Victoria Stratford is a student at the University of Essex, due to graduate in 2025.
For years, the British prison system has been struggling for years with a lack of resources that has led to increased violence, inadequate facilities and overcrowding. On 5 July it was announced that the prison system was at 87,453 cells occupied out of 88,864 – only 1,411 spaces away from full capacity.
Before the election, Conservative ministers were staring down the barrel of letting inmates out early. Labour have now announced they will do so: prisoners could be released once they have completed 40 per cent of their sentence.
Ministers hope that this will give them enough time to create a solid long-term plan – leaving the Cabinet with the tough job of finding the money to reform the prison system in a time where there is little room to spare in public budgets whilst bearing the obvious political risk of those released re-offending, crimes that could be traced (fairly or no) to the Justice Secretary’s desk.
Their first step in the supposed ten-year plan is recruiting 1,000 new trainee probation officers to help reduce the staffing crisis in the prison system. But what else could be done?
For non-violent offenders, community-based sentences could reduce pressure on prisons population; done right, they can help to maintain family connections, support employment, and allow people easier access to support services.
Other upstream interventions could also help. One in seven prisoners receiving mental help support whilst in custody; ensuring that offenders receive mental health support whilst inside would reduce the chances of their reoffending upon release. However, a survey found that most prisons do not employ someone with mental health expertise.
The fundamental question, however, is how many people we jail. The UK as a whole has almost 150 prisoners per 100,000 people, compared to just 70 per 100,000 in Germany. In 1960, there were 30,000 people in prisons in England and Wales and the government of the day declared it a “crisis”. In 2000, there were about 60,000, and today there is 87,453.
Britain is prison-centric. But successive governments have failed to find or follow through on other means to deal with the sort of people who end up there. The closures of residential mental hospitals and day hospitals has left people previously cared for in such settings struggling outside – before ending up inside.
Significant overcrowding leads to prison staff struggling to control the spiralling number of inmates. High levels of violence, including prisoner-on staff-violence, and inadequate spending on pay has resulted in prisons becoming severely understaffed.
The consequences are felt not just by those inside, but by everyone, as if inmates are released unprepared for life outside, they are more likely to reoffend.
But absent a sea-change on sentencing, it is also vital that we make the best use of the prison space we have by ensuring that prisoners are prepared for life after release.
Previous governments have been committed to prisoners working in “employment like atmospheres” in order to help them understand and get used to such settings, but this also covers basic things like getting inmates’ literacy and numeracy up to standard.
That means more investment in the prisons we have, which are in a shocking state: one in seven in England and Wales are of ‘serious concern’; and that rises to 86 per cent of prisons are rated as of concern or serious concern in relation to self-harm or prisoner on prisoner assault.
Much of this is due to the lack of funding and serious cutbacks. When austerity is mentioned, the prison system is rarely included but is always seriously affected. There is no fudging a way past the need for more cash.
