trying to involve Third Sector organisations, but some of the bigger ones like
NACRO have effectively teamed up with the large multinationals. The smaller
organisations will either get swallowed up or they’ll disappear entirely because
they can’t compete in the new world. You can’t say to these small charities that
want to get involved in prisons “you’ll only get paid via payment by results”
because they don’t have the capital to put up front.’
While there’s a great deal of anxiety about the structural changes to
commissioning and delivering drug treatment in the community from next year, there’ll
also be a huge impact on treatment in prisons. ‘It’ll be interesting to see where that
goes because I think there’s a real danger that commissioners will tend to not favour
prisons,’ he says. ‘Brixton is different because you had a degree of coterminosity
between the community and the prison, but let’s say you’re commissioning services
in the Isle of Wight. You’ve got three prisons that hold about 2,000-plus prisoners
and very few come from the Isle of Wight and very few will be returned to the Isle of
Wight, so is the health authority body – whatever it’s going to be called – on the Isle
of Wight going to look particularly at the prison population?’
The emphasis needs to be on prison governors forming relationship with the
local community and health authorities, he stresses. ‘Some governors do that
very well, others I’m not sure. The whole commissioning of health and drug and
alcohol services is going to be a test of that – when it comes to commissioning
time, people are human and if the mutual understanding of need is not there
then the prison may miss out on that commissioning process.’
In terms of treatment in prison, the book is a reminder of how much alcohol
provision is still woefully lacking. ‘There’s none, really,’ he says. ‘There’s alcohol
detox, and they’re beginning to look at commissioning some alcohol services. I
don’t know what’s happening out there in terms of contracts, but I don’t think local
commissioners are giving any priority to alcohol. It’s an absolute disgrace, because
we know how much alcohol is related to domestic violence. There’s disorder and
violence on the streets, but how much is alcohol involved in a whole raft of
offending? There needs to be much more long-term investment in alcohol treatment
in prison. It’s always been the poor relation and I’ve never understood it.’
What’s vital is proper assessment of prisoners’ needs as they come into
prison, he argues. ‘There’s always been the emphasis on opiate treatment, but
when I was at Brixton crack was the drug of choice. Dealing with people taking
crack is more difficult than getting them on an opiate-based programme, so if
you’re a prisoner coming into Brixton you’ll be confessing to opiate misuse rather
than stimulant misuse because you know they’ll give you something, you’re going
to get a prescription.’
It’s widely felt that mandatory drug tests (MDT) are, to say the least, an
unreliable measure of levels of drug use in a prison and, as the book describes,
reasonably easy to fake. The prison service, however, ‘clings to them’, it says,
partly because they can count towards bonuses and appraisals.
‘According to MDT statistics, drug use in prison is either reducing or staying the
same,’ he says. ‘Now if you can find me any problematic drug user coming out of
prison who says that’s the situation, I’m a Dutchman. What I would advocate is to
send in an independent body – or send one jail to randomly drug-test another – and if
the figures are the same as the MDT, then fine. But that’s never been done. There’s
been no independent, external verification of MDT so what’s the evidence to suggest
they’re accurate? The most important thing is to go and talk to people who’ve just
come out of jail, or prisoners in jail – they’ll tell you. There’s also research around
people’s first opiate use being in prison, and we really ought to be acting on that.’
The book goes on to describe many prisons as having an ‘institutional antipathy’
towards organisations like NA, justified partly on security grounds. Does he get any
sense that attitudes are softening? ‘External organisations generally – charities,
voluntary bodies – still struggle to get into prisons and get access to prisoners.
Again, it comes down to the evidence – we spent £150m on CARATs but where’s
the evidence that CARATs works? All I know is that getting someone in from NA to
meet with prisoners on a Wednesday night certainly won’t do any harm, and it will
get a message out to the prisoners that we are interested in this.’
In terms of making the system work – and, of course, the welfare of those in
the system – the transition from prison to community is particularly crucial,
especially with the much-increased risk of overdose. ‘There’s a phrase they use
in the states about ‘drop kicking’ people into the community, and that’s what we
do. Keeping people in prison is relatively easy. Getting them out and keeping
them out, is the difficult bit. But we become obsessed – and measure the
success of our prison system – by people not getting out when the emphasis of
that success should be on getting people out such that they don’t come back.’
As everyone knows, however, reconviction rates remain stubbornly high, as much
as 70 per cent for young offenders. ‘The most optimistic statements you’ll get are
“rates have gone down from 56 per cent to 55 per cent”. If you had a factory
making cars and half the cars broke down after six months, you’d close the factory
down. If we really had payment by results we’d close down the entire prison system.’
These days he’s a freelance consultant and has just returned from doing
some work with New York’s Columbia University. ‘Most of my contemporaries are
on a thousand pounds a day doing work for Serco and so on, but needless to
say they won’t touch me with a bargepole,’ he laughs.
He entered the service after being a teacher for eight years. ‘I had a young
family and I wasn’t earning very much and getting bored and disillusioned, and I
came across an advert one day and thought “that looks interesting”. Twenty-five
years later here I am.’ How does he look back on his career? ‘I’ve enjoyed it. I think
my problem was I enjoyed working in jails but I was a bit of a fish out of water when
I wasn’t in jail, apart from when I was inspecting, where you can make a significant
contribution to getting things done. But working at Brixton was the highlight.’
So which countries are closest to getting it right? ‘Everyone says
Scandinavia, and they are the nearest. In Norway to be a prison officer you need
two years’ training to degree level. And what we need here is a long-term
strategy, rather than just “how can we save money in the short term?”’
Out of Sight, Out of Mind: Why Britain’s Prisons are Failing is published by
Biteback
Photo: TSL Education and many thanks to Neil Turner, neil@dg28.com
10 |
drinkanddrugsnews
| May 2012
Profile |
John Podmore
‘We know – but we won’t
accept – that we use remand
to deal with social problems.’
www.drinkanddrugsnews.com