Are you a prison officer?

[Miljea]

I have been watching Crime and Punishment, on TV.

I am in no ways naive about the job, but only inasmuch as I am a HPC who attends prisoners a couple of times a week at my DGH.

My uneducated opinion is that an 8 week training, and 2 weeks shadowing is -um- 'not enough'...

Should it not be a Band 4 (NHS levels, as an equivalency) job, rising through guaranteed pathways, to Band 5?

Or am I being completely unrealistic, in that Band 5 HCP (but by all means not all band 5 NHS posts) requires a degree? That you need 2 good, or 3 'okay' A levels to access?

I think prison wardens do a bloody hard job. I enjoy chatting to them, as they sit with us, as we attend to their charges. If we valued them more (thus paid them more, on a professional career progression)- might they be able to do more in their roles?

I bet they'd say yes. But, maybe, might recognise that few of them are 2/3 A level contestants.

What do you think?

The parallels between the way the NHS is heading, and the prison service - is chilling 'New screws teaching new screws'.

This is off topic as I was talking about prison staff here, not me / but in my NHS, front line team; my hardy, stalwart, long term, experienced crew of 8-9 of many years turned into 15 in the space of 6-12 months. Of whom half are new, as many oldsters walked. These new people are doing their best. But they start under qualified, they're eyewateringly under experienced.

People need to know what is happening in their public services.

Now, back to that in-the-job 4 weeks lad, after 10 weeks training, who has just has urine and faeces thrown at him.

Hi OP. You should do a search on MN, as there was very recently an interesting and informative thread about becoming a prison officer. It would definitely be worth a look.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/3718123-To-ask-would-you-ever-be-a-prison-officer-And-how-much

Some POs there.

They need a medal and an overhaul. It needs addressing imo before we end up with anarchy in prisons.

Thanks.

I posted on the thread above...

The training does not prepare the POELTS in any way for the job, having said that, there's no way to really prepare for watching someone gouge their own throat out, stamp on someone's head, get covered in shit and piss.

The problem is that they no longer interview (which will probably be a surprise to most people!!). This means people pass the tests who are wholly unsuitable for the role and, quite frankly, put everyone in danger. There are a lot of young POELTS too. Some are excellent, however, if a prisoner who has been in the system for 30 years is being an issue - who do you think he is going to listen to? There is very little respect shown by prisoners to younger staff (even less than they show us oldies!!).

The fact remains that they shouldn't have let so many people go. They have tried to recruit under the pretext of "Key Worker", however, neither prisoners or staff are that stupid that we don't know it is just another way to get people back through the doors to cover up the fuck up of VEDS and letting the experience walk through the door.

Mini rant over. I could go on for a while. Luckily I will be out in a few years but feel sorry for both the staff and prisoners who will be left dealing with the giant fuck up of a few years ago. It's not safe for anyone.