Prison Smoking Ban

So. Let’s ban smoking in prisons. Simple, innit? As ever with all things prison, it’s far more complicated. Somehow these complexities are overlooked.

The sole reason I can uncover for this policy is Health and Safety – the Prison Officers Association are complaining about the foul air their members must inhale while in cells. Which are the only places in prison where smoking remains permitted – even smoking in the open air is usually prohibited (giving the lie to the health and safety rationale).

However, when the national smoking ban was introduced several years ago, and smoking was restricted to cells in prison, procedures were put in place to address this concern. Staff were meant to give a heads-up shout to prisoners as staff were conducting daily cell-checks, so that prisoners could air out the cells. Just to be very clear on this point: procedures were put in place to address staff safety, but staff have never used these procedures. There is no need for any member of staff to enter a smoky cell – unless they allow it to happen. And they do. And in the face of this lazy whine, a total ban on smoking in prisons is planned.

Unlike tobacco in the wider society, tobacco in prison plays a huge role in prisoners’ lives. Tobacco isn't merely a diversion. It is the default prisoner currency, the standard unit of trade that all other commodities are valued against. As such, banning it would have the same social effects as if Government suddenly banned the cash in your wallet or purse. Sans tobacco, some other substance will become the default currency and the only candidate is heroin.

There will, of course, be bits of tobacco smuggled in. Realistically, though, tobacco is bulky and not very smuggle-able. Especially when compared to the size and value of heroin. And the main channel of getting tobacco from one side of the wall to the other will invariably be prison staff – the very group that the Prison Service prefers to think of as whiter than white.

With the current medium of exchange prohibited, waves of disruption will flow through the social structure. Those who "baroned" tobacco – burn, snout – will be worthless, their ability to calm a stressed prison gone. In their place will rise, to a more embedded level than currently, those who deal in the "powders". But tobacco barons have always been a stabiliser, a bank, a bureaux de change, will the flow of tobacco being largely consistent. Heroin, in contrast, leads to some prisoners wielding undue influence – "powder power" – but inconsistently. Supplies of drugs are far more uncertain and temporary, leaving the suppliers in a shaky socioeconomic position and as such as likely to prompt instability as anything else.

Tobacco is also used by the Prison Service as an intelligence tool. Every Wing Manager has traditionally had a few packets of tobacco to hand, to dish out to the passing casual informers. This will now end. On a wider scale, by tracking tobacco purchases from the prison shop – the "canteen" – managers have been able to discern economic activity. This activity is often tied to broader prisoner activities and can highlight the wheelers and dealers. A non-smoker buying lots of tobacco is obviously "up to something"! Whether this oversight of prisoners’ economic activity has ever led to more substantial intelligence is unknown; what is known is that this source of intelligence will now cease.

The practicalities of the ban are yet to be made known, probably to be developed as this policy is rolled out. It begins in Wales early next year. Whatever details are developed, all have to face the reality that nicotine is one of the most addictive of substances and prison is the last bastion of smokers. And 50,000 smokers deprived of their fix will be a fearsome thing.

Obviously, the Healthcare departments of each prison (now NHS run) should be stocking up on Nicotine Replacement Therapies, such as patches. The problem with all of these poor substitutes is that they have success rates lower than a rugby player with a lion on his shirt. As for E-cigarettes; these would be a perfect medium. Alas, E-cigs require chargers, which can also be used to charge illegal mobile phones. How the Prison Service faces this challenge will be interesting. What will be offered medically will be risible and not cull the cravings of the masses.

Banning tobacco, then, will have the key consequences of instantly dismantling economic structures which have stood for decades; will destabilise the social structure; reduce intelligence; tempt staff to smuggle; and throw social power into the corrosive and unstable hands of heroin dealers.

I can't think of a more damaging policy.