Now dangerous life-term inmates could be sent to soft touch prison
- HM Chief Inspector of Prisons for Scotland Wendy Sinclair-Gieben said prisoners serving life sentences for murder must be sent to lower security facilities to ease overcrowding
- Critics warn ‘public safety cannot be put at risk’ by efforts to ease crisis across Scotland’s prisons
More criminals including prisoners serving life for murder must be sent to soft-touch jails amid an overcrowding crisis, a watchdog has demanded.
HM Chief Inspector of Prisons for Scotland Wendy Sinclair-Gieben said more use must be made of open prison – and jails where inmates are handed the keys to their own cells.
Prisoners are also given access to the community when they are in lower-security facilities, so placing them in softer conditions would help prepare more of them for release, she said.
The findings of the Chief Inspector’s review were partly based on interviews with 600 prisoners – with many complaining about the length of time it takes to be moved to open jail.
HM Chief Inspector of Prisons for Scotland Wendy Sinclair-Gieben said more use must be made of space in open prisons
Scotland’s open prison, Castle Huntly, near Dundee
The report comes ahead of the release of around 550 prisoners who are set to be freed early after controversial proposals from SNP ministers were approved by MSPs on Wednesday.
Scottish Tory justice spokesman Russell Findlay said: ‘Given past incidences of absconding, proper consideration must be given to any increased use of open prisons – public safety cannot be put at risk due to the SNP’s prison crisis.’
Scotland’s open prison is Castle Huntly, near Dundee, while so-called ‘top end’ facilities allow a ‘staged approach to community access’ – these are housed inside Greenock prison and Barlinnie in Glasgow – before prisoners ‘progress’ to the open estate.
Ms Sinclair-Gieben’s review found that Castle Huntly had an ‘untenable position of operating below design capacity’.
The open estate has 284 places but has operated at around 60 per cent of that capacity ‘over the course of the last few years’.
Ms Sinclair-Gieben said open prison and ‘top end’ facilities were vital to prepare inmates for their eventual release.
Her report said: ‘Failure or delay in facilitating access to opportunities for prisoners to begin being tested in preparation for successful community reintegration may affect the overall number of people in custody in the context of an increasingly overcrowded prison system in Scotland.’
The top end facilities ‘differ in many ways to those in the closed prison estates’ as there are ‘lower staff-to-prisoner ratios and individuals have a key to their own room’ – while there is a ‘less structured regime’ to ‘encourage the individual to be more independent’.
They also ‘provide individuals with the opportunity to take their first steps back into the community’.
One inmate told the watchdog: ‘It’s amazing … the prison service say you can’t go to open conditions until you’ve done your programme; the Parole Board say you can’t be released early until you’ve done your programme.
‘So it doesn’t matter how well you’ve done, you’re not getting progression because the Scottish Prison Service (SPS) can’t resource the programmes.’
Ms Sinclair-Gieben added: ‘By promoting a system that prioritises rehabilitation, support and successful reintegration, we can work towards a society that reduces crime, and ultimately creates safer communities for all.’
An spokesman for the SPS said: ‘We welcome this report which will help inform our ongoing review of risk management and progression.’
