BEN'S PRISON BLOG

Ben's Big Day Out

2012-01-28T23:57:00.000Z

I've been out on Escorted Town Visits before, around one every 13 years or so, and they never particularly excite me. People always assume that the world has been transformed in their lifetime and yet in so many essential ways it is as it ever was. Shops are shops, people are people. So bumbling around town with a member of staff in tow, whilst being pleasant enough, has never raised my pulse rate.

This one was different, though, because it really mattered. Which made me begin to double guess myself and all I did, which increased my stress so that the day was not as relaxing or relaxed as it could have been. Still, as the point of it was to test me, this was a Big Day Out.

And lucky old me got to travel on a train, for the first time in around 33 years. There was no handle on the door, replaced by two glowing buttons to enter or exit. The seats reminded me of a cheap coach interior but then this was a mere toy of a train, a single carriage shuttle into town.

Getting on a train at a rural platform is simple enough. Getting off at a main station was not. Gone are the days of walking through the exit, waving a ticket at a conductor who would snip a chunk out of the item. Instead I was faced with a row of turnstiles. How do I present my ticket to a damn machine? On the telly people seem to wave their cards at a sensor, which allows them passage. Of course that was London, the Underground, and Oyster cards, but it was the only clue I had as to how to progress. My escort, Mr X, had slipped through without my being able to see what manoeuvres he had performed. I approached and began to wave my ticket at the machine like Harry Potter with a faulty wand. A railworker looked at me sadly and came across to rescue me. The ticket, it seems, went into a slot. Ha, simple, innit?

Finally unleashed onto the streets of Derby, cold and pissing wet, being stuck in the station actually looked like a good option. Onwards we pressed, up into the town to explore the wonders of the shopping centre and thereabouts.

Who'd have thought that every other shop would be a phoneshop, their wares seductively drawing me ever nearer? These temptations only gave way when a food retailer needed space. Phones and food, phones and food, over and over, around each corner we turned. I just had to see what the fuss was about with the IPad and so Mr X pointed me to an Apple shop. Just to make my stance perfectly clear I marched up to the boy at the counter and told him that I detested Steve Jobs and all his works but in the spirit of open mindedness, could I play with an IPad please? The boy guided me to a counter of sleek technology and I began to brush my fingers across the surface. It took me moments to find a search function, then to Google "prisonerben". Ego-surfing is a terrible vice but this was my first opportunity to see the blog on a proper screen rather than on an old phone. I like it. Uncomplicated and uncluttered. Simple. Turning to the boy I declared "hmm, I may well be back”, using a tone that implies I had a wallet full of cash that may – just may – come his way.

How do food vendors ever go bust? A cup of tea being high on our list of urgent matters, we slid into a covered market and coughed over 90p for a mug. Break that figure down, starting with a 1p tea-bag, and either the owner was a secret millionaire or had crazy overheads. The market was blighted by booths and stalls which even the owners had abandoned, closed, for rent, futile. I could have spent hours wandering the stalls, just looking, but I felt sorry for the owners. My loitering would only raise their hopes and I didn't want to add to their disappointment.

Sloshing with hot tea, I ambled around until I found a proper tobacconist. For most of my life I have smoked Old Holborn but this seems to have been supplanted by other, feebler, tobaccos in prison. So I leapt at this chance and bought an ounce of the good stuff as a treat. Given laxer prison rules and a credit card I could have spent a while at this stall, buying tobacco tins, the odd cigar, and a Zippo lighter - all of my life I have always longed for a Zippo but prison management have never been comfortable with the idea of us having access to petrol. Tsk.

I was shown the local probation building and the police inquiries place, just in case I found myself on a future trip unable to return to the prison on time. That is something we lifers dread, missing the bus could have serious ramifications for future progress but asking a policeman is a piece of advice I sincerely hope never to have to fall back upon. Not that I saw a single copper on foot in the whole day.

The main library was an obvious port of call and I headed straight for the corner packed with PC's. No sooner had I blagged a chair that I noticed that someone had not logged off their Facebook page. That resolved itself when I guy came across to point out that he was actually using that machine. Sorry, dude... Failing to log on to an adjacent, unused, PC I was noticed by a security guard. In a library. Good grief. She helpfully pointed out that I needed to check in at the main desk to be enabled and off I went. Was I a member? Nope, just passing through... Did I have any ID? Ah, this is the embarrassing bit, I said as I pulled the only paper I had out of my pocket - my Licence to be temporarily liberated from the prison. Not an eyelid was batted and, a short form filling later and I was back online. Without the distraction of an Apple nerd I was able to relax enough to pop back on to the blog, log in and read the latest comments. And immediately faced a dilemma.

Should I write a quick post? Should I respond to some comments? The lack of interactivity on the blog is something I sorely miss and am ever grateful to you for putting up with so far. The temptation to blog "live" was a real one but also fraught. As I understand it I am allowed access to the net whilst out and about (except for social networking) but I want to have it explicitly made crystal clear that I can blog. My first day out of the prison wouldn't have been the best time to do something that may be perceived as taking a liberty, and one that would drop Mr X in the poo to boot.

Temptation resisted, I popped across to Prisoners Families Voices, which never really worked well on my mobile. Amazing site, wonderful people. And, of course, a quick foray to Jailhouselawyer. Sites look so much better on a big screen! Just wait, I will be popping up and leaving comments all over the place when I have the chance.

Declining a free cup of coffee offered in the library - why? - we returned to the shopping centre to look at clothing and watches. Being an organised man I had laid out everything I needed for the day the night before, including my watch which needs a new battery. And like an idiot, I then forgot to bring it. So we zigzagged around the concourse, pausing at a few of the stalls that weren't trying to flog phones or food, until I found a guy selling watches at a fiver a pop. How could I resist? As he rang up the sale I had to ask him about his business model. How on earth can he sell watches for a fiver? The honesty was refreshing. He explained that they were made in China, would last around 6 months, and to keep them away from water. Fair enough, I thought, I only need it to work until I get home. And if that is longer than a few months, that I have a crap watch will be the least of my problems.

Another cup of tea later - I went the extra mile and forked out 95p rather than a paltry 90p - and lunch beckoned. Not that I was hungry, but as the nick had given me £3.10 for "subsistence" I was determined to eat something. The proper cafe and coffee shops were dismissed with a the haughty disdain that grows out of poverty and found a tiny corner cafe where we both went for a plate of chips and the hottest cup of tea I've ever experienced. As is the way with shopping, the next corner we turned revealed a place which would have cost us half the price. Hmm.

A long stroll away from the precincts led us past the courts, down to the riverbank. I still maintain that my suggestion that we pop into the courts and heckle those in the dock was an idea potent with entertainment options.

Money to spare, the end of the day drawing into view, so Primark and Poundland were the places to be. That I have no concept of style is not a disputed fact, and I leave it to the Editor to ensure that my wardrobe isn't a social embarrassment. The sweatshirts and socks that I bought seem to be this side of the pale, but even Mr X was hesitant about a rack of hats I was eyeing. Similar to Bowlers, but more rakish. I lost my nerve and swooped to the biscuits shelf at Poundland instead.

As we settled onto the train for our triumphant return a man clambered on. He looked slightly down and out, unkempt, but he was sporting one of the pseudo-bowler hats. Even better, he had added a long feather. I nudged Mr X. "I told you they were coming back into fashion..."

The Tannoy is My Shepherd...

2012-01-27T16:47:00.001Z

Closed prisons move to the rhythm of the Keys, our daily lives and movement being guided by how, when and where various doors and gates are being locked and unlocked. This Open prison lives without that control. We just have a Tannoy system, enabling staff in various departments to summon Joe Bloggs from wherever he may be.

In the absence of locked doors and staff, the rhythm of the day and our routine is self imposed. We know - or quickly discover - when and where we should be during working hours. We know when the dining hall opens, when the library is ready, where the visits room is.

And rather than being dependent upon staff to enable the journey to and from, we make our own way around the institution. The official activities such as work and meals provide a framework of sorts but for the rest of the time we can appear or disappear around the place pretty much at will.

This is why, in the initial week or so, it is a boring place. Before a coterie of new comrades or old friends are discovered, until the sources of ease about the place are unveiled, then activity is rendered random, aimless and unsatisfying. Once a job has been found or allocated, though, then it feels as if one is being integrated into the structure here.

Some find Open quite an easy place. Some just don't. The trite may sit in smug judgement and throw around that debased word, institutionalisation, as an explanation for this but they would be wrong. There are those - short termers as well as long - who prefer a more structured life, and that is how they arrange their affairs in the outside world as well. Until they can engage with some activity here, they feel adrift and uncomfortable.

Then there are those who arrive and fail to shake off the mentality which enabled their survival through many years in Closed prisons. This is illustrated most clearly by their interactions with the institution, the run-ins with staff, the complaints they make. Every prison (every human institution!) is riddled with flaws, shot through with issues where improvement should be a necessity. Open prisons are just as liable to these weaknesses as are closed prisons, though the specific issues may be different.

Yet to engage with the nick on that level is to miss the point somehow. Here we must give serious time and effort to looking forward, to gaining release and beginning to rebuild our lives. To be drawn in to arguments with staff over the minutiae of prison life may be a useful strategy in Closed prisons but in Open it is to fall into a trap of looking backwards rather than forwards. And that carries the risk of tripping over your own feet.

Alas, poor Brenda

2012-01-26T18:15:00.002Z

Despite a fortune of several hundred million GBP, I hear that the Queen is finding it hard to keep up her palaces. Bummer.

Still, it puts my worries over finding bus fares into perspective.

The Smallest Minority

2012-01-25T13:27:00.000Z

Out of a prisoner population of about 85,000 I can count the number of cons who are persistent

and vocal campaigners against the prison system on the fingers of one hand.

As anyone who has ever bumped into a bunch of cons can tell you, we can be the most vociferous and bitter of complainers. Surprisingly, perhaps, we are generally not the happiest of bunnies.

And yet this is very rarely translated into a public campaign or action. The majority of cons may sound off in private but that is where their urge to promote change begins and ends. This is a conundrum.

In decades past, a vocal con was one who lived a perilous existence. Leaving aside the formal mechanisms of control exercised by staff, campaigning cons were vulnerable to the unofficial retaliation of the institution. These ranged from an old-fashioned kicking; to mail disappearing; visits being cancelled; extra strip or cell searches; verbal provocations; poor job allocations; being transferred miles away from home...in an institution where the most minute aspects of life can be interfered with, then the ways in which activist prisoners could be messed about were endless.

Not that this battleground has completely changed... In recent years the prison service has
become increasingly formalised, the plague that comprises managerialism rampaging through the
veins of managers. This has not signalled any abandonment of the myriad avenues used to mess
us about but rather has placed them on a more bureaucratic footing.

Coupled with the Incentives and Earned Privileges Scheme, every corner of our lives remains as vulnerable to interference as before, the only change being the shift to bureaucratic fetishism. Alongside these changes, which increased the "depth" of control, there have been developments which should have encouraged more prisoners to campaign, to give voice to their discontent.

The legal landscape for prisoners is far more favourable and accessible today than it has ever been. Witness the Prisoner's Votes case which, 20 years ago, would never have reached Court and probably earned Jailhouselawyer a few good beatings in the process.

Alongside the legal changes there are the technological ones. Accessing the mainstream media -who are always very reticent to examine prison issues - is no longer a prerequisite to having a voice. The availability of the Web, of blogging, affords prisoners an avenue to speak up that was inconceivable in previous years.

And yet, there are a mere handful of us who regularly write and express our broad views of the institution which contains us. Why are so many prisoners so quiet, when such a powerful megaphone has been offered to them?

The Politeness Conundrum

2012-01-24T23:54:00.002Z

Doors are, obviously, a common feature in all prisons. In Closed prisons, they remain under the control of staff because they are invariably locked. Moving from A to B is a matter of waiting for the screw to unlock the door, pass through, then wait for him to relock it.

Open prison is different. Without locks, doors suddenly fall within our domain. And this raises a minor dilemma of civility.

In passing through a door in Closed prison I have to give no thought to the guy behind me. The door stays open, controlled by staff, until it is locked again. Here, though, I have what I call The Tesco Conundrum. As I pass through a door, at what point am I absolved from considering the guy behind me?

I appreciate that Tesco has automatic doors, but still... when I'm passing down the main corridor, barging through the series of doors, how far behind me should I look? If a guy is a few feet behind me, holding the door open until he is closer is fine. But if he's miles away, I let the door swing shut. But where is that cut-off point? Where does civility slide into servility?

You will appreciate that the levels of civility are far greater than in Closed prisons, and I put this down to two factors. Firstly, that everyone here has been selected as being broadly "trustworthy", meaning there is a higher proportion of "sensible" people. And secondly, because Open prisons run with so few staff, we are forced to regulate most social interactions for ourselves; there's no screw standing there to keep us in line.

In such circumstances the only two options are to adopt a broadly benign and civil disposition to

all around, or to descend into a Hobbesian nightmare of war of all against all. The former option is the popular one. And that means not allowing doors to swing back into the face of the person following behind.

At this rate I'm in danger of becoming "civilised"!

Single Cell?

2012-01-23T22:48:00.001Z

With the right circumstances and the right staff, being on the spot when a single cell fell vacant served me nicely. It took three weeks but at last I was by myself. Or so I thought.

It's not the smell of my new cellmate that annoys me, nor the lack of conversation. His beady eyes take getting used to, and I have to steer clear of his teeth, but what annoys me is his habit of rummaging through my rubbish bin at all hours.

There's a moos loos aboot my hoos!

The History of Defecation

2012-01-22T11:27:00.000Z

My brief post on Improbable Correlations prompted a comment that the toilet habits of prisoners are a mystery to the uninitiated. This itself caused me to ponder the changing nature of prison society and how that has been reflected in our toilet habits. I can't say that this is a conceptual lens often selected by prison sociologists...

Back, so to speak, "in the day", the focus of our bodily emissions was a plastic bucket. "The day" in question being any time period up into recent years, but stretching back over a century. Strangely to modern ears, some of the first British prisons were actually constructed with full-scale in cell sanitation (Pentonville?), which was later removed.

And so crapping into a plastic container became the norm. The fortunate had an aptly brown two-gallon plastic bucket complete with white plastic lid. The less fortunate had to suffer a translucent plastic potty.

There are unspoken norms which demand compliance when using pisspots, particularly in a shared cell. The most important of these is not to use them to defecate. This stinks out the cell, and later stinks out the communal slopping-out sluice. Defecation must rather take place onto, or into, newspaper, pieces of prison clothing, plastic bags, and so on. The end product is neatly folded and flung out of the cell window, to be dealt with by the yard cleaning party (known variously as the Wombles or Bomb Disposal). These are the legendary "shit-parcels" , the despair of HM Inspectorate of Prisons and miscellaneous prison reformers.

Urination, then, should be the sole order of the day when using a pisspot. Emptying the containers first thing each morning became an opera of wretchedness. Hundreds of men would converge upon the communal washroom (known as "recess") and each empty their pisspot down a large white square earthenware sink. The stench of urine which had been left to fester in buckets for many hours was one of the defining smells of prison life. One can only imagine how much worse that would be if the prisoners had opted to crap in those buckets as well.

According to our political masters, slopping out was abolished in 1996.1 know because I recall hearing it on the radio news, just before I went to empty my bucket. Such a cognitive dissonance of reality clashing with declaration is not uncommon in prison affairs and so I barely had time to twitch into a cynical grin before joining the queue in the recess.

But this is to jump ahead, to overlook one of the consequences of the wave of unprecedented riots that brought the system to the verge of collapse in 1990. Afterwards, a deliberate effort was made to improve some of the physical conditions of prison and our sanitary arrangements were one focus of change. Cells which were judged to be large enough had a toilet bowl and sink levered into them, usually in a fetching style I call "prison service steel".

Cells which are not large enough for in-cell toilets found themselves in a twilight existence characterised by both piss buckets and toilets. Cell doors were electronically wired to a control system so that, during periods of lock up, prisoners could be unlocked for a few minutes in order to use the communal toilets. This sounds like an eminently sensible system. But that characterisation would be to overlook the prison setting.

This system works on an electronically set timer and queuing system. Hit your bell to join the queue for a pee at 9 pm and you may have to wait hours before the system unlocks your door. The obvious solution to such emergencies is to rely on a bucket in the cell.

In a shameless reversal of position, however, those desperados who are forced to use such a container now face disciplinary charges for "endangering health and safety"! This is despite the fact that there remain small enclaves around the prison system which remain bereft of either in-cell toilets or electronic access. Pisspots continue to exist, with all of the distaste that has accompanied them through prison history.

These sanitary improvements have also seen the loss of the communal toilets (recesses) in many prisons. Prior to in-cell sanitation these were the only place to defecate without having to hover one’s buttocks above the centre pages of the Daily Mail, throwing arm at the ready. A line of stalls sat across the rear of each recess, each divided from the passing population by a mere half-door. Of course, such toilets still exist but more in solitary splendour, tucked away in workshops or the education department. In Closed prisons, no toilet has a full-sized door lest it conceals some unknown but suspected wickedness.

In-cell sanitation sounds like the largest leap forward in prison conditions since the abolition of hanging, but it carries with it the traditional difficulties attending our toilet issues. In a shared cell, for example, defecation, sleeping and eating all takes place in a few square feet and each pairing of cellmates must work out for themselves issues of privacy and decency. Often there is no more that can be done than turn ones head away. The nose must take the brunt of the insult.

The circumstances in which prisoners are compelled to empty our bowels reflects the attitudes of the wider society and the guardians of the prison system. It is a story that comprises a complete lack of privacy and a century long disregard for basic decency, only to change following our largest violent uprising. Even now, the matter of attending to our waste is fraught with difficulty.

Perhaps the cynic had it right when he suggested that the only solution is to provide a pipe of the correct diameter that feeds right from our cells straight back to the prison kitchen...

Censorship?

2012-01-21T11:57:00.002Z

Being summoned to the Centre office is not often a Good Thing. In a prison where contact with staff is

pretty minimal, such a summons can be a malign portent.

I was met by a middle-manager who was holding a couple of pages printed off the blog. He was perturbed, asking if I had permission, who knew about it, and the like. I tried to explain the genesis and status of the blog...this man seemed unconvinced and declared that it would be brought to the governor’s attention.

This has happened, now and then, over the past two years. Some staff are caught by surprise that a prisoner blogging is legal. Some staff recoil at the very notion that any prisoner is able to voice an opinion in public. And some staff are insecure in their work and dread the thought that the prison could be held up to the public gaze.

After two years, though, I still have no answer to the question - why are prison staff still so twitchy about my blogging?

Koestler

2012-01-19T12:05:00.003Z

The idea that any person who can create great art, in whatever medium, must have an essential goodness

to their nature is a seductive one. And, obviously, completely wrong. People who have done horrible things

are also able to produce great art; another illustration of the genuine complexity of human beings.

Arthur Koestler was such a complex being. Both an alleged rapist and definite author, his name is now that of a charity which encourages the creative urges within prisoners, awarding prizes, selling art and holding an annual exhibition. I can only applaud their efforts.

The depth and breadth of artistic ability amongst my peers has always astonished and delighted me, and I encourage you to visit the Koestler website.

Even the most rotten of lives may be transformed by the nurturing of a nascent creative ability and who knows what effect your support may have?

Best Notice Ever

2012-01-18T17:40:00.000Z

The empty spirit of managerialist insincerity has occasionally afforded me the opportunity to share some of the moronic notices that plaster every prison wall.

I recently came across one that somehow says something profound about the nature of prison life:

"Don't shit in the showers"!

Too clever by half

2012-01-17T22:53:00.002Z

As the heating system for the wings is gas fired, having it set up to shut down as soon as the fire alarm is

activated seems to be a good idea. In theory.

Those who have graced these portals will instantly realise the flaw - that cons will sometimes hit the fire alarm out of mischief, boredom or to distract staff while they pick up a parcel of illicit goodies from the perimeter. Surprisingly, no one is suggesting that maybe the governor is creeping around setting the alarms off just to save on his heating bill!

Prison Staff Gagged

2012-01-16T18:28:00.000Z

I have a nasty habit of working from first principles, despite the fact that it can cause difficulties for everyone else - and myself. But if a position is right, then it's right. Which leads me to the improbable position of complaining about the gag placed on prison staff under the Rules.

"Rule 67 - Communications to the press.

(1) No officer shall make, directly or indirectly, any unauthorised communication to a representative of the
press or any other person concerning matters which have become known to him in the course of his duty.

(2) No officer shall, without authority, publish any matter or make any public pronouncement relating to
the administration of any institution to which the Prison Act 1952 applies or to any of its inmates."

Much though it may grieve me, I have to say that this is outrageous censorship. The same arguments that I make for myself to blog apply equally strongly to prison staff. If the aim is to generate debate and to better inform, then prison staff should have the same opportunities to do so as I do. It is strange to realise that, just this once, I am in a better position under the Rules than my keepers!

Whilst I don't know of any prison officer who blogs - even anonymously - there is a public forum run by screws over at prisonofficer.org.uk. Staff post under pseudonyms and no one seems to care about this pretty blatant breach of the rules.

The position should be regularised and the Rules revised. Prison staff should be able to blog within the confines which apply to me. That is, not to identify particular staff or prisoners, to avoid sensitive security issues, and not call for perpetual riots - or the staff equivalent.

It is grossly unfair, and detrimental to the debate, that I am able to share my perspective of prison with you but that staff are prohibited. Granted, they are privy to sensitive information and I am largely not, but this should not be a bar to responsible blogging.

Censorship is a particularly corrosive evil that fosters ignorance and lethargy, both of which are inimical to a vibrant civil society and particularly poisonous in the field of criminal justice. I reject it on fundamental principle. This applies most strongly, if possible, to views with which I completely disagree. Only through the open clash of opinions can true thought be advanced, only when the most repellent of ideas are dragged into the light can they be truly examined and dissected.

Needless to say, I fully expect to disagree with any perspective of prison broadcast by prison staff. Not out of pique, but because our experiences would be so different. Despite this, even because of this, the debate would be better if I was accompanied by a blogroll of staff and other prisoners.

Is the Prison Officers Association going to take up this cause for their members..?

T'internet

2012-01-15T23:58:00.001Z

Between now and my release I will be spending increasing amounts of time in the community, working, on home leaves, etc. This inevitably raises the issue of my directly accessing the Internet. I mean, through a legit computer rather than an illicit mobile phone! I'm steering well away from the latter.

I fiercely defend my blogging. My firm and consistent advice has always been that it is perfectly legal and since they were defeated at the beginning the Ministry of Justice have not made any attempts to interfere.

A Prison Service Instruction does now exist which prohibits our accessing - directly or indirectly - social networking sites such as Facebook. The legality of this PSI is for others to decide, but blogging is specifically not prohibited.

That said, the idea that, very soon, I could blog a post directly - "It's me, live and in real time!" - is causing management to scratch its head. Is such activity legal, when I'm out and about?

Given the positive resettlement ethos of this prison then I'm loath to start any sort of fight but this is an issue that does require resolving. Hopefully this will be done sensibly and, no matter what the outcome, until I am released the blog will continue at least in its current form.

This debate reflects the increasing freedoms that will be afforded me here. Another sign of this will be the legitimate possession of a mobile phone for use outside of the prison. Only very basic models are permitted but this will, sporadically, liberate me from the onerous shackles of the prison payphones. At last I will be able to join the rest of you and decide for myself which network provider will be bleeding me dry.

Ah, freedom!

Speak Up!

2012-01-14T21:08:00.000Z

There was a guy who had a chunk of his ear bitten off in a row on the landing. His new nickname was "18 months". I had to ask, why?

"Because he has an ear-and-a-half"!

Positivity

2012-01-12T20:22:00.000Z

Those who have a passing familiarity with my career may recall that this is my second attempt to scale the

summit of open prison.

The first attempt, Leyhill in 2004, was characterised by the words spoken to me by the lifer manager - "We don't care". This led to a year of utter misery and frustration for me, leading to a further 6 years of imprisonment. The whole ethos of that prison was rooted in negativity, suspicion and endless restrictions. Lifers lived in daily fear of being "lifted", waking up to face a set of handcuffs and a taxi back to closed prison. The expulsion rate at Leyhill remains legendary, as does the pervasive management attitude of thinking of any and every reason to deny a man access to the community.

Despite this heavy baggage haunting my memory, I left the Reception building here with a heavy load of box files and an open and positive frame of mind. Speaking to other Lifers I noted an absence of the fear and misery that pervades Leyhill. They assured me that the lifer management here were efficient and took a far less oppressive role in our lives.

After three weeks I was called-up for an induction talk with a lifer manager. Where Leyhill presented a brick wall, this man offered me an open door. In confirming that my timetable of activities began with me out in the community in January, leading to my possible release in May, I was struck dumb by the positive attitude underlying this vista. Rather than having to fight for anything, it seems that all of this is there for me to lose.

This is such a refreshing attitude. While this place may be far from home, cold and a bit of a dive, when it comes to the essential point of open prison - resettlement into the community - I get the feeling that I've landed on my feet.

For once!

By Hand or by Brain

2012-01-11T16:36:00.000Z

Isn't it odd that the people who are most vocal about the joys of manual labour are those with soft hands, delivering their speech from a comfy chair in a warm office?

Or as we know them, Governors.

The Great Unwashed

2012-01-10T00:59:00.000Z

Whenever I bitched at Erlestoke about being dumped on a wing littered with short sentenced smack heads, some pompous ass in a uniform would berate me. It seems that I "must learn to live with different sorts of people, like in the real world".

Tripe. Utter balls. In all of our individual lives - here and out there - the people we mix with are ones with whom we share some affinity. Just take a shufti at your own social group.

Obviously we bump into those we would not select to deal with, be it at work or in the supermarket queue. Again. the same applies in here as out there.

But this is a far cry from being forced to live with them 24 hours a day. So my response to these sill staff is to tell them that when they choose to take their annual vacation on the local sink estate, I will hear them out. Until then...

Roasted!

2012-01-09T02:03:00.000Z

A tale has reached me of a local company which was offering work for a fair number of prisoners here. Only semi-skilled and with few prospects to advance, but regular work with fair wages.

This offer existed for as long as it took for a member of the local community to phone a tabloid newspaper, who blew it up as a scandal. The company withdrew the work.

We all fret about rates of reoffending, which we often forget are the aggregate of the sum of individual victim's suffering. And we scratch our heads as to how to reduce this bleak future.

Here's an idea. Stop bleating about rehabilitation and just deliver it instead. When we finish our sentences, allow us back into society fully.

Shunning us, denying us opportunities to build a normal like, can only lead to some of us deciding that a "straight" life is just impossible. Further crimes and victims result.

Just for once let us really try rehabilitation. Because treating prisoner like crap hasn't worked yet, has it?

Message on a postcard to stand in Ed

2012-01-08T13:25:00.001Z

Rumour has it that some management here at Sudbury want to try to stop me blogging. I will resist any such effort. If they do try, I hope that the blogosphere will do whatever they can to help resist this censorship?

False Consciousness

2012-01-08T03:16:00.000Z

Bless that theoretician for mass murder, Marx, for without his phrase "false consciousness" I'd be at a loss to begin to comprehend the actions of some of my fellow prisoners.

Many prisons now have contracts with outside companies to whom the Governor sells our labour. This work is tedious and unskilled but often pays at a rate higher than equally crap prison work.

The economics of this are simple. The outside company gets labour that works under threat of punishment and at a fraction of the minimum wage. The goods are then sold on the market at the normal rate, giving the company a far greater profit margin in relation to its competitors.

Whether you support this abuse of prisoners or not, it is undeniable that this is simply using slave labour for the commercial profit.

The mystery for me is how many prisoners fail to see what is staring them in the face. Rather than appreciating this for being an abuse, many see it as an opportunity to earn a higher than usual prison wage; maybe £25 for a 35 hour working week.

So they compete for these jobs. They willingly line up to be worked like dogs just so some private company can screw some extra profit.

I just don't get it.

Prison Rule 3

2012-01-06T23:33:00.000Z

It is astonishing to realise that this Rule, headed "Purpose of prison training and treatment", is the one defining the ethos of incarceration and yet it is a mere 24 words in length:

"The purpose of the training and treatment of convicted prisoners shall be to encourage and assist them to lead a good and useful life."

It has been noted that this once held the august position of being Rule 1 before being symbolically demoted in the latest incarnation of the Rules. This gives a hint as to the actual relevance of the Rule to the functioning of prisons.

The astute will note that the word 'punishment* is absent. Indeed, the term only appears in the Rules in the context of being slung into solitary for some internal infraction. When the odd, ballsy, Minister stands up and declares that imprisonment IS the punishment, not FOR punishment, then he is telling the legal truth. Our punishment is the loss of liberty (much under-rated by those who enjoy it) and not the further infliction of suffering behind these walls.

According to this Rule, rehabilitation has been the official purpose of prison for at least 45 years.

I'm as surprised as you are!

The Stamp Thing

2012-01-06T07:58:00.000Z

Obviously the British mail system attempts to mark stamps as they pass through their clutches, but sometimes this effort fails - and this gives the opportunity to reuse the stamp. It is to prevent this that some prison staff scribble with biro over the stamp.

This prison does not allow us to have stamps sent to us from well-wishers, making recycling even more attractive! And yes, they need glue to reattach, which really isn't beyond the Neanderthal capacity of prisoners...Doh!

Through The Glass...Fortunately

2012-01-03T09:49:00.000Z

Not all glass items are banned, which makes the coffee jar embargo all the more ridiculous. And I say this as the proud new owner of a stainless steel knife, part of the cutlery we are permitted to own in open prison. But Lord forbid I get caught with a coffee jar.

And whoever mentioned resealable Kenco bags has obviously never had to live on prison wages! Kenco?! I should be so bloody lucky.

Mugged

2012-01-02T23:58:00.000Z

Being robbed, having one's hard earned shekels removed through threat is always unpleasant. When it is done by government diktat it is even worse.

This government has enacted the Prisoners' Earnings Act, a mechanism by which our paid work is made livelier by having the Minister of Justice hold a knife to our throat whilst menacingly whispering "give us yer money".

Once we reach the position of holding paid work in the community, we are subjected to the various deductions that signify "citizenship". And still no ability to vote... Taxes, National Insurance, the regular leeching of the State. Such is life. But the Prisoners' Earnings Act adds to that burden. They then remove a full 40% of the remainder in our wallets, excepting the last measly 20 quid. And out of this remainder we have to pay for our travelling costs to work.

This is explicitly a "victims tax", the money being allocated to various services for victims of crime. And I don't like it one bit.

Being fined - that is what this is - is a judicial sentence, one of many at the disposal of the Courts. And having politicians inventing and enforcing additional sentences decades after the crime took place just sticks in my craw.

It also risks increasing the number of future victims under that well established principle of prison policy making, "unintended consequences". Our successful resettlement into the community is to the general good. But if we work hard and then have our money taken, what does that tell us about the benefits of honest labour, the work ethic? Perhaps the lesson is that criminal enterprises are tax free and so more likely to help us stand on our feet?

Before this pathetic grab for the tabloid vote, Lifers - myself ! - had a chance of leaving open prison having worked and earned to have a deposit for a home, or being able to support our families. Now we risk being sluing out into society with bugger all, with the added insult to the taxpayer of then being a burden on the social security system. Sentencing is the domain of the Court system, not politicians. Victims have a range of avenues to seek redress, from compensation orders to even suing their assailant. But to have all this disregarded and substituted by a grubby self-defeating political spasm makes me sick.

Happy New Year

2012-01-01T01:45:00.000Z

A happy new year to all our readers!

Thank you for all your messages of support and for taking time out of your day to read this blog.

Ed.

Hip Hip for the Doc!

2011-12-31T22:29:00.000Z

After a full hour of mind-bending tedium in the woodwork shop, the GP has rescued me from the perils of sandpapering.

It seems that I'm such a physical wreck that manual labour and I should part company for the time being. Damn...

Note to future employers: Just don't expect me to lug stuff about or dig ditches. Apart from that, I'm your man. And reasonably priced as well!

Punitive Health Care

2011-12-30T00:54:00.000Z

Outside of bad porn or dim basements in Essex, being punished by a nurse is an uncommon occurrence. Except in prison.

What penalties do you suffer if you fail to attend an appointment with your GP? If you really take the Mickey, being struck off his list; but for missing the odd surgery? Perhaps some verbals from the practice manager, a sternly worded letter or two?

The NHS - repeat, NHS - staff who work in prisons have a more potent arsenal to draw upon, the privilege system. For failing to attend an appointment they can issue a formal warning under the Incentives and Earned Privileges Scheme (IEPS).

These warnings affect our level of privileges. How much money we can spend to phone our families. How often we can receive a visit. And, at open prison, when or whether we can work in the community or have home leaves.

Even if we put aside the legality of NHS staff using the prison's mechanisms of control, the question of its ethics is something I'd really like to see justified.

How Your Value is Judged

2011-12-29T12:26:00.000Z

In your world the question, "What do you do?" is heavily loaded with socioeconomic meaning. You know that the way you earn a living can be used to judge everything from your intellect to your ethics.

This isn't the case in prison. Our employment is not viewed as a central part of our identity. We may ask each other "Where do you work?", but the response is only a small part in the jigsaw that comprises who we are and far less important in the judgement of identity than sentence or time served.

This may be a function of how prison work is allocated. The blind hand of the market plays no part - the needs of the institution and management imperatives are all important. The needs of prisoners are largely irrelevant, even though this failure to train useful skills may have very real consequences in terms of reoffending.

On a very personal level I can't help wondering about the bureaucratic mind which saw fit to allocate me to a workshop in order to sandpaper prison furniture. Having already spent several months scrubbing floors I wondered if there would ever be a point at which my keepers would consider that I may just may have abilities which could be used to make a more positive and significant contribution to prison life?

Or is this situation a reflection of management attitudes - prisoners are stupid and useless? Perhaps it is over optimistic of me to think that, in the last few months of my sentence, staff may think, "hey, he's on his way out, lets see just what he is capable of?"

Improbable Correlations

2011-12-28T09:15:00.000Z

As the height of the prison perimeter fence decreases, the height of the toilet doors increase. True.

Both reflect the malign imaginations of our keepers. And so, at Open, there is no security fence, it is a redundant feature. Similarly, in Closed prisons the toilet doors are half-height, leaving you staring passers by in the eye as you sit about your business. Obviously, Devious Things would occur behind full sized doors. Obviously...

In Open, though, we are trusted to go about our toilet behind the privacy of a full sized door.

Live and learn!

Why?

2011-12-27T22:10:00.000Z

Why oh why does every other notice from management have to end with blood curdling threats of sanctions?

We get it. Bad boys are slung out, OK?!

Cast Adrift

2011-12-26T11:40:00.000Z

One of the pains of imprisonment is the dependancy that the prison service insists upon. We have to rely upon staff for everything from supplying toilet paper to organising release. The full range of human activity is constrained, denied to the prisoner except through the agency of staff.

Until you reach open prison. Sudbury has a 'do it yourself" attitude, leaving us to fend for ourselves. This is a shock to some, an irritant for others and liberation for many.

It has its drawbacks. Prison is prison, open or not, and there are crucial moments when we must engage with the "Administration". This is not easy when they are nowhere to be found!

Autonomy is also at it best when it rests on sound and plentiful information. The basics, such as where to find our food through to the momentous such as when do I begin my home leaves. This places a burden on staff which is inimical to the attitude of benign neglect that of necessity shakes us out of our previous state of dependancy.

Whether the precise balance has been found here is something I'm yet as unsure of, but as I bomb about the place trying to get my life organised feel sure I'll soon find out.

Merry Christmas

2011-12-24T21:37:00.000Z

In a segregation unit far away in time and distance, the night patrol was stomping up and down the corridor in his boots, keeping the prisoners awake. This was rude in the extreme; night staff usually wear appropriately silent footwear lest they disturb their charges.

This particular fellow was being ignorant in the extreme, and was subjected to volleys of abuse, all of it unrepeatable for the civilised eye that graces this page.

Until, deep into yet another night disturbed by his footfalls, a prisoner's voice sang out from behind his door.

"Guv", he shouted, "when's Christmas?"

The screw, quick as a flash, replied "the 25th".

The impatient convict replied "No, I mean, what day does it fall on?"

The screw reached for one of the three items of equipment no screw is ever without, his diary, and began leafing through. Much ruffling of pages later, he shouted back to the con "on a Saturday".

"Thanks, said the con. We'll make sure we buy you a present then - some FUCKING SLIPPERS"!

The Plan

2011-12-24T00:13:00.000Z

Oh yes, there is A Plan! This comes in the form of a timetable of activities which must take place for the Parole Board

to release me in May next year.

It used to be that Open prisons worked to their own internal rhythm, parole board be damned, and so I expected to be stuck here for a year before release. Sudbury, bless it, has grasped the reality of releasing Lifers and offers four timetables each determined by the timing of the Lifers next parole hearing. As mine is May, 6 short months away, then my countdown to release is as follows:

In the first 2 weeks I should have an escorted town visit. A month after arrival, I have 2 unescorted town visits and begin unpaid, unsupervised work in the community. This is the real Beginning Of The End, my first forays into the world sans handcuffs in 31 years. Am I ready? Yep. Are you..???

At 3 months in, 3 town visits, work and... home leaves!

And at 4 months after arrival, I can begin paid work.

By May next year I should be able to approach the Parole Board with a record of activity that demonstrates that I'm not a basket-case. They should then order my release.

This is all happening very, very fast.

Week 1 Part 4

2011-12-22T12:30:00.001Z

My ambitions for the magazine seemed to chime with the Education Depts and I believe that they could appreciate how I saw developing the mag into a positive force and a small nexus of creativity within the prison - and as a channel with which to engage the outside community.

The words, "You're hired!" had only mjust faded when the phrase, "ah, but, ummm..." raised its all too familiar head. The job of editing the magazine is an "orderlies" position, and such jobs cannot be taken by men who have been in this prison for less than two weeks. Ability, necessity, enthusiasm, experience...all count for nothing in the face of "local policy". Neither does plain common sense.

And so at the end of my week of job hunting I fell into the clutches of the Labour Board. And they have ordained that the sum of talents and aspirations are best met by standing in the rear of the carpentry workshop, sandpapering bits of prison furniture.

I'm really, really, trying to stay positive...

Ed's Footnote: since writing this post Ben has actually started working on the prison magazine.

Week 1, Part 3

2011-12-21T19:56:00.000Z

Open prisons have a fondness for work that borders on fetishism. With this in mind the wise use all their spare time during the induction week scuttling around the nick trying to find a job. If this fails then the dreaded Labour Board makes the decision.

Given my various ailments, coupled with the failure to shove me in front of the GP within 2 weeks, I was handicapped in this unseemly scrabble for employment. Provisionally graded "Labour 2" (lightish duties) I found my options seriously limited. Obviously all the better jobs were filled long ago.

Relying on my more natural abilities, I began applying for jobs more likely to use my potential. The Library, the advice centre, induction, and - thanks to a quiet tipoff - the Editorship of the prison magazine.

The only door that was graced with a welcome mat was that of the Education Department; a nice change from how Education has treated me in recent years. Keen to replace the Editor who was soon to leave, and being longtime readers of my output, they were very enthusiastic at my appearance...

Week 1, Part 2

2011-12-20T22:29:00.000Z

There are a range of ways in which to enter a prison, styles of adaptation, states of mind, which can profoundly effect

the way that time flows in that prison.

Although I was rather highjacked and dumped 3 hours away from my home area, given that my next Parole Board sits in a mere 5 months, I squashed every negative or arsey thought and determined to enter Sudbury with a positive outlook.

Through benign Fate, I've fallen in with a helpful and thoroughly decent bunch of people. They are full of advice, questions and - in one case - an endless supply of mischievous lies. In this respect, I've landed on my feet.

I also rolled into a double cell... The torments of this situation are vastly unappreciated by the uninitiated and it serves to ratchet up my baseline stress hugely. I am trying to write this to the accompanyment of Coronation Street and Emmerdale. Oh, the horrors! My cellmate wasn't even born when I came to prison.

Being ninth on the list for a single cell, this stress could gnaw away at me for some time.

Open Prison - The First Week Part 1

2011-12-19T22:35:00.002Z

The uninitiated often assume, if unthinkingly, that a move to Open prison would include something of a culture shock.

After all, there are few locked doors, no barred windows, no security fence...oh, the freedom!

I must disappoint you. Liberty is the natural, default, state and it is confinement which provides the culture shock. And never forget that Open prison remains prison. The lack of bars and fences only serves to highlight the essence of modern incarceration - it is based upon bureaucracy and managerialism. These things remain, perhaps exist in an even stronger form, in Open prison.

Open prison is also mindbendingly bloody boring. Being unlocked all of the time forces us to live an extremely long day, far removed from the fragmented days in Closed prison where we psychologically adpat to bang-up via the medium of sleep or bad TV. With seemingly little to do in these long days, boredom quickly sets in.

As culture shock goes, the psychological effects of moving to Open are no greater than being moved between two Closed prisons. Each has differences and nuances, but the dimension of physical liberty is not hugely significant.

Lifer should mean Life.. .again

2011-12-18T13:59:00.000Z

It never ceases to astound me just how many prisoners contain fascist urges, advocating law and order policies which might make Himmler wince.

Cornered by two such proto-fascists, I was berated ("nothing personal...") with the concept that "life should mean life" for murderers. Haven't I heard that dim-witted slogan a thousand times before? And addressed it in previous posts!

The problem with that idea is that the definition of murder is far, far broader than the common mind appreciates. No intent to kill is necessary. All that is required is an intent to cause serious harm, and death resulting. That intent can be inferred from the circumstances.

The legal conception of murder, then, encompasses old ladies who administer a lethal drug at their dying husbands request; through to the craziest of serial killers. And this is where the "life should mean life" chant begins to waver.

It turns out that, faced with these facts, what people actually mean is that Life should mean Life only for the murders that they themselves find particularly awful. And grannies bitten by the euthanasia bug are not included. Odd, that.

These glitches in the argument aside, I argue from a more heartfelt position. That no person is irredeemable. And that no amount of suffering inflicted on a murderer alters the endless fact that a person is dead.

Quote of the Day

2011-12-17T21:16:00.002Z

Just to give you a sample of the wit that passes for conversation in prison, when we are sitting

around bored out of our skulls...

".. .I'm not gay. I'd never give a blowjob without wearing a condom..."

Trust

2011-12-15T23:15:00.000Z

Prison life is littered with small indicators of our status, particularly how far we are trusted - or not.

Does a screw step aside on the stairs to ensure that you aren't walking behind him? When he's talking to you, does he look over both your shoulder and his own? In these and other small ways our untrustworthy status is signalled, often to my frustration.

Open prison is the epitome of this. Some are festooned with CCTV cameras, even on the landings. In others, the windows in the rooms don't open more than a few inches, assuming we'd be heading for the horizon if clambering out was made too easy. Not that a pane of glass hindered an escapologist but as a signal of trust, it suggests that management focus more on "prison" than on "open".

Here, my window opens wide. So wide that I have to use caution not to fall out when I pull it shut. If we wanted to recreate the Greatest Hits of Colditz, circumnavigating a pane of glass wouldn't be on the list of perilous obstacles. I have a key to both my door and the one at the end of the landing. There is no perimeter fence of any significance - the one that does exist is said to be there to deter travellers from sneaking in and joining the dinner queue.

These are small things, but they signify acts of faith on the part of our keepers. Some, a tiny minority, break with that faith and they duly pay the price.

For me, these are significant signs that I am being invested with a measure of sense, that doesn't happen too often in prison.

Moving In

2011-12-14T23:54:00.000Z

Reception is a low brick building that shows its age - over 60. I don't think that the local architectural society would object if I called the collection of buildings that comprise this prison 'eclectic'.

Old Receptions have a unique atmosphere, as if the walls ooze with the collective activity that they have long contained. New Receptions are sterile, the prison equivalent of MacDonald’s.

My property was searched, classified, listed, with distinct piles for that allowed and that forbidden. Overall the process was relatively painless - always a good start in a new nick.

Prisoners who smoke and those who do not are, as far as possible, not required to share cells. On arriving on the Induction wing this led to 2 non-smokers being swapped about to free up a cell just for me and my filthy habits. Each of them was in a cell by themselves and so both lost out badly in this activity. They end the night sharing a cell whereas I am in solitary splendour.

Rule 1 in entering a new prison - don't piss off your neighbours. Sorry, mate.

Moving on Up

2011-12-13T22:22:00.001Z

Slung out of the Block for my last night at Erlestoke, I found myself on the newest wing. For a Cat-C prison it was weird, acres of steel and festooned with CCTV. Stranger still, the cells appeared to be taller than they were long, psychologically "heavy", like sleeping at the bottom of a freshly dug grave.

Twiddling my thumbs all morning waiting for my transfer, I became increasingly uneasy as the hours passed. Lunchtime came simultaneously with the wagon. Dragging my piles of books and papers I made my way between the wings to be met by a gaggle of staff waiting at the sweat box. Prison verbals were bandied between us.

My blood ran cold when I heard the escort mention in passing that we may arrive too late and so I may get dumped in another prison. The Cardiff episode lurched from my memory and I made it very clear that I'd raise hell if yet another move to Open was screwed up.

Being the only man on the wagon I was offered a choice of cubicle. The sweat-box was a new design that lacked a communal radio to while the miles away, promising a dull 3 hour journey. The seat was a tormenting sheet of horizontal plastic that made no attempt to acknowledge human physiology. After 3 hours my back was in agony.

Pulling up outside of Reception I began the seemingly endless wait as my property was unloaded and my file cracked open. At last. The escort began to unlock my cubicle, paused, then asked himself why he was reaching for his handcuffs in an Open prison...?

Beware of the Snakes

2011-12-12T21:06:00.001Z

During the induction talk the staff warned me about the dangers and prevalence of "black mamba". Lethal snakes in Derby were not on my list of potential Cat-D pitfalls...

Inquiries revealed that Black Mamba is a legal high that substitutes for cannabis and is undetectable on urine testing. Its popularity speaks for its efficacy.

I'm not tempted. But I will now be treading more cautiously in the long grass...

Victims (yet again)

2011-12-11T13:02:00.002Z

I don’t recall saying that I would avoid topics which may be uncomfortable, controversial or even offensive. Putting the full weight of the State on a person and throwing them into prison is a profound act. It is to expel them from their community and to deliberately inflict suffering. Given the seriousness of this, then confining the debate to some comfortable island, to bow to sacred cows, or to merely bandy trite stereotypes around would be cowardly and pointless. As I have a voice, it would be pure ego to use it merely to flatter you or to polish my own image. As the only regular prison blogger in this country then I feel a responsibility to strip away the detritus that often passes for penological debate and attempt to deal with some of the difficult issues. This clearly makes some readers uncomfortable.

One of the most sensitive issues is that of the victims of crime. Those who have followed the blog from its early days will understand that I decline to be led by popular opinion on victims’ issues. At the same time, I refuse to poke at victims’ issues merely to provoke outrage. There are genuine issues to debate and I will on occasion raise them.

This may seem to be indecent and I'm not insensitive to that. People whose lives have been wrecked by crime should receive support and the utmost consideration as individuals. Human suffering should provoke our empathy.

As a collective, some victims have grouped to form a political lobby whose effects are visible throughout the criminal justice system. Individual victims may - from plain decency - be left in peace but political lobby groups are legitimate targets for debate or criticism. The alternative is to abandon policy-making to the hands of a particular group, whose agenda may not be for the good of the wider society.

Such criticism may seem unseemly. That is the price of debate. That such subjects are being analysed by a murderer seems to be plain crass or foolish, as one commenter alleges. That may be so.

As a member of a society whose criminal justice system is being warped by victims lobbying, I maintain that I have every right to join the debate. Justice should, after all, belong to all of us. As a prisoner whose daily living conditions and progress to release are affected by victims lobbying efforts, I insist that I have a perfect right to be heard. And as a man who lost his sister to a violent crime I myself am a victim and on that basis I feel it should not be viewed as improper that I have a voice. Unless only "nice" victims are allowed to speak?

In some sense I may be uniquely placed to speak on such issues. As the singular prison blogger, and as both the perpetrator and victim of homicidal crime, I may offer a bridge that could span the chasms in these debates. And if some readers find such debate uncomfortable I can only hope that they examine their beliefs.

An uncomfortable debate always holds the potential to be a deeply productive one and this blog always prefers to generate light rather than heat.

The Mysterious Mind of Management

2011-12-09T16:55:00.000Z

A governor told me that he was looking to create a new orderly position, duties to include keeping the myriad notice boards up to date.

Negotiations were going well until he suggested the job title - "information orderly".

Was he trying to get me killed?!

The Rules

2011-12-08T23:15:00.001Z

Sprinkled amongst other posts across Christmas and the New Year will be a number of posts relating to the Prison Rules.

The Prison Rules 1999 are, to you, a few clicks away. It is their meaning, context and the way that they shape prison life which is absent from the prison service website -an information gap which begs to be addressed. I just can't resist it.

Although the Rules are dated 1999 in nearly their entirety they are a rehash of the Rules of 1964...which in themselves were a rehash of the Rules from the end of the 18th century. You will get a flavour of this historical continuity when you realise that the Rules relating to the death penalty were only expunged in 1999 - a full generation after execution was abolished In the UK. Bread and water existed as a disciplinary punishment into the 1980's.

Obviously I wouldn't indulge myself or abuse you with a mere retelling of the Rules. It is their hidden meaning which justifies my writing about them... And if I include the odd tale of my brushes with these Rules, well, the Festive Season is approaching and levity begins to creep in. And to stave off any who may be tempted to bleat about the influence of Human Rights legislation on the Rules, it is worth noting the provisions of Rule 34:

"...a prisoner shall not be permitted to communicate with any person outside the prison, or such person with him, except with the leave of the Secretary of State or as a privilege..."

That's my excuse for failing to deal with my unanswered correspondence - and I'm sticking to it!

Bureaucracy v Reality

2011-12-07T21:09:00.002Z

Is it not the hallmark of the true bureaucrat that, unless the proper procedure is followed and the correct paperwork completed, then he is able to deny the reality standing before him?

A prisoner in the block was on hunger strike. He simply refused to attend the hotplate where I daily offered the best in prison service catering...After missing three consecutive meals this is logged by staff as an official "food refusal". Paperwork begins to be generated, procedures swing into action.

One member of staff took the view that he wouldn't log this as a food refusal because by his reckoning the prisoner was not following the "proper procedure". That the man would be just as dead in several weeks was neither here nor there, proper procedures MUST be followed. In their absence, the reality of starvation could be denied.

Is this not a sign of a lack of humanity? An indication that bureaucracy can become a reality in its own right and one that denies something in the human spirit?

And should such a corroded, misguided soul ever be given authority over the welfare of other human beings?

Smokin*

2011-12-06T19:16:00.000Z

Just to state the bleeding obvious, prisons are not pubs. There are severe restrictions on where we can now smoke in prison; essentially nowhere except in the open air and in the sanctity of our cells. The analogy is that our cell is our home.

Those who suspect that the under-occupation of the Isle of Man prison is related to it being a wholly non-smoking institution, and therefore unwelcoming to the criminal classes, are fixating on an overly simplistic idea. All prisons for young prisoners (under 18) are non smoking and their places are wildly over-subscribed. There is no correlation between prison conditions and crime rates, for the reason that no criminal believes he will be caught before setting out to commit his wicked deeds.

Meanies

2011-12-05T16:18:00.000Z

The wages prisoners receive for our labours are pathetically meagre and yet must bear the weight of many demands. One of these is maintaining contact with the outside world through letters and phone calls.

This situation prompts us to save pennies wherever we can and one way is to steam off stamp? from mail received and to re-use them. This is a fraud on our inept postal system that I have no great justification for save necessity.

The prison service, intent on maintaining our poverty, sinks so low as to actually scribble with a biro across stamps on incoming nail, preventing this recycling.

Is this the most menial job being done by a public servant known to Man???

The Coffee Jar

2011-12-04T12:57:00.003Z

Some while ago we were prohibited from buying any goods which arrived in a glass jar.

Coffee was the most obvious casualty.

This policy - enforced across every prison - was a knee jerk reaction to events in a Block up north. It was alleged that a prisoner attempted to murder three screws by way of a broken bottle of sauce. History does not recall whether it was tomato or brown.

The prisoner has now been acquitted. Pity he can't celebrate with a nice cup of Nescafe...!

The Orwell Prize

2011-12-02T15:44:00.001Z

Having fallen last year as my writing attempted to leap the gap between the longlist and the shortlist, I hesitate slightly to put myself forward again.

The past year has been a difficult one, where my writing has been frequently disrupted. Throw in the loss of my word-processor and a blown central fuse and I do wonder if I have produced ten posts which are worthy of submission. Sans internet access, I also haven't a clue as to what I've written and cannot look it up. A strange situation.

The Editor will obviously have a prominent role in organising this year’s submission, although she will have to read my whole year’s output. as I did last year, I also invite readers to pop over to read the Orwell criteria and highlight any of my posts which they think may be worthy of submission.

I'd like to say that if I won, then I'd take you all out for a drink...

And as look back over the past year, I must thank you for your patience. How, and what, I write is obviously a reflection of the state of my life and the vagaries of my mental state. Neither has been at its peak this year and that you hang about reading what even the Editor has characterised as being crap on occasion, I can only count my blessings that I have the only real comfort for any scribbler - an audience.

As I regain my mental footing and refuel the fires in my belly, I hope that I may repay your patience.

A Novel Resettlement Scheme

2011-12-01T11:56:00.004Z

The willingness of Britain's Upper legislative chamber, the House of Lords, to continue to employ members on their release from prison warms my heart.

If only other enterprises were so open minded...

What a washout

2011-11-30T11:46:00.003Z

Senior management have removed the washing machine and drier from the Reception department. And why should you give a hoot?

Reception is where we are - surprise - received into the prison and it is our last stop before release. Reception also deals with our property, clothing, incoming parcels, and so on. Their dealings with our clothing are a significant part of their work in that they monitor the amount we have, what we can buy, and what we are all¬owed to have. At the end of our sentence they are also obliged, by law, to ensure that we are suitably equipped with clothing as we hit the street. Society is worried enough by ex-cons; releasing us naked would only increase that social angst.

Reception has a small mountain of clothing which has been donated by prisoners, for various reasons. Much of this is high quality merchandise. When a man reaches the end of his time he is offered a selection of these clothes to wear. Obviously these clothes need to be clean, hence their need for a washing machine.

In taking the machines away, Reception will now have to stop accepting donated clothing and instead will have to go out and buy new clothing to equip those being discharged. This will cost tens of thousands of quid.

This is why you should give a damn about the bizarre shenanigans of prison managers. The results of their decisions will shortly appear on your tax bill.

A Question

2011-11-29T14:06:00.000Z

Does anybody know of any research that focuses on the functioning and culture of Segregation Units in the UK?

Or does my present job as an orderly give me a chance to add something new to the literature?

No blog today

2011-11-28T22:35:00.000Z

Been to a funeral, normal service tomorrow!

The Disappeared

2011-11-27T21:05:00.002Z

Putting my feet up mid-morning I heard voices just outside my door, "...and look into the empty cells to see that staff aren't hiding anyone..." There was a small chuckle of disbelief.

Sticking my head out I discovered a gaggle of the Independent Monitoring Board. The experienced member was explaining to two new members how he inspected the Block.

The IMB - an independent watchdog body - is often subjected to criticism but in this case the advice of the experienced member was sound. I've been in blocks where prisoners have been so badly beaten that staff have tried to hide them in an "empty" cell, safe from the eyes of visiting governors, chaplains and the IMB.

I explained this to the new member. Strange things can happen in prison, after all. It was also worth my pointing out that my presence was an indication that this Block was free of such abuses. Only a fool would employ a cynical blogger as Block orderly if they weren't pretty sure I'd be bereft of negative material!

Third Time Lucky?

2011-11-26T12:55:00.000Z

From the Ed:

Ben was told yesterday that he is to be transferred to an open prison this coming Wednesday.

Let's hope he actually makes it this time...

Kidnapped

2011-11-25T12:26:00.001Z

The dull sound of a polycarbonate riot shield outside of your cell door is never a welcome one. It’s invariably a portent of Bad Things.

All the more so when you have just refused to be transferred. The rattling shield is the signal that the refusal is not being taken as the final word. Such was the situation with one of the guys in this Block recently.

Watching as best I could through the gap around my door, I witnessed the initial charge into the cell. Known to us as a "planned cell extraction", it involves a 3 man team (in this case, led by a woman) that charge into the cell, the shield-bearer leading the way. Having wedged the prisoner with the shield the two flanking staff attempt to secure the con’s arms in Aikido joint-locks in what is tastefully known as "pain compliance". Once "compliant" the con is moved from A to B, in this instance B being another prison.

As with all plans, this one didn't go quite as predicted. Matey squirmed and wriggled his way around his cell floor for a good 40 minutes before being firmly grasped, a period of time so long that staff involved had to be relieved half way through. This "use of force" is always a messy affair and it is a welcome development that such events are attended by a screw with a video camera. We can only hope that this reduces the scope of staff getting carried away and crossing that fine line between a legitimate use of force and assault.

Matey was, finally, “bent up" and carted away. To his credit, he was cogently and calmly complaining all through the process, rather than screaming bloody murder. Interestingly, it is not the staff who regularly man the Block who conduct these operations; staff are brought from elsewhere in the prison. I assume that someone realised that occupants of the Block can hardly have any type of working relationship with staff who may have previously been twisting them up. A rare glimpse into the prison service's single neuron in action?

I myself prefer to walk onto the sweatbox for a transfer. If I’m not happy about it, it's the receiving prison which finds out...

Hotel Catering

2011-11-24T12:44:00.000Z

A wily con waved around a regulation stating that we should be provided with either 2 slices of bread or toast at breakfast.

Much staff debate followed. Now my first job of the day is to make toast for all. This didn't pass unnoticed by staff, the comment "are we running a hotel?" being most frequent.

As ever, this raises the question - what is the nature of punishment? And what should its details comprise?

Toast, or plain bread at breakfast?

Compulsory Pampers?

2011-11-23T16:57:00.003Z

Walking out of my door first thing in the morning, my only thought being the logistics of toast making, my brain was slightly confused when confronted by men dressed as aliens. Paper suits, gloves, goggles...Just what had happened to the world whilst I was asleep??

Then the rolls of Biohazard tape began to be deployed, sealing off a cell and its occupant. Ah, a dirty protest. For the uninitiated, a dirty protest is rather more than the avoidance of soap and water. A dirty protest is to smear one’s cell with excrement - and to keep living in it.

In days of old this form of protest was very disruptive to all involved and within olfactory range. This bureaucratic age, though, has seen the writing of a detailed policy for everything, including dirty protests. Out come the paper suits and striped tape, and life goes on as normal. The protestor is also charged with endangering Health and Safety.

Of all the many forms of protest available to prisoners, the dirty protest is one of the more extreme and one which I refuse to indulge in. Given the procedures developed to deal with dirty protests, their utility as a disruptive force has been much muted.

Living in a box smeared with crap is a desperate ploy but, thankfully, not the method of protect chosen by many.

More Abuse

2011-11-22T13:31:00.000Z

A very unhappy con shouted through his block cell door, "You fat cow!" The female screw was outraged, having lost a significant amount of weight. "I'm not fat". The con, retreating from an unsustainable accusation, paused for a moment. "Well, you're not exactly skinny, are ya?!"

The Block

2011-11-21T13:49:00.000Z

It struck me that what is, to my jaded eyes, mundane and familiar is unknown territory for most people outside. How do you imagine a punishment Block in your mind’s eye? Possibly something dark and damp, populated by unwashed, starving and hirsute desperados?

Whilst not denying the existence of such places -?- -most Blocks are housed at basement level - the one whose floor I sweep (in between breaks from writing...) is a more humble yet modern edifice. In a previous incarnation a resettlement unit, the 10 cells line a single short corridor. The 8 punishment cells on one side, the 2 orderlies, shower and storeroom on the other. Around the corner, occupied by the main office, are the 2 holding cells, a "special cell", the servery, adjudication room and managers office. The whole comprises a very small building.

On paper, the daily regime is sparse and structured around the mandatory events for all Blocks. During the day a governor, medic and chaplain will visit each cell and conduct a ritualistic exchange with each Prisoner. "Any problems...?"

The captive residents are unlocked, one at a time, to collect breakfast and make applications just after 8am. Cereal, toast, flask of water, tea bags. This is the main exchange with staff during each day, the moment to chase up problems or raise issues. It is also the point at which each man can subscribe to "the regime" - to elect to have exercise, a shower or use the payphone. Often, these exchanges set the tone, the level of tension, for the rest of the day.

Once all have been fed, bang-up reigns. Those who have so chosen will, always singly, take their exercise etc. The statutory visitors - governor, medic, chaplain, will make their rounds. Except for these momentary interruptions, each man is left alone behind his door. By lunchtime this activity has petered out and from lunchtime through to the next breakfast prisoners are rarely disturbed from their lock-up save to collect their tea time meal. It can be appreciated that the Block is not a place of great activity. The locked cell door and absence of visible prisoners is the hallmark of all Blocks.

Any thought that this suggests a quiet, monastic existence should be held very tentatively...

Taking the Temperature

2011-11-20T12:42:00.000Z

In a quiet moment the member of staff pointed out that it had been a peaceful few days across the prison. "That means either that there's absolutely no drugs about, or a lot of drugs about..."

Before the advent of heroin as a great force, it was a staff mantra that "a stoned prisoner is a happy prisoner". The spliff may have been replaced by the needle, but not much ever changes.

Ingenuity

2011-11-19T00:17:00.001Z

The creation of a non—smoking prison on the Isle of Man has seen prisoners doing what we do best – using time and desperation to circumvent the restrictions placed upon us. In this care, the desperate locals have resorted to boiling nicotine patches to extract the ingredients to sate their hunger for a decent hit of nicotine.

This enterprise pales into insignificance compared to a recent event here. A man managed to build a computer in his cell with illicit components.

Never underestimate a prisoner with a lot of spare time...

Progress and the Human Spirit

2011-11-17T00:09:00.000Z

Is it not a central purpose of political society to wrangle the monstrous atavistic emotions that batter our modern minds and to sift them, to channel and retrain them, to re-shape them into social forces that move us forward to a better civilisation?

From the perspective of lifelong resident in the bowels of the State, it appears that every human endeavour has given birth to the greatest heights of aspiration. Literature, art, science, philosophy, politics economics...there is no field, which, while encompassing the basest of our drives, has not moved humanity onwards to new perspectives, joys, opportunities. Society has benefited from every difficult step we have taken as a society from the primordial slime.

Amidst this social and human bounty there stands a rancid edifice. It is replicated in city centres across the nation and as individuals we pass beneath the walls with indifference. The edifice that is prison stands in almost deliberate opposition to all of the advances achieved by our society.

This is not to deny the existence of change. Prison itself as a form of punishment is a rather modern development, a concrete manifestation of a shift in the nature of punishment from inflicting bodily pain to inflicting mental suffering. Does this constitute an advance, progress? Does this change in the locus of pain stand as a beacon of social achievement?

No. Imprisonment is a failure on every level. In practical terms, it persistently fails to change the individuals who are fed through the gates and subjected to the process of mortification. On a social level, imprisonment perpetuates crime through gross reoffending levels. And on a human level, inflicting suffering upon each other degrades us all.

Why has punishment, this wilfully self-defeating infliction of suffering, remain immune from the progress that is evident in every other field of human endeavour? Why do we cling to the ancient urges to hurt those who hurt us,even when there is no benefit? And why is this debased enterprise seemingly unable to be transformed by social or political processes so that it reflects the best of humanity rather than the worst?

Time Travel

2011-11-16T11:26:00.001Z

Producing the blog, at my end, has taken on hints of time travel.

For the first 18 months I resided in the 1970's, using a word-processor. For the past 6 months I revisited the scholastic Middle Ages - pen and paper. Today, I have leapt forward to the late 19th century having finally taken possession of a manual typewriter.

I suspect that the average blogger doesn't have this experience! And this ever shifting technology base has a real effect on my output. Writing by hand meant that the editor had to decipher and type my posts, a dedication that I could only repay by avoiding long posts.

The typewriter will be a great help but I have to wonder if the prison service will ever allow me to use contemporary technology?

Ed's note:this is a great relief as his writing is terrible! I can now scan what he sends me into Word. A big thank you to the kind blog reader who donated the typewriter.

Shared Beliefs

2011-11-15T00:42:00.000Z

My broad view of prison managers is long established. It was a pleasure, then, to bump into a screw who shared my views.

As he put it, "I'd be a governor but I'd have to walk around with fingers in my ears to stop my brain running out..."

What a Shambles

2011-11-15T00:40:00.002Z

That most toxic of combinations - media outrage and Government populism - has seen the lifer population leap from 3600 to over 10000.

Given the short-term impulses that led to this situation, the long term consequences were carefully neglected. And this is now biting me in the ass like a starving snapper-turtle.

Given that, at last, the forces that control my life appear to be content that I attain release, a swift move to open prison and a kindly Parole Board next year should have seen me off into the sunset. Alas, the open estate is choked.

With over 10,000 Lifers - easily sentenced, less swiftly released -then the demand for places in Open were inevitably going to be excessive. Our political masters failed to plan for this. The result is that I am stuck: in a queue of over 300 Lifers all competing for a move to open conditions.

The history of the Life sentence, its justification and criminological basis, is lengthy and convoluted. But never before has it come to pass that we can be told that we must remain in prison solely because the narrow path to release is oversubscribed.

Prison Essentials

2011-11-13T20:39:00.002Z

There are certain core features of what comprises a prison. Physical security is one of those features.

So, having a man break out of his cell and spend 3 hours in the dark repeatedly attempting to scale the fence unmolested must be a tad embarrassing...?!

Back to the Future

2011-11-12T00:57:00.003Z

There are times when penology seems to be a perpetual circle, forever revisiting previous ideas, practices or ideologies.

Nearly a century after the crime was viewed as a "disease" - the medical model - that idea was resurrected with a twist in the mid 1990's. Psychologists infested prisons, tasked with attempting to cure us of our criminogenic ways of thinking. Fifteen years later and hundreds of millions of £'s spent and the utility of this effort is still debated.

There was one immediate effect, though. The provision of trade courses - bricklaying, painting, etc collapsed. Across the whole prison system, the rehabilitative eggs were placed solely in the psychologist's basket and other avenues to shift us away from crime were neglected.

However, a conversation with the Governor today revealed that he is reinstating trade training at this prison. It is rare for me to be able to report a positive development, but this is one.

If a prisoner wished to attempt to create a life away from crime, no psychological course or basic skills certificate is going to help. And in a society where employing an ex-con is bottom of everyone's list of priorities, providing prisoners with the skills to enable them to earn a living for and by themselves is a good thing.

Quite where the Gov found the investment to resurrect these training courses is a mystery to me. Prisons are as poverty stricken as the rest of the nation. To return to old practices is a bold move in these circumstances.

One final thought though. It would be a perfect adjunct to those trade courses if the participants were also offered a course on how to start a business. In this way, cons are liberated from anti-prisoner attitudes in their future employment. Their future will be in their own hands - and that is real freedom.

Endless Struggle

2011-11-11T00:57:00.000Z

The official criteria for priority to move to Open Prison is whether one is over tariff, and how long one has been waiting for the move.

As I'm 21 years over tariff and have now been waiting a full year for the transfer, I'd like to think that I've been put near the top of the list.

Hmmm...

A Miracle!

2011-11-10T12:15:00.000Z

How is it that all murder victims are apparently incredibly wonderful human beings?

I find it a tad odd, a statistical anomaly, that no assholes ever seem to get murdered.

Non-Punishment Block

2011-11-09T13:38:00.000Z

Oddly, it is not unusual that no-one held in this Block is actually serving a term of punishment.

There are several routes to end up down here, and the least common is to be punished. Overwhelmingly, people filling up the cells are either hiding on Rule 45 - own protection - or have been isolated for reasons of Good Order and Discipline. That is, it is believed they are up to something but the evidence isn't sufficient for a formal charge.

Despite this, the Block runs what is officially termed a "restricted regime". Everyone lives in bare cells, denied their privileges and locked up for over 23 hours a day.

The sign outside may now read "Care and Separation Unit", but the reality is that this is not intended to be a refugee unit or interrogation centre. It reflects a very fuzzy thinking on the part of the prison service as to how to deal with the varied needs of people and a failure to even contemplate the nature of punishment itself.

States of Denial

2011-11-08T13:21:00.000Z

There is a group of prisoners who labour under the weight of a special acronym - IDOM. This is bureaucrat jargon for those Lifers who protest their innocence. IDOM means "In Denial of Murder", and it is a ticket to a difficult and lengthy sentence.

Denial works both ways, and the criminal justice system has a long and disreputable history in this regard.

Consider the numbers; some 85,000 people in prison. If the criminal justice system has achieved the improbable level of being 95% perfect that would mean there are over 4,000 innocent people in prison.

Just who is in denial here?

Self Loathing

2011-11-07T16:33:00.001Z

You could reasonably assume that murderers are broadly against capital punishment. And you'd be right.

But on occasion I bump into a fellow Lifer whose views are worse than a Daily Mail editorial. These people give a glimpse into that taboo area - the suffering that murderers endure because of the crime they committed. Such emotional twists and turns are hardly welcomed in the public discourse which prefers to portray us as monochrome monsters. Sadly, it is also an area that prison staff, such as psychologists, run away from in horror.

These emotional convolutions can express themselves in incredible depths of self-loathing, to the degree that some Lifers support a return to executions.

Whilst I empathise with their distress, I'd prefer they pick an avenue to pursue that doesn't involve those of us who prefer to remain alive!

Eureka

2011-11-05T20:28:00.001Z

Courtesy of the canteen facilities in the visits room, I have discovered the joys of "cheesy chips". You guessed it - fries sprinkled with grated cheese!

What else have I been missing??

Barrack-Room Lawyers

2011-11-04T13:09:00.001Z

Barrack-room Lawyers (BRL) must surely be distinguished from Jailhouse Lawyers (JHL) who comprise an honoured and dedicated collective.

For me, a BRL is often just a pain, an embarrassment. It is a prisoner who is forever bleating that something or other is "agaisnt human rights". But, in constrast to the JHL, the BRL is a prisoner who has rarely even read the ECHR and whose only use for The Times Law Reports is as material for an emergency cigarette paper.

The BRL may have a dim but certain realisation that "rights" do exist, and he shares with the JHL the knowledge that the law does not stop at the prison gates. But that is the extent of the common ground. The BRL does, if anything, make the life of JHL more difficult on the prison landings. By being unable to add legal substance to his vague assertions, the BRL diminishes the weight of the rules, the law, in the eyes of prison staff.

Prison regulations and the legal context within which they sit are complex and ever-shifting. They are not shallow waters in which to paddle on a whim, rather they are a deep pool into which the earnest prisoner must immerse himself.

The Law can be a keen-edged weapon. Misuse it, deploy it ineptly, and you dull its edge to the detriment of the next prisoner who wields it.

Death of the IPP

2011-11-02T23:36:00.000Z

The last Government's poisonous legacy to penology, the Indeterminate Sentence for Public Protection, is finally to be buried.

Alas, the thousands of people in prison because of it can't jump for joy yet. The Government still lacks the decency to resurrect those suffering this stupid and wicked sentence back into freedom.

This is only half a job done. The fight to truly expunge this disastrous sentence and its effects must continue.

Rumours of Rumours

2011-11-02T00:38:00.000Z

One of the odd and unsettling aspects of the local culture is the seemingly infinite willingness of a lot of prisoners to spread gossip and repeat private conversations. In such a captive, introverted community such indiscretion can be a recipe for trouble.

I find this strange. As a political and legal activist I am used to having conversations that remain private. Finding myself in a situation where everything that's said is repeated out on the landing is disturbing.

Even so, I shall try to maintain my practice based on Chatham House rules - whatever is said in my cell should damn well stay there.

The Great Game

2011-10-31T21:36:00.001Z

Every block in the system shares fundamental characteristics. Each prisoner alone in their cell for up to 23 hours a day, isolated and finding ways to fill the time.

Another common thread is the perpetual attempt to pass items between cells, a prohibited practice. Monthly, these efforts centre around tobacco and cigarette papers.

Even in isolation, cons leave their cells. There are daily periods in the exercise pen, the shower, food to collect, clothes to change... And all of these provide an opportunity for the quick of hand to secrete an item to be picked up by the next man.

Staff try to disrupt this exchange but the reality is that the never have enough time. With maybe dozens of men to exercise, feed, shower, then their time to search each location between uses is truncated.

This smuggling has always gone on, and long may it successfully continue.

The Mad Rumour

2011-10-30T23:58:00.000Z

Prison life seems particularly well suited to the generation and perpetuation of rumours.

After all, we have 2 groups - screws and cons - more than willing to believe the worst about each other, and both share a certain base cynicism of the whole edifice.

As I served lunch today I was reminded of the long-standing rumour that the staff in some notorious block who, having beaten a prisoner to death, tried to muddy the time of death by stuffing the body into the wing server hotplate to keep it warm.

I have to admit, it wouldn't surprise me.

Literacy

2011-10-29T12:19:00.000+01:00

While sweeping out the 2 cells used for holding people just before they face disciplinary hearings, I take a brief look at the graffiti on the walls.

The dreary "X was here" litters the paint, a boring testament to a man's existence. The occasional insult creeps in: "fuckin carrot-munching southerners"!. On this showing, I have to wonder if the government's literacy drive is wasted money.

And yet, in perfect script, stands out the surreal injunction, "Polly put the kettle on".

Abuse

2011-10-28T11:34:00.000+01:00

It's not exactly rare for a con to let fly a volley of abuse against a screw, particularly down here in the block.

One such staff victim was loudly pondering the line thrown at him earlier that day, an invitation that he should "go suck your momma".

In attempting to deconstruct the precise meaning of this abuse, he pointed out that he'd have to travel some 200 miles in order to "suck his momma".

I raised an eyebrow. "So the travelling distance is the only problem you see with that idea?!"

The Slightly Less Silent Majority

2011-10-27T00:46:00.000+01:00

The Ed has sent me the comments left to my Silent Majority post, and I thank all of you who responded to my largely rhetorical question of who reads the blog.

It is a pleasant surprise to realise that such a broad spectrum of people take the time to pop in and read; there's no pressure at all on me to keep you entertained then...!

While it would be wonderful - if naive - to think that anything I wrote could prompt people to abandon deeply held views, that I have nudged some of you to think more deeply about the issues I raise on the blog is gratifying.

Thanks, one and all.

Censorship and Stupidity

2011-10-26T00:50:00.001+01:00

While the old joke may have it that the most dangerous thing on earth is a gorilla with a machine gun, any prisoner can tell you that is wrong. The most dangerous thing is a dim-witted screw armed with a prison rule.

In this instance it relates to porn, which we are not allowed. And on that basis a screw confiscated a DVD of Superbowl Thirty. Why? Because the title said "Superbowl XXX", and with that many X's on the cover then it must have been porn...

Why Decency Matters

2011-10-24T22:42:00.000+01:00

There are those who will attack and denigrate prisoners at all costs and at every opportunity. Some such people occasionally leave comments on the blog and one theme is the eternal question of why should prisoners be treated decently? After all, given the suffering we have caused, why should we get anything more than cold gruel and a daily kicking? I could dismiss such people as being ill-informed, neanderthal, but that would be facile. Such people, I assume, may be suffering the effects of crime and their contempt may be genuine. Their comments may be crude but the emotions behind them may be very real and complicated. It would be abrogating the purpose of the blog if I were to dismiss such people as they dismiss me.

So why should prisoners be treated decently? There are two main reasons, one utilitarian and one moral. I don't expect either to persuade those who stew in a pit of their own hate.

In a utilitarian frame of reference, how society treats prisoners has a strong effect upon the levels of future crime. If you prescribe punishments that include hatred and despair, if you strip away all social capital and reject the prisoner to the extent of being outcast from society, then there are consequences. Those consequences include higher rates of future offending. It may be emotionally and politically satisfying to hurt those who have hurt us, but in doing so we create future victims. In this sense, advocating endless punishment and degradation for prisoners is stupid beyond belief; it is the social equivalent of a toddler's temper tantrum.

Morally, to degrade prisoners is to deny a shared humanity. To degrade other individuals reflects upon the darkness in our own souls. It is an impulse to be resisted, not fed. To expel prisoners from society - emotionally, socially, politically - is to expel them from being considered human. And this carries unspeakable changes to all of us.

Treating prisoners decently is often posed as being anti-punishment; it need not be. But there must surely be limits to punishment, a defined purpose and a rational outcome. To reduce ourselves to acting out of emotional spasms degrades all involved.

There are debates that could, should, be engaged with. What should be the aims of punishment? What should be the limits? What should the daily regime of prisoners be like, what facilities should be afforded? At present these are not issues for debate but rather act as lightening rods for our basest personal emotions and political urges. And as long as this remains the case, then society loses as much as prisoners do.

The Charge of the Bright Brigade

2011-10-23T18:36:00.000+01:00

It is a pleasure to see that (General) Lord Ramsbotham continues to grace our legislature and pepper Ministers with perceptive prison-related questions.

A man with a keen eye for the inept or unjust, Rambo is of late inquiring about the number of counsellors and therapists available to deal with prisoner's mental health.

Ha! For an institution which is so keenly equipped to disassemble, dissect and judge us using the tools in the modern psychological armoury, the prison service has systematically neglected our mental health. Whilst claiming that fully 3/4 of us suffer from a mental disease, the system cheerfully avoids dealing with those problems.

Of course, mental health provision in the wider community is notoriously variable and drug-centred and the expect better in prisons is but a crazy dream.

And yet, I am grateful that there are those such as Rambo who give a voice to such important concerns. Only persistence in the face of indifference has any hope for change.

Call me Ishmael

2011-10-21T15:42:00.001+01:00

Or Sir, Boss, Guv, Officer... Just how do you hail a screw? Not by shouting "Oi, Screw!" And no-one calls staff Sir either, which is a level of obsequiousness that prisoner culture finds nauseating.

Lately I've been hearing a lot of cons calling staff "Boss". It grates on me, carrying with it shades of the plantation, and "Massa". And like slavery, "Boss" should be buried in history.

For me, a straightforward "Guv" (as in Guv'nor) has always served in any situation, being neither disrespectful nor obsequious.

Strangely, there is no generic equivalent for staff to call prisoners. As a group we may be "cons", but if a screw wants to get attention of a con, he never calls "Oi, con!". Ever.

The Stupid Leading the Blind

2011-10-20T14:22:00.002+01:00

Long gone are the days when a prisoner could pass through these stygian halls to be disgorged into the daylight of freedom with little effort. This particularly applies to Lifers.

Gaining release, and finding a bearable way of life along the way, requires deliberate effort by the prisoner. It is required that we engage with many processes, all of them quite bureaucratic. The most prominent of these are the Offending Behaviour Programmes, the psychology courses intended to cure us of our wicked ways.

These courses are heavily reliant on written materials and demand copious amounts of "homework". And there lies the trap - for those with sensory impairments, low IQ's, or the plain illiterate then progress towards release is blocked.

For the illiterate, a couple of extra years may be served as the prisoner is forced through an educational programme, before starting the OBP courses. For those with impaired senses or learning difficulties there is no such obvious solution. I've met deaf prisoners who have had to fight for years just to have an induction-loop installed so that they could engage with group work. And I've met men with learning difficulties who have wasted the best part of a decade just waiting for psychological assessments.

Such people are royally stuffed. Unable to undertake the psychological courses that earn release they find themselves being bounced from prison to prison as each Governor finds it easier to transfer "the problem" rather than allocate any resources or brain-power to deal with it.

In this convoluted way, and through no fault of their own, prisoners with disabilities often serve many more years than their crime deserves. They are punished for their deficiencies.

A Long Road

2011-10-19T18:05:00.000+01:00

Having been cleared to move to open prison a full year ago, I'm now told that it may take several more months before a space can be found for me.

The problem? An increase in the Lifer population from 3,500 to over 10,000 without anyone thinking to increase the number of places in open prisons through which we must be released.

This is how our lives - and your taxes - are slowly but surely leeched away.

Proctology Calling

2011-10-18T10:46:00.000+01:00

So a guy his his mobile phone in the usual place - his ass.

Having set off the metal detector he must now produce the goods in order to leave the Block. Which is the problem.

The phone has decided to migrate and explore the wilder parts of the guy's colon, and refuses to be expelled.

Is there an "app" for that?!?

School's Out

2011-10-16T22:08:00.000+01:00

As I watched a group of psychology undergraduates being given a tour of the block I was struck by two thoughts. Firstly, they made me feel so old; they represented the life I never had.

More importantly, I wondered just how prison staff can ever explain the "prison experience" to such visitors? They can explain the brutalist architecture, they can briefly explain the bureaucratic processes, true enough. But those things are not the essence of imprisonment; they are merely the external form that conceals the powerlessness and mortification that is the reality of the prisoner's life. Keeping prisoners out of this process of guided tours is to lose a valuable opportunity to educate.

That said, I did take the opportunity to plug the blog. So, hi students everywhere!

Discrete Comments

2011-10-16T11:22:00.001+01:00

The editor tells me that she has had to delete a comment or two posted by prisoners from their mobile phones.

Not for their origin or content, but because they contained identifying characteristics.

Doh! Come on guys, play smart!

The Human Zoo

2011-10-14T11:46:00.000+01:00

Like the old Bedlam, all prisons are sporadically invaded by gawkers. These tend to be various species of criminal justice professionals, magistrates, students and the like.

Here, in the Block, we can only listen as they appear whilst we are banged up. It is frustrating, and some cons shout out entertaining allegations to these unseen visitors.

Why not introduce these enquirers to a con or two? Staff may well be able to adequately describe the basics of the Block regimes, but only a prisoner can begin to explain the experience of isolation and bang-up.

At the very least, let the visitors bring in bags of peanuts or sticky buns to throw at us!

To the Posse

2011-10-14T11:40:00.000+01:00

I get a few requests for name-checks on the blog, and I turn them down.

But - hi to the South Wales Che Guevara Gally and mates!

Professionalism...

2011-10-13T20:28:00.000+01:00

The Screw sits in the block office, looking slightly frazzled. "I shouldn't say this in front of you but there are times when I want to bash their brains out!", indicating the corridor of cells.

It had been a busy, fractious day with the occupants of the Block giving the staff a bit of a run-around.

A few minutes later I saw that same screw at a cell door, seemingly perfectly calm as he was faced with an irate, aggressive con.

Is this the definition of professionalism for prison staff?

Walking on Sunshine

2011-10-12T11:27:00.000+01:00

A sunny day, a concrete path... to some, this is just an obvious invitation to jog.

Or walk quickly. The Gov had to decide on this point at a recent disciplinary hearing when a man was nicked for running.

Yer man insisted he was only walking very fast. After some debate on the walking v. running definition, the charge was dismissed.

We now await the Notice to Prisoners laying out the official Olympic rules on when speed-walking degenerates into running.

The Silent Majority

2011-10-10T18:35:00.002+01:00

I'm told that the number of visits to the blog has settled to between 18,000 and 20,000 a month. Who would ever have imagined that? At the beginning, an eventful 2 years ago, the Editor and myself were overjoyed when a single soul popped in.

In a perfect illustration of the law of unintended consequences, the blog survived a difficult birth and was only brought to the notice of the wider world by the attempt by the Ministry of Justice to shut it down. This was resisted by Jailhouselawyer and the Guardian, and from that point the existence of the blog was assured.

Gathering readers, though, is another matter! Occasionally I do ponder about the number of "personal" blogs in existence, their readership, and how many of them are begun in a fit of enthusiasm before being left to whither. Is my having survived for 2 years in itself unusual?

Prior to recent times I had absolutely no idea of the extent of the blogs readership. The Editor's decision to click a few of Google's clever buttons and generate statistics was a revaluation to us both. And a source of some pressure - which is why I always resisted knowing blog stats!

Most of you remain a mysterious presence, a brief blip of electrons in the ether. Those of you who do comment have forged a community of strong personalities and voices, which brings me great pleasure. But the overwhelming majority of you stay silent.

I can't help wondering...who are you? What is your interest? What are your views? There will never be answers to these questions but it means so much to me that people all around the world take a little time to read my waffling.

For any other writer/blogger, the loss of their audience may have a significant effect on one part of their existence. But as I write, I never forget that without you I would be reduced to talking to myself. My world would collapse to the precise dimensions of my cell.

Perhaps in this sense you, the readers, have a far more powerful effect upon this solitary little blogger than readers of other blogs. You are my umbilicus to a wider world than the narrow corridor I inhabit. And your efforts have such an intimate influence on my daily life. It is astonishing to realise that someone in Basingstoke or Adelaide is - via the donate button - responsible for the paper on which I write this, and the cup of coffee at my left hand. How many bloggers and readers have such an influence upon each other?

Your collective presence makes me feel so fortunate. And to be fair, I do suspect that I am getting the best end of the interaction!

A Future

2011-10-09T18:37:00.000+01:00

Having begun the process of regaining my equilibrium after my recent mental implosion, the news that I am (again) to journey off to open prison is a well-timed boost.

In truth, I shared management's view that the mobile phone affair would see the Ministry of Justice refer me back to the parole board, at a cost to me of a year or more. I also thought that this would have been a pretty vindictive move. After all, whatever my use of a phone says, it is hardly an indicator that I pose a "risk to life and limb".

Attempting to divine the motives behind Ministry decisions is nearly always a futile effort. The Ministry moves with biblical levels of mysteriousness. Yet I can't resist the urge to ponder this development. Has someone in the MoJ decided to give me a chance of a future life? Are they giving me a rope and hoping I hang myself? Perhaps this is the Ministry making an effort to appear fair in the light of the police investigations into possible political interference with my last parole hearing? All of these are possible, and more; but we will never know.

Let's just accept the decision and try to use it. Once I am physically moved to open prison (regular readers will know that I have been waiting for almost a year) then I should be released within some 12 months. Along the way I will face significant challenges. Not the ones some of you expect - the outside world - but rather the very low levels of expectations and the extremely limited opportunities offered in open prisons. As I always chafe when being treated like a halfwit, it will fall to me to persuade managers to allow me to explore avenues to develop my future opportunities.

Staring at the walls here in a Block within a closed prison, the idea of being "free" in a year or so can seem unreal. After all, tomorrow has all the hallmarks of being a seamless continuation of the last 31 years. But I am cautious to avoid this trap. Even though open prison is still prison, time there holds unique challenges and experiences and to become lazy, to take one's eye off the goal of release, is to court disaster. That is not a mistake I intend to make.

As a year can pass by very quickly, I must look past open prison and give careful thought to my post-prison future. Decisions need to be made. Do I retire from prison politics and quietly sidle off into obscurity? Do I attempt to earn a living as a media tart, or as a writer-commentator? Resume my PhD and hope for some niche research position? There are so many potential paths into the future, so many questions.

And I'm not going to be shy about asking you guys for ideas or about opportunities. The cynical amongst you can view it as an experiment in rehabilitation.

The next year promises to be the most interesting that I have had for, oh, about 31 years...

Handle with Care

2011-10-08T11:23:00.000+01:00

Physical contact is rare in prisons, even in the showers!

Physical contact between staff and cons is extremely limited, only allowed when being pat-searched or when being "restrained". Routine handling of prisoners is, apart from the above, taboo.

Contrast this with American prisons, where it seems that staff routinely hold prisoners by the upper arm.

If tried on a prisoner in the UK, in normal circumstances the screw could expect a fight.