Prepared: 2:24 on 13th July 2011
Q17. Damian Hinds: Are you saying that payroll deductions to open a savings account with contingent access to those funds, which at the very least would only be on release, could be done without legislation?
Frances Crook: It is what we did. We helped our employees—our prisoners—to open bank accounts. They then benefited from increased money within the prison economy, so they could buy extra bits and pieces within the prison. Most importantly, they could send money out to their families. At the moment what families have to do is send money in to prisoners; and if the families are on benefits, that is a huge tax on them.
I think the other thing that is missing here is support for families. If a man is earning a real wage in a prison, why should he not be asked to keep his family? At the moment there is a sleight of hand with the Benefits Agency, which means that they are not required to do that. They are not required to support their children or their families, and I think that is a huge mistake.
Q18. Yvonne Fovargue (Makerfield) (Lab): Social welfare law is being removed from scope at precisely the same time as one of the hugest upheavals in the benefit system, with the introduction of universal credit. What do you believe will be the impact on community cohesion and crime levels?
Juliet Lyon: That is a difficult but good question, given the prison population. We know that they are likely to be the poorest people in our society. I think there is a very important lesson for Government—that if you are going to do criminal justice reform you have to link it up to social welfare provision. You have to think seriously about joining up services, and not having a separate silo for justice.
We think, for example, there is tremendous merit in the roll-out now of the liaison and diversion schemes, which will enable people who are mentally ill and people with learning disabilities to get the mental health treatment and social care that they need, if it exists in sufficient measure.
That is the point; there are many people in prison because they have been failed by other public services. We would not want a diminution in other public services; and we would like a better joined-up process for those who do need to go to prison—more emphasis on resettlement and on engagement of other public and voluntary services, so that while they are in prison the whole purpose of their time there is to spend it preparing for a responsible life on release. That is the Prison Service mission, but it is difficult to achieve in the current circumstances.
The Chair: I suspect that this will be the last question.
Q19. Mr Wallace: I would just like clarification from Frances Crook on prisoner earnings. When you said you set up a business, if I heard you right you talked about it being voluntary. It was a voluntary relationship between the prisoners and the Prison Service to deliver that business. Is that correct? There was no compulsion on the prisoners to do it.
Frances Crook: I do not think it would be lawful or moral to compel prisoners to work. We do not have forced labour. It would be against international law. We recruited our prisoners from the prison.
Q20. Mr Wallace: I was not asking about compelling them to work, but about earnings—taking some of their earnings and using them for something else; what if they opposed that? That would be the change in the law that would seem to be required.
Frances Crook: We did it. As a condition of applying for a job with us they had to agree to having 30% of their wages deducted, and we asked them on top of that to make voluntary donations to Victim Support, which they all did. I do not know how much they gave, because it was between them and Victim Support. Victim Support of course benefited from the tax through gift aid as well, and got extra money. We have done that, and I did not see any problem with it.
Andrew Neilson: The key thing is that point; it is about the business and the prisoner making the agreement as a condition of employment. In that sense it is voluntary. We are not forcing them to work. The problem with the Bill is that it focuses on the Prison Service taking the money away, but our model, on which we published a report, called “Business Behind Bars”, which we can make available to the Committee, looks at things from another point of view: prisons themselves can agree with businesses the terms on which the businesses come in; then the businesses find prisoners who are willing to work on those terms.
Q21. Mr Slaughter: Payment by results is the only way it is suggested new resources will go in. Are you concerned that that is the only way, and it may skew what alternatives to custody may be available?
Juliet Lyon: We do not think that the only answer is payment by results. We feel that it is an untested method. It may well prove to be an answer, but it will not be the only one.
In conclusion, what the Bill seems to offer is the opportunity—
The Chair: Order. I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Lady. In accordance with the programme motion, which the Committee agreed, that brings us to the end of the time allotted for the Committee to ask questions of our witnesses in the session. Thank you all very much for coming along this morning, giving up your time and giving evidence. We will now hear evidence from the National Association of Probation Officers and the Prison Officers Association.
Mr Slaughter: On a point of order, Mr Hollobone. I note Mr Wallace asked questions about IPPs, which are not in the Bill. Given the constraint we have on time is it permissible to ask about things that are not in the Bill?
The Chair: The hon. Gentleman makes an extremely valid point. There was another question from a Labour Member that was also slightly wide of the mark, but I used my discretion as Chairman to allow both to take place. However, his advice to the Chair is well meant and well put and if we can keep to the terms of the Bill that would maximise the effectiveness of the time deployed.
Mr Wallace: Further to that point of order, Mr Hollobone. On the question that I raised on IPP, first, it is in the sentencing Bill and I appreciate your discretion. Secondly, the witnesses who gave evidence this morning included IPPs when they made submissions to the Green Paper and in public. As it was the final opportunity to ask for their view of an IPP, and as the Government have openly said that measures on IPP may come forward at some stage in the course of the Bill, I thought it was correct to do so.
The Chair: I thank Mr Wallace for that point of order and his remarks are on the record.
Examination of Witnesses
Jonathan Ledger and Steve Gillan gave evidence.
11.32 am
The Chair: We will now hear evidence from the National Association of Probation Officers and the Prison Officers Association. For the record, please would you be kind enough to introduce yourselves to the Committee? If either or both of you would like to make a short statement to the Committee, you are invited to do so.
Steve Gillan: I am Steve Gillan, general secretary of the Prison Officers Association.
Jonathan Ledger: My name is Jonathan Ledger. I am general secretary of NAPA.
The Chair: May I ask for indications of which Members would like to speak? At the moment I have Helen Goodman, Andy Slaughter, Dave Watts, Yvonne Fovargue, Elfyn Llwyd, Alex Cunningham and Mike Crockart. Going from Opposition to Government, I will take Mike Crockart second, then the running order as I have described. This session ends at 12 o’ clock.
Q22. Helen Goodman: One of the Government’s main objectives is to increase significantly the number of prisoners who work while in prison. At the moment a minority of prisoners work for around 20 hours a week. The Government’s proposal is to get almost all prisoners working 40 hours a week. It would help the Committee if we understood the implications of that for running the prisons, particularly from Mr Gillan. What sort of staff oversight would this entail? What other investment might be needed? Could he tell us something about the practicalities of this?
Steve Gillan: First, we broadly support the ethos of prisoners working and being trained for when they are released so that they can hold down proper jobs as part of the rehabilitation process. However, when Kenneth Clarke announced it to the Conservative party conference last year, we were taken by surprise by the announcement of a 40-hour week, bearing in mind that the core day had previously been cut.
Q23. Helen Goodman: Could you explain what the “core day” is to the Committee?
Steve Gillan: The core day refers to how long prisoners are out during a day and at the weekend. A few years ago, that core day was slashed simply because there was not enough money to go around. The Prison Officers Association was not in favour of that because it actually locked prisoners up for longer. However, we are broadly in support of prisoners coming out to work. We do not think we can get anywhere near 40 hours a week, because, first, there is not the space, and secondly, there are not the resources with the ongoing cuts over the next four or five years.
Q24. Helen Goodman: If 40 hours was achieved, could you explain in more detail what sort of impact it would have on staff—for example, would it mean employing more people or longer hours?
Steve Gillan: There are different ways of looking at it. You have to look at the detail, but at the moment, there is no detail and that is our problem. For example, prison officers work on average 39 hours a week, so it is ridiculous to consider that prisoners should be working for 40 hours a week when the staff are not going to be there to implement that. That is one of the resource implications that we would have. Of course, prison officer numbers are actually going to fall as prisons are closed, with further market testing on the horizon.
Q25. Helen Goodman: Could you say something about what the change in the prisoner’s core day has been over the last 10 years?
Steve Gillan: Answers to parliamentary questions about prisoners work activity show that, on average, it was about 13.9 hours in 2009-10. Last week I was in Holme House, which has managed to get 100 prisoners working up to 34 hours a week, but that is keeping prisoners out over lunch time. The governor’s worry is that once budget cuts start to kick in over the next three or four years, he will have to cut back again.
Q26. Mike Crockart (Edinburgh West) (LD): It is a pleasure, Mr Hollobone, to serve under your chairmanship for the first time. My question relates to implementing the Prisoners’ Earnings Act 1996. We have heard evidence this morning that there is a feeling that prisons are not equipped to employ people meaningfully. Do you agree with that, and if so, what can be done to achieve such employment?
Steve Gillan: It depends what prison you are looking at. Some local prisons are severely overcrowded, and do not have the correct work spaces and workshops that prisoners can go to, to do the work. For example, Holme House is a newish prison, but it has over 1,000 prisoners and only 100 of them were allocated to the workshop doing 34 hours of work. That is a tiny proportion in relation to Holme House. We would have a problem with other aspects of prisoners working and the amount of money involved, and I am happy to elaborate on that later.
Q27. Mike Crockart: The point that previous witnesses in the evidence session made was that it need not necessarily be the type of work you are talking about—the workshops that are already there. If we are talking about external companies coming in and setting up a business within a prison, then surely it would be up to them to set up the infrastructure to allow those prisoners to do the meaningful work. Is that not a better way forward?
Steve Gillan: That would be a very interesting concept but the reality is there is no meat on the bone at this moment in time, and we do not know what individual companies may be talking about. We are broadly supportive of prisoners working, but it has to be meaningful, constructive and worthwhile, not putting knives and forks in plastic envelopes for airlines, which does not assist at all. Of course, you have to look at the situation with regard to companies that may well be laying people off on the outside and coming into prisons and setting up work forces. I am not sure how the general public would view that.
Q28. Mike Crockart: You major on the word “meaningful”— that it has to be meaningful work—and then give the example of putting knives and forks together. Plenty of people outside prison are doing that type of work and regard it as meaningful because of what it achieves for them. Surely that is what we are trying to get for the prisoners. That sense of meaningful work is in supporting their families and giving something back to society.
Steve Gillan: I was not demeaning anybody in outside industry. I thought that what we were trying to do was to rehabilitate prisoners so that they did not come back. Unfortunately, for the past 25 years or so we have been playing political football with the issue, and we have not got anywhere. To be honest with you, the real issues are alcohol abuse, drug abuse, mental health issues, education and social exclusion. Until investment is made in those areas, we will just go round in circles.
Q29. Mr Slaughter: In so far as there will be any new resources for dealing with rehabilitation, and particularly if there will be enhanced community punishments, they will come through payment by results alone. Does that cause you any concerns, and how do you see that working?
Steve Gillan: It does not cause me concern at this moment in time, for the simple reason that we do not know enough about payment by results. The first pilot was started at Peterborough, but we are awaiting the results of those pilots, which are not due out until 2015. To lay all your eggs in one basket, as we have just seen in the market testing process of Doncaster, where it was said that the payment by results ethos was in effect what got them the contract—it has not been measured and we seem to be playing a little bit of fast and loose and a little bit of Russian roulette with the criminal justice system.
Jonathan Ledger: On that point, I agree with Steve. We know very little at the moment, and the signs are that the project in Peterborough will take some time to assess. It seems to be something of a side issue in terms of those working on the ground and those who are dealing with community supervision on a day-to-day basis. At the moment, that has had no impact at all. We are concerned that there are issues about how you measure payment by results, and what you are looking to find out. Are you looking to improve things such as recidivism rates? We would all support that, but the problem is that with some sort of profit motive or financial incentive around it, we fear that the wrong motivation may begin to underpin a payment-by-results system. That is something that we would expect to be rigorously scrutinised.
Q30. Mr Slaughter: I do not know whether you have had a chance to look at the Civitas report that came out this week. It seemed to say that rehabilitation as it is envisaged in the Bill would not work for repeat offenders, and that not enough consideration could be given. From your own experience—particularly Mr Ledger—do you feel that that is the case?
Jonathan Ledger: I missed the beginning of what you said.
Q31. Mr Slaughter: The Civitas report commented on rehabilitation as the Government envisage it at the moment, and stated that Civitas was not persuaded that it would work in the case of persistent repeat offenders. Do you think that more needs to be done to deal with that problem?
Jonathan Ledger: From the NAPO perspective, we have argued consistently—we argued this very strongly in our response to the Green Paper—for an increase in resources for the probation services in order to focus on offenders, particularly those in the category that you have just described, so that we could target the problem behaviour that they were presenting and intervene intensively and frequently at an early stage post sentence. The concern is that something of the revolution has been lost in the resulting Bill—we welcomed much of the original Green Paper—and we fear that there is now less of a focus on how we intervene positively to change lives, to use the old chestnut. That is how we protect communities and reduce the number of victims in our communities. It would be true to say that there has been a shift away from the focus on early intervention and rehabilitation, which may have unfortunate consequences.
Steve Gillan: I have seen that report, and I concur that we have had a big problem with prolific and repeat offenders. Again, I refer to Holme House and some of the excellent work that is going on there at the moment. Prisoners are identified as being prolific and prison officers are attached to them now in a multi-agency approach from outside in the community. We did this sort of thing probably 20 years ago, when it was called through care, but because of resources it goes by the wayside. It is very important that we get back to that ethos of investment. If we invest in the right areas, the prison population will come down and the general public will get what they want anyway—an efficient prison and criminal justice system.
Mr Slaughter: I could ask about resources but I think my colleague is going to ask about that. I will stop there.
The Chair: A lot of your colleagues are lined up to make contributions, starting with Mr Watts.