It costs more and achieves less: Why prison doesn’t work
"Prison does work," Chris Grayling told the Tory party conference last year.
"It takes the most difficult and prolific offenders off our streets and protects our hard working, law abiding citizens. It sends a strong message about what our society is willing to accept, and what it is not willing to accept."
Grayling was wrong. Yesterday, a report by the British Academy became the latest to highlight the evidence for why it is a grotesquely expensive and counter-productive punishment for most crimes.
Predictably, the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) dismissed it out of hand, without bothering to check with their Lib Dem colleagues. That caused anger among senior Lib Dem figures, as the consensus between the Lib Dems and the Tories on law and order – a relationship long taken for granted and abused by the Grayling – becomes more fragile.
There's nothing surprising about the MoJ ignoring the report. The evidence that prison doesn’t work for the majority of crimes is overwhelming. Governments have been ignoring it for years. But it’s worth taking a dip into its findings to see how badly our prison service is failing.
The prison population has nearly doubled since 1992, when it stood at 45,000. It’s currently 84,000. That’s completely out of line with other western European countries. "Prison regimes now see more overcrowding and emphasis austerity and cost reduction rather than decency and rehabilitation," the authors found. "There are serious questions about the effectiveness and the morality of this situation, especially given that a high proportion of prisoners face disadvantage or challenges such as mental health or learning difficulties, abuse, homelessness, drug problems and unemployment."
The cost of prison has doubled, from £1.5 billion to nearly £3 billion in the last 20 years. The average cost of a prison place is now between £35,000 and £40,000.
Privatisation hasn't helped and the authors couch their criticism of privately-run prisons in quite dry tones. "Whilst private sector competition has clearly stimulated cost reduction and some innovation," they wrote, "the evidence suggests that private sector contracting is a high risk strategy, with mixed impact on quality." They added: "Managing prisons is a complex and demanding task. Attention should be paid to the empirical evidence available on quality and outcomes in private sector prisons. A more evidence led, contextual approach to policy in general is needed."
What do have is a stronger testing standard for the more fluffy aspects of prisoner experiences, using the Measuring Quality of Prison Life (MQPL) index. Standards vary from prison to prison, but what’s glaring is how pivotal personal development is for prisoners. That makes it sound academic and invariably that’s not how it’s expressed, but authors report young people, stunned by the lengthy sentence they’ve been handed, looking for some way to navigate this period of their life. They are not suddenly deciding to become molecular biologists, perhaps. But they do want meaning.
Instead, in many prisons, they retreat into their cells where it’s safe. Any efforts to educate themselves or find worthwhile work in prison – contrary to the prison minister’s assurances to the Commons this week – were unlikely to be fulfilled.
This situation has only gotten worse, as the prison service is hit by financial pressure, staff reductions, the closure of smaller prisons, lengthy sentences and privatisation. Parts of the prison estate is unsuitable for a modern prison service, the report found.
"In less organised and 'professional' prisons, preoccupations with safety and survival dominate; opportunities are few and negative emotional states among prisoners are common. Safety and perceptions of safety are reduced. Prisoners retreat into their cells and avoid risk," the report says.
In the rare prisons which are properly ordered and spend more time trying to find meaningful personal development activities for inmates, they become more capable of positive change. It's not just a nightmarish trap they have to survive. But this is not the norm.
"Prisoners' lives 'on the street' have often been violent and turbulent, sentences are often unexpected or unexpectedly long, and the route out of prison is increasingly difficult to navigate, as risk assessments depend heavily on the successful completion of scarce programmes," the report says.
A study of prisoners in one high security prison found that "once in prison, and through the extended period of 'shell shock' brought about by their extremely long sentences, prisoners found it hard to establish their own identity".
Activities designed for personal development were now regarded as "hedonistic and pleasurable and self-indulgent" by officials. That's where the relentless media war drums lead – a view that anything which might actually have some success rehabilitating a prison is unconscionable liberal pampering.
"You still feel you want to express yourself, but you can't in prison so you don't know where you are," one prisoner said. "I have no idea any more where I am. I’m a totally different person from when I first came to prison. I've lost my identity I think."
This creates a particularly interesting situation when it comes to Islam behind bars, which appears to be taking a stronger hold of prisoners as they struggle for meaning.
Of 52 interviews with inmates, 12 of the 23 Muslims had converted in prison. Researchers raised fears that alienated, impressionable young criminals with "little sense of belonging or identity and few constructive avenues for self-development in prison" were easy pickings for people spreading religious messages, perhaps even including extremism. It's hardly surprising. If you do nothing to offer prisoners a constructive path into a meaningful life others will adopt the role you should have.
There was evidence of forced conversions and "major incidents" over faith issues. "There was considerable fear and violence in the prison and some new rivalries between a changing hierarchy of prisoners as well as mutual distancing from staff, which made the prison feel much less safe," the study found.
Powerful leaders among inmates were able to use nervousness about religious equality among staff to wield power in prison and push authorities around on issues like pork in the canteen or prayers during the prison routine.
It's a disastrous state of affairs. But the standard response is that draconian measures are what the public want. Well, that’s not strictly true.
Admittedly, if you ask the public if sentencing is too lenient, they will say it is. But if you show them individual cases, they find sentencing levels to be appropriate or even too harsh.
As senior law lord Lord Bingham told the Spectator in 2002: "Everybody thinks our system is becoming soft and wimpish. In point of fact it's one of the most punitive systems in the world."
That's where the media campaign against any progressive criminal justice policy has got us: an ill-informed public, an approach which discourages rehabilitation. That’s the pressure which led to Ken Clarke being replaced by Grayling at the MoJ and the one which led the MoJ to dismiss the report yesterday. It’s created a disaster, and an expensive disaster at that.
