Wednesday, December 05, 2007

Prison Building: Are We Heading for a Titanic Mistake?

I don't pretend to be an expert on prisons, so it is with some degree of apprehension that I even broach the subject of the announcement today on the planned creation of three TITAN prisons. It's not often that I LINK to Jailhouselawyer, but on this occasion I think he raises some interesting points, particularly about rehabilitation. The former Prisons Inspector Lord Ramsbotham slammed TITANS in the House of Lords today...
I hate Titans ... The last time they came in they were called techno prisons.
They were impersonal but all locking and unlocking was done electronically and
it broke down the one thing that you need to have in prisons, which is the
relationship between prisoners and staff.

In his response to Jack Straw in the Commons, Shadow Justice Secretary was quizzical about Lord Carters recommendation that TITANS should be built. He said...
And is he sure that Lord Carter’s recommendation to build large “Titan” prisons
is right? Would it not be better to build smaller, local prisons where
offenders can be closer to their families to aid rehabilitation?

I hope Nick's quizzicalness may turn into outright opposition. From what I have read this evening, we may be heading for a disaster.

I should also mention tonight that I am thinking of all my ex neighbours in the North Norfolk village of Swanton Abbott. They now face RAF Coltishall being turned into a prison. Their house values have been slashed overnight. I had to sell my little cottage there 18 months ago to be able to pay all my election debts. I would have dearly loved to have kept it. I have to say that I am now glad I didn't.

24 comments:

Beachfreak said...

Careful with the assumptions about house prices being slashed. I'm not saying for a minute you aren't right, but there's nothing worse than a self fulfilling prophesy.

Ralph Hancock said...

It's Jeremy Bentham's 'Panopticon' again. His original design, in the 18th century, was for a prison with corridors radiating from a central observation point so that just one warder could supervise and control hundreds of prisoners. Electronics now let you achieve this without the difficult architecture.

See Wikipedia under 'Panopticon'.

Anonymous said...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2007/12/05/nosplit/flagvote.xml

very funny

Anonymous said...

No offence, but why do they have to give everything a brand name in Britain? I've noticed it before - and my brain has just drained of any examples. But it identifies something too much.

We need more prisons. Whether they build ultra-secure, electronic or regular prisons should be a matter for what the prison service requires. Giving something an identity, like Titans, gives nitwits something to protest against. (Oh, boo hoo! They're too crool!)

Already, the Shadow Justice Secretary has raced in with: "Would it not be better to build smaller, local prisons where
offenders can be closer to their families to aid rehabilitation?"

Answer: communities don't want local prisons, as though they were local Tescos. Second, if "being close to their families" - i.e., living with them - did not stop them offending in the first place, how will it help with their rehabilitation?

Can we stop worrying about the sensibilities of prisoners and start thinking about the law abiding and the vulnerable who depend on effective law enforcement to walk around in freedom? - including vulnerable old people and children?

Americans don't give prisons names and identities. They just announce that they're building some. I think Alcatraz was the last one that had an identity, and even then, it wasn't a brand name. Building a Titan sounds like building one of the numpty housing developments identified as a "village" with the builder's name.

Why not just say you're building more prisons, without personalising them with a brand name?

Anonymous said...

The main reason for fewer bigger prisons is because of NIMBYs. Smaller prisons are also obviously more costly and we already spen a vast amount on the prison service,

copydude said...

I rather like the idea of bringing back prison ships. It would create many needed jobs in Tilbury that haven't been seen since Dickens was a lad.

A turnover of prison ships and grieving relatives would also alleviate the decline in retail sales in the neighbouring Lakeside shopping mall, sorely hit by declining consumer borrowing.

And if these ships could sail to Australia too . . . problem solved.

Anonymous said...

From the way the top of the heap Comrades are behaving - appearing to break their own electoral law - they must be planning to fill up these prisons with members of the political arm of the trade union movement [aka Labour Party]!

Anonymous said...

Copydude - Oz doesn't let people of that class in any more. I'm not saying I don't find the idea of prison ships strangely appealing, but there's nowhere to send them these days. Cuba might work, if we slipped Castro enough bung.

Anonymous said...

But america does have different prisons, for different catagories of offences, you have the County jail which is fairly slack, but is ran on a local basis, and is for sentences of less then a year, and people held on remand etc, and then you ahve the larger prisons, which themselves range from quite slack, to verging on brutal. The thing about the US is though, its vastness means that they can stick a prison completely away from any community, and land space is not an issue.

Anonymous said...

Well the prisons have got to go somewhere, if there wasn't one to be built in North Norfolk, there'd be one built in someone else's constituency. It's not unfair.

Also the Tory reaction smacks of trying to create problems where there really shouldn't be any. They shouldn't just oppose everything the government does from now on.

Machiavelli's Understudy said...

Verity,

If communities want a relatively effective justice system and the benefits of it, they must also share the burdens of it. That means communities having somewhere for prisoners in their custody.

Frankly, I want prisoners to have a chance of rehabilitation- I want to see them have the opportunity to break out of the cycle of criminality that bedevils a large number of those with multiple convictions. I certainly want to make sure that prisons are a safe and stable environment, if not for improving the chances of prisoner rehabilitation, then definitely for the safety and well-being of those who work in prisons on a daily basis.

I know you'd dearly love to build massive penitentiaries with guard towers and prison officers armed with machine guns, beating prisoners with glee- and perhaps that's how they do things in Mexico- but I don't think that's the solution for us in the UK. Perhaps you could try Germany, though?

Anonymous said...

Titanic Prisons, Now I have an explanation, but you won't believe it anyway so why should I bother.

Oh Ok then, I'll Bother...But you still won't believe it at first, not until you start to think about all the recent changes to our Laws.

First off though you have to accept that our Own Govt, and their shadowy elite Pursestring holding puppetmasters are absolute hideous Monsters, on a Par with Adolf Hitler or Josef Stalin.
Evil enough to begin plotting the sellout of their Own country to the EU only a decade after hundreds of thousands had fought and died to protect Queen and country.
See FCO Letter dated 10th May 1972
Amongst others.
Vile enough that both Conservatives and Labour Conspire together with the Press, to shepherd the British into the whoever they vote for, See FCO Doc W J Adams to Mr Hugh Jones, Dated 14th Sept 1971.

Evil enough to begin an eradication policy of its own People via freely available abortion, (6 Million to date) and soon to be made even easier. Knowing full well that demographically the British People, will be Swamped out of existance within a few decades, because their birth rates are below replacement levels.
Vile enough to import Millions of Foreign EU Voters to Replace said aborted British Children, Lured by Welfare that could have gone to support said aborted British Children, in a bid to totally eradicate the British People and their Identity from the face of the Earth.
Despite the fact that said Aborted British Children would now be rearing children of their own, the logic here clearly being, we want Voters, Just not British Voters.
A Genocidal Policy confirmed when Jack Straw stated 'The British are not worth saving as a race'
The Eradication of National Identity
http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/865
Now that you have accepted that Westminster is run by Hideously Vile Monsters set to exterminate and replace their own People, By MASS MASS MASS Abortion Programs AND MASS MASS MASS Immigration Programmes, the real purpose behind these Extermination camps should become obvious.

I'm not sure if Milibands Proposed Incinerators have anything to do with the British eradication Project, we'll have to see.

But you have to remember we have passed Peak Oil and we do have a Massive Housing Shortage in Britain and Indeed Throughout the EU, sorry, Europe, Where you will find Similar Projects Springing Up.
Sure would solve a Lot of Problems Getting rid of those Freedom Loving Western Europeans.

This plot is not unlike that to Replace Mexico, Canada and the USA with a North American Union which also has Death camps for Dissenting Americans and Canadians.
http://www.rense.com/political/campsfound.htm

http://www.detailshere.com/concentrationcamps01.htm#An EX CIA's admission

http://www.detailshere.com/concentrationcamps2.htm

http://www.detailshere.com/concentrationcamps01.htm#An EX CIA's admission
http://www.detailshere.com/redbluelists.htm
http://www.infowars.com
http://www.prisonplanet.com



See I told you you wouldn't Believe me.

Anonymous said...

Why not just nail the buggers to crosses along the M40, and leave them to rot?

Anonymous said...

Machiavelli's Understudy - How sad to be so trite. No, sweets, that's not how "they do things in the Mexico". How old are you, anyway? The world has changed since your day.

And "beating prisoners with glee"? You are one bizarre poster.

Offenders against society should be kept in a secure environment which metes out punishment for offending. That means no TV. They should try reading a book. And working for eight hours a day. Exercise in an exercise yard, not a gym.

Also, why should "communities" as you term them have to tolerate this effluent? What about those islands in the North Sea that feature on weather forecasts?

Anonymous said...

Stalin McSporran says why not just nail the buggers to a cross.

They are not worthy of it.

Anonymous said...

Verity has said everything I wanted to say, there's no reason why prisons shouldn't be built in the empty wastes of the realm - I was going to say Scotland but.....the only reaosn these places are built near 'communities' is so the inmates can have vists from their nearest and dearest. I suppose, too, that the staff don't particularly marooned. It is time that prisoners were made SERVE as opposed to be SENTENCED to MEANINGFUL prison terms i.e. SERVE the entire SENTENCE handed down. I thinbk there would be a reduction in reoffending if they knew this to be their fate. Maximum sentences as proscribed should be the norm, especially in crimes of violence and the carrying of weapons - no need for all these 'aggravating' bolt-ons. Build 'em quick, and make the buggers wish they'd never done the crime. You know it makes sense.

Anonymous said...

I rather suspect these prisons are being built on military estabilishments as the government are not required to obtain planning permission, thus saving many years of a consultation process. We had a similar situation in Bedfordshire. An imigration detention centre known as Yarlswood was built on ministry land. The government ignored advice to install a sprinkler system (no doubt to save a few bob) and guess what, within a short period, the inmates burnt it to the ground. £100 million up in smoke. The nearby village will probably have a bypass built (as did the village of Clapham near Yarlswood) to go some way to appease the locals, but house prices in the surrounding area to Yarlswood are lower.

Anonymous said...

Outsource prisons to Siberia or China -- that way the criminals can also be put to work to earn at least part of their keep.

It'll save money, allows judges to inflict real sentences that actually reflect the crime committed, without worrying about capacities, and it'll make prison something to fear again.

I'm all for mollycoddling and rehabilitating the non-violent criminals who have not caused huge damage, but people who kill and maim others should be punished, not pampered.

Newmania said...

"local prisons where
offenders can be closer to their families to aid rehabilitation?"

It is no business of the so called justice system to worry about rehabilitation and I am at something of a loss to se what the problem is here .
Offenders have to be securely held at minimum cost with minimum levels of decency. If they are away from their families it is probably a good thing ( who cares) and if the experience is unpleasant all the better.

I have long thought the best plan was to out source internment to India where they would be further away cheaper and held under civilised conditions . If you are going to attack Brown attack him for then years in which the Home office got nothing right and in which there has been demonstrably too few prisons.

There is a good case for privatising the whole business as well. Criminals deserve far worse than they get in this country where you are far less likely to go to prison if you commit an offence than anywhere else in Europe.


Poltically this is not good for brown however as COnservative who approve will not vote Labour and socially conservative "Working class " are not swing voters . The Liberal Constituency will hate it and they are the battele ground infuriating though it is at times

Anonymous said...

Patriot ...
"See I told you you wouldn't Believe me."

We stopped reading after a few lines.

Unsworth said...

If we decreased the amount of fatuous legislation then we could reduce requirement for prison places.

In fairness to the Judiciary, it's increasingly the case that their decisions are dictated by central government and/or Parliament.

What's wrong here is that Judges are now expected to take the availability of prison places into consideration when determining (custodial) sentences - as if the are an arm of 'Management'. Why?

The clowns in this Government seem not even able to understand the correlation between levels of legislation and prisoner numbers. Their stock response is 'when in doubt, legislate'. But they also seem congenitally unable to abide by their own laws.

Anonymous said...

Why not build them in Poland?

Anonymous said...

10:48 - I didn't stop reading after a few lines. Perhaps you should have stuck with it.

Outsourcing of prisons is an idea whose time has come! Britain cannot accommodate more huge prisons PLUS 3m McHouses for unwanted, unneeded and unproductive immigrants.

Newmania - No. Not India. Why should they get a free trip to a wonderful country like India when I have to pay?

However, I love Cinammon's idea of China and Siberia/Russia. Vast countries with loads of space and an unsympathetic attitude. Sleeping on mats on the floor (as, in fact, they do in highly civilised Singapore, as well), working for their meagre living, long, long, long, Russian winter nights and no TV. I love it already!

For sure, recidivism would plummet.

I would take it one step further, even. Why not outsource immigrants, too! Send them to Russia and China! Not too many Romany or Urdu translators in local governments and hospitals there, but they have to take the rough with the smooth.

Anonymous said...

Plus, we could outsource that Godawful Shami Chakrabarti individual so she could monitor the prisoners' rights in China, Russia and Siberia. That should keep her busy little uppity mind occupied.