Dear Governor
Re: Offer of Support and Solidarity
We, the signatories of this letter, are all professionally and personally linked to Nottingham, with expertise in prisons, punishment and safeguarding against mental ill health.
It has been recently stated that there are as many opinions on prisons as there are prisoners. We are painfully aware of that. We are unlikely to agree unanimously on every idea we have to alleviate the suffering we see among both staff and prisoners across the estate. We are also aware that Governors, more than anything, value autonomy.
The reason we are writing this open letter is to offer support. Our observations of incidents at HMP Nottingham over months and years have now been further validated in the form of an Urgent Notification issued to the Secretary of State for Justice by Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Prisons. Whilst there may not be consensus among us as to whether increased resources will solve the problems found at HMP Nottingham, we wholeheartedly offer our solidarity to all working and living in the prison.
These are some basic suggestions we can make which may not appear in the forthcoming Ministry of Justice’s action plan, but that we hope will complement it:
(1) Offender Supervisors, under cross-examination at parole hearings, have revealed they have never heard of the Care Act 2014. They could be encouraged to read Prison Service Instruction 3/2016, which was specifically drafted to assist with the interpretation of this Act. This is a way of bringing Nottingham City Council into the fold, to alleviate the burdens shouldered almost exclusively by the prison at present, in the provision of adult social care. It also has implications for the availability of support on release, and reducing the eye-watering 4300% increase in recalls seen over the last 20 years.
(2) Adopt a flexible approach to the disciplinary (particularly IEP) regime. For example, if a prisoner is behaving erratically, and needs his television to help him cope with auditory hallucinations, do not remove that television as a disciplinary sanction. This is a real example, which led to a further deterioration in the prisoner’s wellbeing. Another local prison, HMP Leicester, has mitigated some of the inherent suffering of imprisonment acknowledged in the Mandela Rules, by adopting a new approach.
(3) Abandon ‘wing wisdom’ about self-harm. There is continual reference in security reports to ‘attention seeking’. This is a particularly dangerous concept in predicting suicide. Research indicates self-harm is the strongest predictor of death by suicide that we have regardless of the intent of the act thus it is vital to take all self-harm seriously.
(4) Give very serious thought to whether or not prison is the right environment to manage a prisoner’s capacity for self-harm. Many features of safety plans developed for those at risk of self-harm take for granted options available to those in prison. For instance, going for a walk, spending time with a pet or playing an instrument. Ask whether an assessment to transfer a prisoner under section 47-49 of the Mental Health Act 1983 is appropriate.
(5) Utilise screenings, such as WASI-II (for intellectual functioning), S-CLR (for mental disorder) and BISI (for brain injury) which are either not too resource intensive or already funded by the Ministry of Justice, and can assist in appropriately diverting prisoners.
(6) Consider the extent to which prison, particularly for very ill prisoners, has a pronounced effect on life expectancy. These prisoners may well be eligible for compassionate release.
For any of the above suggestions that are not entirely resource neutral, may we offer to run a pro bono legal clinic on a fortnightly basis? If there are difficulties in mobilising third parties, or a need for expert input from other professionals, this would be an effective way of finding a solution. Similar projects have been trialled successfully by other organisations, both nationally and internationally. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime indeed encourages rosters of lawyers to be drawn up to provide advice to inmates for free. In order for this to be sustainable, or more frequent than fortnightly, there of course needs to be proper legal aid funding.
In the meanwhile, we will endeavour to help where we can. We would be happy to meet with you and, if you consider it appropriate, a representative from the Ministry of Justice, to discuss these matters further, either before or after the latter’s publication of an action plan.
Best wishes
Dr Jennifer Bamford, Senior Forensic Psychologist, Tully Forensic Psychology Ltd
Professor Rob Canton, De Montfort University, author of Why Punish? An Introduction to the Philosophy of Punishment
Dr Vincent Egan, Associate Professor of Forensic Psychology Practice, University of Nottingham
Professor John Holmwood, School of Sociology and Social Policy, University of Nottingham
Amjad Hussain, Barrister, Trent Chambers
David Parker, Partner, Carringtons Solicitors
Kushal Sood, Solicitor Advocate, SL5 Legal and Director of Trent Centre LLP
Professor Ellen Townsend, School of Psychology, University of Nottingham
Dr Ruth Tully, Director, Tully Forensic Psychology Ltd
Rants on Fire 