admitted having used drugs in the previous month. {Bromley Briefing Nov 2009]
On this 'retox' programme, prisoners facing release and thought to be likely to return to heroin use are assessed by psychologists and drug counsellors and, if it is decided that there is a strong possibility of renewed heroin use, the soon-to-be-prisoner is offered a place on the voluntary programme tailored to their previous history of drug use.
When news of this programme 'leaked' out in 2002 it caused a certain amount of outrage amongst politicians playing to the gallery, but was quickly forgotten as in practice it proved less than controversial. Now the Sun, with its usual flare for creating a reactionary mountain out of a very small liberal molehill, has splashed news of the English and Welsh version of the scheme across its pages, in what it claims is an exclusive. Under the headline 'Jails put lags back on drugs', replete with the de rigueur posed photo depicting the 'reality' behind the story, this one of a baseball-capped chav quaffing a small container of green liquid (could be night Nurse or even Absinthe!) in what is supposed to be a prison cell.
The article declares: Our fight for the truth
"The Sun was tipped off by a senior police source - but repeatedly given the runaround by the justice Ministry and Health Department.
Civil servants blocked us at every turn. Finally we hit England's 145 Primary Care Trusts with a Freedom of Information request.
The secret was out."
"DRUG-free cons are secretly being turned BACK into junkies by prison medics before going free - with the Government's blessing. The controversial treatment - called "retoxification" - has seen more than 460 lags released across England hooked on drugs such as heroin substitute methadone. Amazingly the campaign - trumpeted as for their own benefit - has been going on for FIVE YEARS."
So in reality, that's 92 prisoners a year amongst a prisoner population of 84,000 or 0.1% of that prison population. And if one relates that figure to the 135,000 or so people who enter prison in England and Wales each year, its only 0.07%. Given how few prisoners that actually is and the cost of a few weeks of methadone for each of these prisoner, it hardly comes out as much of a cost to the tax payers the Sun appears to be worry about. But then again, given the tabloid press' general hostility to prisoners, the Sun would rather have dead prisoners littering the streets than anything humane like a rational policy of "state-sponsored drug dealing". [07/04/10]
BEAM PARK WEST PRISON SITE REJECTED
Plans for the building of one of the government's 'mini-Titan' prisons at the old Beam Park West Ford's factory site in Barking, East London, have been dropped according to the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) in statement on 12 February. The main reason cited was "the potential cost of mitigating flood risk". This is no surprise as the site is only 4 metres above sea level - the adjacent road being called Marsh Way is a bit of a giveaway!
The MoJ also claimed that they had "taken into account the views expressed by local residents" and Labour's local Dagenham MP Jon Cruddas was quick to claim the decision as "a huge victory for people power - thousands of local people signed up to the campaign and said no to Dagenham prison." However, given that Jack Straw is alleged to have told a Prison Reform Trust meeting that the Barking site was chosen to provide jobs to tempt potential unemployed voters into becoming screws rather than joining the BNP, Cruddas may not feel so cock-a-hoop come election night.
One place where local opposition clearly did not sway the Ministry's decision is in Chelmsford where the MoJ submitted plans to the local Council last month for the second 'mini-Titan', on the site of the former Runwell Secure Psychiatric Hospital, announced along side Barking last April. The MoJ rather disingenuously claim that the new prison "should create more than 800 new jobs and generate approximately £17.1 million in annual revenue for the local economy if it gets the go-ahead." This form of bribery is always used with prison building schemes but evidence from around the world shows that the claims rarely hold true.
So the MoJ are now looking for another site in the capital, as "there is a significant shortfall of prison places in London, so sites in and around London remain a priority." And other priority areas on their books for the other 3 planned mini-Titans are North Wales, the North West and West Yorkshire, so beware as a new prison could be coming to a site near you. [18/02/10]
ANOTHER DISTURBANCE AT HMP ADDIEWELL
Two prison officers were injured in yet another disturbance at HMP Addiewell in West Lothian last night. The incident happen on the same Lomond B Hall as last November's incident and involved either 10 "actively" involved prisoners or "more than 100 inmates", depending on whether one believes the official Lothian and Borders police statement or the Evening Times ('Scotland's top selling evening paper').
The incident was believed to have occurred when a prisoner was informed by one of the officers that his methadone prescription was being reduced. Prisoners then barricaded themselves on the wing. A Kalyx is quoted as saying, “We can confirm that a contained incident, involving a small number of prisoners, took place in one of the wings at HMP Addiewell on the evening of Monday 25th January and was brought under control last night. There has been minor damage caused, mainly as a result of burst pipes." Although one screw at the jail described the scene as “total carnage” with trashed furniture and daubed the walls with graffiti. [26/01/10]
RETURN OF THE PRISON HULKS?
The Tories' prison plans for the next parliament, should they be voted in, appear to have sunk even further into the mire. They have already had to drop their plans to gazump Labour's prison building plans by 5,000 new places because of certain accounting difficulties, a combination of their miscalculating the amount of money they could realistically raise from their idea to sell off 30 Victorian inner city prisons (most of which are listed buildings) to finance the plans and the global financial crisis, or as Cameron would like to have it Labour had already “adopted our policy.”
Hot on the heels of that climb down comes an internal row about the possible use of prison ships to fill the gap between available prison beds and the extra spaces needed for Tory plans to keep people locked up for even longer periods by introducing minimum-maximum sentences and the scraping of the early release scheme. In keeping with the oxymoronic level of such debate, the Conservative spokesperson claimed that there was a “need for extra capacity in view of tougher and more 'honest' sentencing plans the Conservatives intend to introduce".
The Tories have latched on to the fact that 75,000 prisoners have been released early since Gordon Brown came became Prime Minister and that 1,500 offences have been committed by those on early release. However this means the recidivism rate is only 2%! And given that the maximum period of early release is 18 days, this compares favourably with the fact that 47% of adult prisoners are reconvicted within one year of being released.
The last floating jail, HMP The Weare, originally a troop ship in the Falklands War and a floating jail in the US, was sold in 2005 after eight years holding 400 prisoners at a time off Portland, Dorset. Its use was roundly condemned by prisoners and the Inspectorate, the later denouncing it unfit for purpose because of the lack of access to fresh air and exercise. One possible way of doing it on the cheap rather than buying a new prison ship or leasing it might be to employ the sort of converted containers that are currently being used to expand prison cell numbers up and down the country on a docked container ship. If it works on dry land, then why not on water?
According to senior shadow cabinet members, the plan is the idea of Cameron's communications chief, Andy Coulson and the senior policy team that have spent the last four years cobbling together a prisons policy only to see it torpedoed by an ex-Tabloid editor a la Alastair Campbell is particularly galling. One of those apparently less than pleased with the plan is Alan Duncan, the shadow prisons minister, who at the weekend is also alleged to have said that the slogan 'prison works' was repulsively simplistic" and that "Lock 'em up is Key Stage 1 politics." Needless to say, the comments didn't go down too well in the Daily Mail. [24/01/10]
STATE OF EMERGENCY DECLARED IN ITALIAN PRISONS
The Italian government have declared a year-long state of emergency in its prison system. This is because the Italian prison system is in crisis, with the prison population currently standing at 64,910, its highest level since 1946, and housed in jails built for only 43,480.
Last year there were 174 deaths in prison, of which 72 (41%) were classified as suicide. In the decade 2000-09, there were 1,568 deaths, 565 (36%) of which were suicides (and 12 times that number of attempted suicides). This is the highest suicide rate since 2001 (12.11 per 10,000 vs. 12.52), and by far the highest number for more than 20 years. It is also the highest in Western Europe apart from France, Luxembourg and Switzerland! And inn the first 2 weeks of 2010 there have been 5 more suicides.
The state of emergency was the result of plans flagged up last August and presented to the Council of Ministers by Justice Minister Angelino Alfano on 13 January. There are four elements to these plans:
- the building of 47 new prison wings, largely using private investment, creating 21,749 new beds and bringing the prison capacity up to 80,000;
- to amend Article 385 of the Penal Code and bring in home detention for those with less that a year to serve on their sentences (estimates put this at 32% of the current prison population) and 'community service' for those sentenced to less than 3 years;
- 2,000 new prison officers;
- and an extension to the powers already granted to Franco Ionta, head of the DAP (Dept of Prison Administration) as special commissioner for prison construction. The later means that he will be able to summarily decide on all contracts involved in the new €600m building scheme, answerable only to Berlusconi himself. Planning will be simplified and projects will follow the pattern of 24 hour working followed in the aftermath of the L'Aquila earthquake.
Needless to say the plans have not been universally popular. During the debate there was a demonstration by public sector unions outside the Italian parliament organised by UILPA Prisons (Italian Workers' Union - Civil Servants section), OSAPP (Autonomous Union of Penitentiary Police), FP-CGIL (Civil Servants section of the Italian General Confederation of Labour) and SI.DI.PE (Union of Prison Directors and Officers). FP-CGIL, UILPA, RdB (Rank & File Union) and FLP (Federation of Public Workers & Functionaries) have also declared a strike by judicial workers for 5 February in opposition to the plans.
The PSD (Party of Security and Defence Professionals - effectively the Military's trade union even though they are banned from joining unions) has called the scheme a scandalous waste of money and claimed that no new building scheme is needed as there are already 40 prisons standing empty across Italy. Some, like San Valentino (Pescara) and Arghillà (Reggio Calabria), have never been occupied. Others, such as Morcone (Benevento), are standing empty after extensive refurbishment.
The government's scheme has also been denounced by prisoner support groups such as Antigone and Hands Off Cain, and the opposition PD (Democratic Party) have introduced a counter-motion declaring that the whole judicial system is broken and building new prisons is not the solution. They point out, amongst other things, that 50% of all prisoners are currently on remand and 30% will be inevitably have the charges against them dismissed. Other have pointed out that the government's anti-immigration policies and the general racism in Italian society means that 37% of the prison population are foreign prisoners, where as only 6.5% of the total population are foreign nationals.
Inevitably criticism has also focused on the role and powers of Franco Ionta and the potential for corruption given the sweeping powers that have been invested in him, under the direct supervision of Berlusconi. Given the government's professed anti-mafia/anti-corruption stance, it is to be seen whether the financial corruption alleged to have occurred around the L'Aquila projects will be repeated with the prison building schemes. [14/01/10]
REHABILITATION, NOT INCARCERATION?
According to Channel 4 News, the Tories 'cast iron' pledge to increase prison places by 5,000, funded by the sale of 30 Victorian inner city prisons if elected next year, appears to have suffered a sudden reality check. Obviously having seen the transformation of the old Oxford Castle nick into the Malmaison Hotel, David Cameron thought that this was a realistic option to raise £250m to fund a massive increase in prison places in order to to bring an end to the current Government's automatic early release scheme.
What he and his advisors obviously didn't take in to account was that the Osbourne Group had only paid £1 for the site and had invested around £35m into its refurbishment. Also, whilst most of these Victorian jails are on prime development sites, many are also protected listed buildings, and their sale was never going to realise anything near the £250m that they had earmarked to add these 5,000 new places. Even allowing for this rather optimistic estimate of how much they could raise from this fire sale, their figures never held up.
The main problem is that by closing these 30 Victorian prisons, and dependent on exactly which jails were sold [1], they would be losing somewhere around 18,000-19,000 existing places. Additionally, using the current average capital building cost per prison place of £142,000, the £250m would create only 1,760 places (and this assumes that the government already owns the land the new prisons are to be built on).
So we have 18,000 places removed from the prison estate in order to build 1,760 new places, a net loss of more than 16,000 places. Clearly something is very wrong somewhere. Maybe they are using that old government trick of double counting places that have previously been announced (by Labour) to make it look as if they are doing more than they actually are?
So, quietly backtracking, the Tories are now apparently planning to build only "several thousand" new places and will instead be converting more ex-military buildings like the recently opened HMP Bure (ex-RAF Cottishall) and fencing and re-categorising open Category D prisons, under a new "rehabilitation, not incarceration" policy reflecting the increasing influence of Iain Duncan Smith's Centre for Social Justice and paving the way for his idea of doubling Contract Services and prison workshop activities. [03/12/09]
[1] These prisons range in size from HMP Kingston, with an operational capacity of 195, to HMP Leeds at 1,154 and possibly HMP Birmingham at 1,450.
DAY RELEASE FROM OPEN PRISON SHOCK HORROR
In the grand tradition of ill informed tabloid coverage of prison stories comes the Daily Mail story (also covered in the Telegraph) 'Prison raffles off a day out to inmates for a £1 a ticket' The story is that prisoners in the Category D open prison HMP Kirkham who volunteer to cook Christmas dinner for the elderly residents of Milbanke Day Centre will be eligible to buy £1 tickets in a raffle. No problem there except in the eyes of the Mail (and Telegraph) and of rent-a-quote Glyn Travis, assistant general secretary of the POA, because the top prize is a day release. Shock horror. Category D prisoners being allowed out of prison on day release. What next?
Travis blusters: "I think, as a prison officer, prisoners buying raffle tickets with public money to win a day out where they can go out and enjoy themselves is fundamentally wrong." Which bit is fundamentally wrong Glyn? Prisoners buying raffle tickets, buying them with public money (except the money will be earned by the prisoner in the same way that prison officers earn their wages), prisoners being outside the prison's walls during the day (exactly what open prisons are designed to allow) or is it just prisoners 'enjoying themselves'?
The article also quotes Patsy McKie of Mothers Against Violence, "They should not be releasing people on this basis. They should look at who is best suited to being released back into the community. Anyone could win that prize - even the most dangerous man who is coming to the end of his sentence. They should serve all of their sentence and only then should they be considered for release." Clearly she hasn't a clue about the supposed function of open prisons and the operation of the parole system. But the Mail clearly thinks she provides good copy otherwise they wouldn't use her in almost every prisoner related story.
Towards the bottom of the article the MoJ is quoted as saying that the raffle is a new initiative under the Incentives and Earned Privilege Scheme, and that "HMP Kirkham holds low-risk prisoners in open conditions. All prisoners are rigorously risk-assessed before release on temporary licence and no prisoners are released if there are concerns for public safety. Only prisoners who meet the eligibility criteria are granted temporary release." But of course that doesn't make for a sensational enough story does it?
The bizarre thing is that on the same day the Mail published a reasonable (for the Mail) comment piece by that self-style 'prisoners' friend' Jonathan Aitkin, 'Open all hours! How my cellmates Spider and Brown Bread Fred taught me the farcical truth about open prisons'. I say reasonable because he talks about the people he met in open prison as if they were real human beings, rather than as the tabloid cliches or as fodder for party political point scoring, and his criticism amounts only to a call for the reform of the open prison system and the complaint that "it is absurd that the penalty for recaptured absconders is only 28 days' loss of remission". The use of the word farcical in the title of his article is the Mail's own invention and typical tabloidese behaviour. Can't have a Tory being resonable about criminal scum can we? [26/11/09]
INANE HEADLINE OF THE DECADE
'So Why Doesn't Anyone Get Sent To Jail Any More?' - courtesy of the Daily Mirror. Clearly the do not realise that England and Wales (with 154 people in prison per 100,000 of the general population*) and Scotland (153 per 100,000) lock up more people that any other Western European countries, apart from Spain (164 per 100,000) and Luxembourg (155 per 100,000). And the current prison population in England and Wales is 84,681, up 1,542 on this time last year. So clearly people are still getting sent to prison! [22/11/09]
* Figures for October 2009, from the World Prison Brief.
