Profile |
John Podmore
May 2012 |
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‘P
rison is really only a deterrent for those who’ve got something to
lose,’ says John Podmore, author of Out of Sight, Out of Mind: Why
Britain’s Prisons are Failing. While ‘prison isn’t working’ arguments
may have become familiar, it’s extremely rare to hear them from
someone who spent 25 years in the service – as governor of
Brixton and Belmarsh and then as an inspector – which is what makes the book
so fascinating and its arguments so powerful.
‘If I were to go to prison, I’ve got a lot to lose – a great family, friends, lots of
interests and things I love doing, and that’s true for most of us,’ he says. ‘But
for a lot of people out there, particularly in the current economic climate, going
to prison wouldn’t actually mean losing very much. If you haven’t got a home
you’re not losing a home, if you haven’t got a job you’re not losing a job.’
And, as the book spells out, neither does it stop crime being committed –
acting as a networking opportunity for major drug dealers in particular – or
people going on to reoffend once they’re released. ‘You hear all this stuff about
“we need to make it tougher and harsher” and so on – well, what we need is a
larger section of society having something to lose by going to prison,’ he says.
‘We’ve got a huge number of people who are socially excluded, dispossessed
and struggling with life, so rather than looking at prison we’ve got to look at
society. That’s where we need to put some of the emphasis.’
The book grimly details the systematic over-use of the remand system in
particular, especially for people who aren’t even likely to get a custodial
sentence if found guilty. The result is a world where those with drug, alcohol or
mental health problems presenting before the courts for relatively minor
offences will be remanded just to keep them off the streets.
‘We know – but we won’t accept – that we use remand to deal with social
problems,’ he states. ‘That is not a good principle for putting people on remand.
The least we can do is say “he’s got a problem and needs drug or alcohol
treatment or psychiatric support, let’s provide that in some kind of supported
housing, not a prison”. We need to have better, more flexible facilities. The
remand system is not the place, and anyway there’s no more money – the way
the remand population is created, managed and maintained is diverting huge
sums away from other parts of the system.’
Government plans to improve the remand process, however, appear to have
been shelved, presumably for fear of being seen as ‘soft on crime’. Does he
have any optimism that things could change for the better? ‘No one wants a
“rehabilitation revolution” more than I do, but by definition in a revolution
something has to be overthrown. I don’t see anything major happening, other
than privatising a load of jails.’
The book makes a stark warning that privatisation will mean the interests of
shareholders coming before those of staff and prisoners. With eight prisons out
for contract and up to 20 more expected to be announced later this year, this is
‘privatisation on a scale that no country in any part of the world has ever been
down the road of,’ he states.
‘I’m not going to be King Canute about this – we’re going to have private
prisons. OK, one, let them be more cost-effective – despite what anyone says,
there’s no real evidence to suggest that private prisons are cheaper. The whole PFI
thing should have given a real warning about that. Two, there should be some
positive new initiatives in the service, but if you get the private contractors to talk
they’ll say, “they’re not looking for much in the way of initiatives, they just want
cheap containment.” There is this kind of perception of “private good, public bad”
and I’m prepared to listen to the arguments, but in this world of the evidence
base, give me the evidence that this strategy is the best one. It’s not there.’
What prompted him to write the book? ‘It was serendipitous, really,’ he says.
‘I was planning to leave the service and I was working with the [freedom of
expression organisation] English PEN scheme. I was at an event where someone
asked if I’d thought of writing a book and said he knew the guy who ran Biteback
Publishing and he’d give me an introduction.’
He found writing it both tough and cathartic, and the feedback so far has
been ‘extraordinarily good’, he says. ‘It never worried me that people would
disagree with me because the whole aim was to stimulate debate, but one of
the most gratifying reviews was from [serving prisoner] Ben Gunn in Inside Time
[the newspaper for UK prisoners]. Ben who, shall we say, is not backward in
coming forward in his views of the service said he was “nodding in agreement
with almost every page” – although he found himself uncomfortable with that
because he’s not someone who normally agrees with prison governors.’
Press coverage has also been positive, including – perhaps surprisingly – in
the Mail. With politicians of all parties seemingly running scared of the press,
particularly regarding crime and drugs, does he think attitudes might be
changing? ‘That’s an interesting question, because I had a call the other day
from the Guardian to tip me off that I was a victim of phone hacking. The
information they got on me has been redacted so we don’t know when it was,
but it may well have been the time I was at Brixton.’
Was that a shock? ‘People have asked me why I’m surprised, but it leaves a
very nasty taste. It kind of comes with the territory, but I was more disturbed by
it than I thought because it’s such a personal intrusion. But in general terms,
I’ve found it’s easy to blame the media. When you deal with the quality media
they just want to know what’s going on, so I think if you engage and have a
positive relationship with the media it can be mutually beneficial. You’ve got to
be wary of tabloid headlines and all that, obviously, but sometimes you get the
negative stuff because there’s this kind of media barrier. If you don’t offer
anything they’ll just go off at a tangent and do their own thing.’
As the book points out, this was particularly a problem in the Blair years,
which he describes as ‘the worst in recent memory’. ‘It was dreadful,’ he says.
‘They were just obsessed with the media and there was no real engagement with
what should be done – it was just a case of “we want to stay in power and don’t
do anything to stop us staying in power”. I found that very sad.’
He’s also saddened by the way innovation in the system is being killed by
risk-aversion and the commissioning process, he says. ‘We need innovation and
we need change and that’s not coming about from the private sector. OK, they’re
‘I’m not going to be King
Canute about this – we’re
going to have private prisons.’