Labour's early prisoner release programme and why it's (still) a terrible idea

[musicalfrog]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c0ejwedl1gno

The family of PC Andrew Harper have rightly come out today to criticise this policy. My heart breaks for them - it really is the biggest insult.

If prisons are getting too full then build new ones - why this wasn't initiated two years ago when it was already a big problem I have no idea.

The police and CPS have gone to a lot of time and effort to get these convictions - and that ain't exactly cheap! A good number of these criminals will re-offend upon release and the process starts again - sooner than it would have if they'd served their full sentence. Not exactly saving much time and money there.

Plus the blindingly obvious fact that a larger general population will naturally bring with it a larger prison population.

You let criminals out early, the general population suffers more, you put the police and CPS under additional pressure, nobody wins except the criminals who think they have even less to fear from the process than ever before.

What exactly are Labour trying to achieve here because I can't see it?

Build the bloody prisons!

It’s such a shame that families are abandoned after sentencing, as if the sentence alone is somehow healing for them. Prisons are grotesque, stinky, violent places where people are left with poor healthcare, insufficient food, a lack of basic cleaning facilities even. They are full of drugs and people with serious mental illness, and also people who are absolutely awful. Prisons are not cushy.

High secure mental hospitals are less crowded and have marginally better conditions, fewer (illegal) drugs and generally better physical healthcare, but staff still have the power to restrain you and in some cases can force you to take medication. The company is equally grim.

If anyone thinks either of those things are cushy they are bonkers. I believe families are fed a lot of rubbish by tabloid journos so they can exploit them for years with photo ops and quotes. But does it ease their pain? No, if anything it prevents them from getting even the tiniest bit of peace.

But that's the problem, prisons are not cushy but they also do nothing for the people in them. In Norway they get structure, training and routine and In turn the offending rate is a lot lower. Unfortunately British people have become obsessed with punishment as opposed to strict structured rehabilitation.

It was Anne Widdecombe that went to one of these Norwegian prisons and despite admission it works still couldn't bring herself to agree that tax dollars should be spent this way. She would rather have them rot in jail's as opposed to come out with skills and better behaved

And you are right prisons do smell, they can be violent and that alone tells you everything you need to know about what goes off inside. Why are we willing to accept violence in prison.

I definitely think there should be more daily structure within the prison. A focus on rehabilitation and training. Otherwise it will be very hard to break the cycle of reoffending. I also think it will help to reduce violence within the prison if inmates have a structured day. People might not care about inmates attacking other inmates, but it’s the prison guards who have to intervene risking their personal safety. Do we really want angry, resentful people coming out of prison with no path forward? Reoffending rates are just under 30%, so I think something needs to change.