Suicide, assault and despair: The story of Glen Parva prison
Another day, another example of a crumbling prison system which does more damage to its occupants than good.
The inspector of prisons' report into Glen Parva prison, a young offender's institute, is damning. Three young men have taken their own lives since April. Assaults on staff and prisoners have risen by a quarter over the last year, although this is probably an underestimate. The inspectors weren't assured that all incidents were being reported.
The segregation unit is being used all the time. The suspicion is that this is a way for prisoners to find safety. Twenty-eight per cent of inmates are locked in their cell throughout the working day.
It sounds "more like an extract from William Golding's Lord of the Flies than a report on an institution that is meant to help young people turn their lives around", Howard League chief executive Francis Crook said.
Staff shortages account for some of the problem. Howard League research suggests staff have been cut from 250 in September 2010 to just 140 now.
Prison chaos is often spoken about as if it was a bureaucratic affair. It isn't. This policy failure claims lives – those of the offenders and those of their future victims when they emerge from prison in a worse state than they were put in.
Here is the family of one of the young men who committed suicide in Glen Parva:
"Myself and my family have been left utterly devastated and heartbroken over the apparent suicide of my son Greg, whilst in the care of Glen Parva.
"Our thoughts are with any other family this has happened to and pray that no other family is left as desolate as we are without our precious baby."
The psychological effects of a stay at Glen Parva must be considerable. It is damaging people who cannot afford to be further damaged.
Here's the mother of a young adult in the prison, in a letter to the prisons inspector describing why she asked for her son to be moved to another institution:
"During [an earlier spell in Glen Parva] he was the victim of three separate assaults by three different inmates, had his trainers stolen from him whilst wearing them, been unable to leave his unit or move about the prison due to a risk to his personal safety and has had to move units at least five times due to acts of violence against him or bullying.
"The last assault resulted in [him] being taken to [hospital] with a suspected broken jaw."
"Prior to my son being an inmate at Glen Parva he had made nine suicide attempts in the space of roughly 12 months and was hospitalised on most of these occasions. Glen Parva were aware of my son's fragile mental health, hence him being put on an ACCT [Assessment, Care in Custody and Teamwork] upon his arrival there.
"He was unable to leave his unit because of the risk to his safety, so was unable to join in with any work or activities. Is the government and its ministers aware that services they claim to provide are actually non-existent to some inmates?"
This is not an isolated case. Inspections of other young offenders' institutes, such as Aylesbury, Brinsford, Feltham and Isis, have resulted in damning reports.
The inspector's report is very clear: "This is a model of custody that does not work."
If the Ministry of Justice was a place which based decisions on evidence, rather than knee-jerk authoritarianism, they would take note of the savagery they are imposing on young people who need their lives turned round. It is not, so today's report is unlikely to make any difference at all.
