Committee
Justice Committee 29 January 2013
29 Jan 2013 · S4 · Justice Committee
Item of business
Prison Visits
I attended Low Moss last week. It is a very modern prison; it will be a year old next month. It has 700 prisoners, which is just about full to capacity. There are nearly 120 remand prisoners; comments were made earlier about the difficulty of engaging with remand prisoners because encouraging them to participate in prison life and activity is something of a problem. Some of the other short-term prisoners also need to be encouraged to see the point of participation.Low Moss has some unusual aspects. It has very tight external security; there are a significant number of external and internal closed-circuit television cameras to cover the environment, and the prison has a no-metal policy. Staff and management believe that the prison’s culture can be more relaxed because the external security is such that there is a high level of confidence that the internal area of the prison is reasonably secure, and contraband is reduced to an absolute minimum.There is a curfew on TV access, so prisoners are put to bed at one o’clock in the morning and TVs are turned off. That seems to have had a positive effect on the prison, because it encourages prisoners to get a night’s sleep, which means that in the morning they are more engaged and determined to go out and do something. I understand that in many other prisons, prisoners are allowed to watch TV through the night. We all know that if people do that, in the morning they are not in the right frame of mind to engage.Family visits are a main feature of the prison and families are encouraged to come in throughout the week as and when they wish. Family visits take place in the main hall, which looked to me like a gymnasium—you could play five-a-side football in it. However, there is no doubt that prison staff have made it as friendly for receiving families as possible and, apparently, it works. I did not see any families when I was there, but there is no doubting the staff’s enthusiasm. The area looks fresh, clean and tidy.Cubs, scouts, brownies and guides are all encouraged to meet within the prison environment, and the children of the prisoners are encouraged to join the local cubs and scouts groups and so on. The hope is that those children will take that experience back with them to their own locales and estates, where they might maintain that kind of community involvement.Prisoners are involved in work within the prison to maintain the prison environment. That includes stuff such as basic painting and window cleaning, which I think is a good thing. The governor is keen for external work to be included within the process at Low Moss. In the old Low Moss, which is now a long time gone, external work groups maintained the pathways, dealt with vandalism and cleaned up areas around East Dunbartonshire and apparently gave a lot of time and effort to the local community.The first page of my report includes a breakdown of the hours dedicated to the various purposeful activities. Without in any way wishing to undermine the effort that the staff put into those activities, I think that it is very noticeable that “Offender behaviour programme attendance” had a mere 6,800 hours, whereas “Scheduled activity/work attendance” had 436,000 hours and “Other activity (eg PT, sports)” had nearly 52,000 hours. By comparison, the 6,800 hours for the offender behaviour programme perhaps pales into insignificance. The same is true of “Education attendance”, to which 21,500 hours were dedicated. Given the information that we have received over the past couple of years about the importance of education, a bit more effort needs to be given to education and to the offender behaviour programme.I had a very positive visit. I was really impressed with the culture among the staff and management in Low Moss, who deserve encouragement.
In the same item of business
The Convener
SNP
Item 4 on the agenda is a report on our prison visits. Members have visited Barlinnie, Edinburgh, Inverness, Low Moss, Perth and Polmont over the past two we...
John Finnie
Ind
We were made welcome. A lot of positive work is going on in Inverness. The issues include the limitations caused by the building’s construction and the conse...
The Convener
SNP
Perhaps later we can ask why the women’s unit is so successful. That is interesting.Colin Keir and David McLetchie both went to Saughton. It is HMP Edinburgh...
David McLetchie (Lothian) (Con)
Con
The prisoners’ work programme has limitations, many of which are to do with the significant number of relatively short-stay prisoners, in that it is harder t...
Colin Keir (Edinburgh Western) (SNP)
SNP
I agree. We saw some impressive work activities, such as portable appliance testing and woodwork, but there are fundamental problems, particularly with the s...
The Convener
SNP
Your report mentions internet restrictions and states that internet access for educational purposes is provided successfully elsewhere in the United Kingdom....
Colin Keir
SNP
From what I remember of the conversation that we had on that, the issue is about where to draw the line. Allowing internet access for educational purposes is...
The Convener
SNP
Alison McInnes and I visited Polmont.
Alison McInnes (North East Scotland) (LD)
LD
The visit was interesting and we were made very welcome. We had a good time exploring a number of things. There are particular challenges for a young offende...
The Convener
SNP
I will add a couple of points to that. I accept the difficulties about internet-based learning and I agree with Alison McInnes about what I call education by...
Graeme Pearson
Lab
I attended Low Moss last week. It is a very modern prison; it will be a year old next month. It has 700 prisoners, which is just about full to capacity. Ther...
The Convener
SNP
Does “Education attendance” mean formally sitting down to learn to read, write and count, or does it include—as I think it should—applied education?
Graeme Pearson
Lab
I think that the education includes all sorts of things. There may be a softness to it, in that prisoners who merely attend and show an interest will be incl...
The Convener
SNP
Sandra, do you want to tell us about your visit to Barlinnie? You went to the Bar-L.
Sandra White (Glasgow Kelvin) (SNP)
SNP
Yes—I think that is what they called it when we walked in. It was very interesting—
The Convener
SNP
You got a hat out of it.
Sandra White
SNP
I got a hat and a mug—the clerk got a mug as well—which you cannot buy. Perhaps in later years the mug might appear as an heirloom on the “Antiques Roadshow”...
The Convener
SNP
I am conscious, having done it myself, that we have been speaking about purposeful activity, which is a spectrum of activities including activities to addres...
Sandra White
SNP
We should raise that point as we proceed with our inquiry. In Barlinnie, a number of the prisoners who took part in courses were able to get Scottish vocatio...
The Convener
SNP
Do employers go into Barlinnie?
Sandra White
SNP
Martin Plant Hire employs a number of prisoners; they do not use an apprenticeship process, but the prisoners work there. Various other companies are involve...
The Convener
SNP
You, too, had experience of the Bike Station, Alison.
Alison McInnes
LD
Yes.
The Convener
SNP
Do we know whether the people got jobs at the end of it?
Alison McInnes
LD
I think that one person was employed at the Bike Station after they had left prison.
The Convener
SNP
Roddy—you were at Perth prison.
Roderick Campbell
SNP
Yes. I will try to be brief, as a lot of the points have already been covered. I was impressed by the governor and his staff, including the deputy governor, ...
The Convener
SNP
I thank members for that.I suspend the meeting briefly to allow Colin McConnell to take his place so that members can ask questions in our purposeful activit...