Prisons In Crisis

[00:00:00] The Why Curve, Phil Dobbie and Roger Hearing are prisons are bursting at the seams.

[00:00:07] There are fewer than 250 places left in men's prisons in England and Wales.

[00:00:12] Governors are being told to send inmates home two months early to free up cells.

[00:00:16] We have the largest prison population per head in Western Europe and it costs us £48,000

[00:00:21] a year to keep them there, a fraction short of what it costs to be eaten.

[00:00:26] And does it work? More than half of those serving short sentences reoffend.

[00:00:31] So what is the answer? How can we have a humane, just and effective system

[00:00:36] of dealing with those who break our laws?

[00:00:38] Can we think of alternatives or are we imprisoned by our own prison system?

[00:00:43] The Why Curve.

[00:00:46] So I think there's about 95,000 people in prison.

[00:00:49] Might be a bit hungry.

[00:00:50] I hate you five was all I heard but it may have gone up a bit.

[00:00:52] Well I've got 2023 and when are your figures from?

[00:00:54] Anyway, I think 2023.

[00:00:56] But the interesting thing is there's been a big increase since 1990 so it looks like

[00:01:01] the numbers have doubled whereas the population at that time has only grown by about 20%.

[00:01:05] So what is going on?

[00:01:06] We're all more criminal clearly.

[00:01:08] But the things were not because you look at the crime survey estimates and it says

[00:01:13] basically crimes of half since 1990.

[00:01:15] Well we were less crime more people going to prison.

[00:01:18] A lot of it is to do with throwing kind of stuff towards certain parts of the population.

[00:01:23] Let's say in a prison, don't get votes but putting people in prison or threatening to kind of does.

[00:01:29] So it's populism.

[00:01:30] Well I think you could say that.

[00:01:32] The other thing is there was this famous indeterminate sentences which were brought in by Labour and New Labour in the late 90s

[00:01:38] where you go to prison but there isn't actually an out time for you necessarily depending on your behaviour.

[00:01:43] Which may be sound like a good idea at the time but what it means is there are a lot of people who've got no prospect

[00:01:49] of coming out at all.

[00:01:50] Yeah, ever.

[00:01:51] So it's a crazy situation we're in isn't it?

[00:01:54] And again you can look at the Nordic countries.

[00:01:57] How often do we look at the Nordic countries?

[00:01:59] As often as we can.

[00:02:00] They seem to be doing everything well, don't they?

[00:02:02] I know.

[00:02:03] Because if you look at the incarceration rate, so in the US, we know it's...

[00:02:08] I mean it's crazy.

[00:02:09] The US is mad, that's true.

[00:02:10] So per 100,000, they've got 531.

[00:02:13] That basically means what?

[00:02:14] One in 200 people in prison in the United States, which is just a staggering statistic.

[00:02:20] For us it is about one in 700 compared to them.

[00:02:25] But if you...

[00:02:26] So it's so a lot less but if you look at that rate of 531 per 100,000, in Norway it's 52, in Finland it's 52.

[00:02:36] Even in Canada which is just over the border from the United States.

[00:02:40] You think?

[00:02:41] Yes, yes.

[00:02:42] Well the last time I looked on a map.

[00:02:44] So we just got one line, just a border there and all of a sudden the incarceration rate drops

[00:02:51] from 531 to 88.

[00:02:53] So what's going on in the United States?

[00:02:55] It is very strange, isn't it?

[00:02:56] I mean is it so associational attitude?

[00:02:58] It is to be.

[00:02:59] But also I mean the point about prisons is yes, okay the numbers who are in and the numbers who...

[00:03:02] And the fact we haven't got enough prison buildings.

[00:03:04] But also what on earth are we doing in prisoning that many people if it doesn't actually do the job?

[00:03:10] I mean what's prison for?

[00:03:11] Obviously to punish in one sense but also to take people off the street if they're dangerous.

[00:03:16] But also with a hope of rehabilitation.

[00:03:18] The thing is there are so little resources there that you don't actually...

[00:03:22] There's very little goes into actually giving people skills or trying to change the way they think or whatever it is.

[00:03:27] To try and make sure they don't when they come out.

[00:03:29] And it's very hard isn't it when government finances are so short and they are only short because they don't want to spend the money.

[00:03:35] For them to say well okay what do we do? Do we fix prisons or do we fix potholes in the road?

[00:03:40] What are people going to go?

[00:03:41] They're going to go well have you seen the state of the roads lately?

[00:03:44] And people are going to say wow prison it's a prison.

[00:03:46] It's a holiday.

[00:03:47] Exactly, it's a holiday.

[00:03:48] Exactly, there's to make it worse for them.

[00:03:50] Exactly.

[00:03:51] So there's a lot of things going around here but it's...

[00:03:53] I mean the ultimate conclusion is just not working.

[00:03:55] It isn't working and it's going to be very difficult particularly in an election year to do very much about it.

[00:03:59] The prisons minister said look we know we've got to do something.

[00:04:02] We've got to let people out.

[00:04:03] I mean that's slightly bizarre.

[00:04:05] Everybody gets two months off their sentence and they make a much difference in some ways I suppose.

[00:04:09] The other problem is he's short sentences, you know which probably don't do very much.

[00:04:14] Perhaps take people out of society for a brief period doesn't change their outlook, doesn't change very much.

[00:04:19] And they're over half the people on them what they call short sentences reoffent so it doesn't do anything at all.

[00:04:25] They cost a lot of money to put them there.

[00:04:27] Exactly and there's a lot of reoffenders on this.

[00:04:29] You're going to want to wear the people reoffending because they...

[00:04:31] It's quite like the lifestyle.

[00:04:33] Because it's a holiday camp didn't you?

[00:04:36] Yes, that's right.

[00:04:37] It's a lovely place to be.

[00:04:38] Anyway let's hear from someone who really knows what they're talking about and that's Mark Day.

[00:04:42] He's deputy director of the Prison Reform Trust and he joins us now.

[00:04:46] Mark just before we started talking to you I was talking about...

[00:04:48] The numbers don't seem to stack up in that we've now got more people going into prison, more people incarcerated.

[00:04:54] Crime doesn't seem to be increasing in fact these things to be decreasing.

[00:04:58] And the number of people you know the prison population is increasing at a far greater rate than the population of the country as a whole.

[00:05:06] That doesn't seem to stack up does it?

[00:05:08] What's happening here?

[00:05:10] Well there are a number of factors which are contributing to a rapidly rising prison population which the latest projections suggest could get as high as 114,000 by the time we're going to be in the next generation.

[00:05:23] By March 2028.

[00:05:26] 114,000 we haven't got any space for that have we?

[00:05:29] Absolutely not on current plans there is simply no way that the Ministry of Justice could meet that increased demand.

[00:05:37] So is it populism that's driving a lot of this just the fact that the media and politicians are using it to score points to say hey look we're getting tough on crime?

[00:05:46] So what we've seen over the past 30 years is a rise by 93% in the prison population.

[00:05:55] So what is driving the growth is a combination of longer term factors and also more short and media term factors so if we look at the longer term factors involved there has been no doubt that we have seen a lengthening of sentences across the board.

[00:06:15] During that time and particularly we have seen sentence inflation at the top end of sentencing so that is the sentences past for the most serious offenses have increased quite markedly.

[00:06:29] And is that judge's discretion or is it statutory?

[00:06:33] This is statutory so so the primary thing that has been driving this growth has been changes in legislation.

[00:06:41] And then yes court judgments particularly court of appeal judgments in relation to particular cases would set general case law and that can also have an impact.

[00:06:53] But it is it is often led by the statutory changes so for instance if we look at the 2003 criminal justice act what happened there was we saw an increase in minimum tariffs for various forms of murder.

[00:07:10] And almost overnight what we saw as a consequence of the passing of that legislation we saw quite a rapid increase in the length of tariffs past for those offenses so that had a direct impact on the length of time people were then serving.

[00:07:26] But murder is a very small part of the crime area isn't it? I mean if that couldn't be the determining factor right across the piece.

[00:07:34] You need to think about the impact of long sentences on the prison population overall versus short sentences so the thing about giving somebody a long sentence is what essentially you're doing is you're saying this person will be in your prison and will be a burden on your prison system for 20 30 years.

[00:07:56] Whereas if you are passing a short sentence which in terms of volume much greater volume of shorter sentences past the longer sentences but say if you only have a sentence of six months you released in three months.

[00:08:11] Ultimately released at the halfway point you represent much less of a burden in terms of the actual demand on a prison place compared to that person on the longer sentence so even though as a proportion of overall sentences these longer sentences are smaller as a proportion they represent a much greater burden on the system and that is why they have been had such an impact in terms of driving overall demand on the prison system.

[00:08:40] Right and you the soon longer prison sentences I mean obviously part of it is protecting society from those people that you don't want walking the streets but it would be a disincentive for the crime but well this does it does it does it do that.

[00:08:55] So one of the things we've criticized the government for in with regards to various changes made to the sentencing framework at this top end is the lack of evidence around what what what what is being hoped to achieve by increase increasing lengths of sentences because if you look at the evidence around a Terrance has actually relatively little convincing evidence that it actually works except for a very small non very small group of particular

[00:09:25] type of offender for lots of offenders you know sentencing as a deterrence doesn't really work because because when they commit the crime in their mind is not oh I better not do this because I might go to prison for X number of years.

[00:09:41] Yeah well if we look at murder for instance murder is often a crime of passion so people will not be thinking rationally in those moments when that when the offense is committed.

[00:09:51] You know around what if I did this will will I receive a longer sentence than I might have done otherwise so you know that that's the therefore you know to make an argument around a Terrance doesn't really work for that type of events but it's not politically tenable is it to say we're going

[00:10:10] to reduce the the sentence from murder I mean people want them to be locked up for as long as possible but politicians obviously feel that they want to increase the length so there is a choice involved at that moment and one of the consequences

[00:10:27] is that the consequences politicians are now having you know they're reaping what they so for 30 years they have been passing legislation which has imposed longer and longer sentences.

[00:10:39] The impact is now a prison population which is growing at an unsustainable rate so politicians have a choice and you know we let politicians to lead responsibly and what we see

[00:10:52] are you so old fashioned and the overall governance of our system is is irresponsibility in how we have to run.

[00:11:01] There's always one question about populism so I before we started talking I just flick through a book called Pino populism by John Pratt and I don't know if you're aware of it but he basically argues that the media including social media is responsible for a lot of this because you know it is painting this picture that crime is out of control and needs to be cracked down on

[00:11:20] and that is putting pressure I guess not on the judicial system you know from your point of view it's putting pressure on the politicians to increase the sentences in legislation and is that the root cause of all of this.

[00:11:33] I think certainly the media plays its part in what made drive politicians to sort of legislate.

[00:11:42] I mean I think another another factor involved is sort of generally lack of public understanding of sentencing and what is actually happening.

[00:11:54] And I think there's a bit of a perverse consequence here because I think what happens when politicians say they are going to legislate to make sentences tougher.

[00:12:06] I think what the public probably here is sentences aren't tough enough so because what we do see from all the public opinion measures you know over a number of decades is public confidence in the system.

[00:12:23] It's not gone up so and often what politicians do is they justify increasing sentences on the grounds of public confidence we are doing this in order to increase public confidence in the system.

[00:12:38] Well what the evidence shows is that hasn't worked so you know clearly something's going wrong here and you know a definition of madness is to repeat the same thing again and again expecting a different outcome.

[00:12:52] That's I see what politicians have been doing they have been lengthening sentences in the hope of public confidence increasing and it's just staying the same.

[00:13:02] And they're not prepared as you talk about responsible governance they're not okay if you accept them and I don't necessarily that giving higher sentences has any kind of effect on deterrence or public confidence but you have to then spend the money to build the prisons for the population that you've gotten and people saying

[00:13:20] yes we're going to increase sentences maybe is popular but people saying I'm going to build X number of prisons with this amount of money instead of some hospitals or schools isn't popular I mean there's no logical they're being illogical in that.

[00:13:34] Yeah well I just Roger made the point early just before we started talking to you that you know people are more likely to say well if it's more uncomfortable in prison and that's a good thing why spend money on it.

[00:13:43] I think that the prison system has been a victim of the fact that in many respect it is a hidden public service that people don't know much about don't really understand what goes in on in prisons and so it has been treated like a political football really so you know during the the decade of austerity.

[00:14:05] The Ministry of Justice experienced particularly severe cuts and that had a direct impact on conditions in prison particularly with a really worrying drop in numbers of staff and subsequently a very very worrying spike in violence in prisons and levels of self harm as well.

[00:14:28] So certainly that period the Ministry of Justice took a large hit in terms of public spending and again I think what we see now is the prison system taking that hit from from from from what you rightly say is a for the penal populism.

[00:14:48] You know it's very easy for politicians to promise increasing sentences in many ways it's the sort of out of the box solution to problems even though you know because it might play well in the media where there's a lack of evidence often for for being an infected policy solution.

[00:15:08] But down the line you will have consequences on the system in terms of it pressures on the prison population.

[00:15:15] But you're right it is hidden isn't it we have no idea what goes on you know yeah and to you apart from obviously that that very accurate view that we got on porridge years ago and we've gone no one's got a clue on that.

[00:15:27] And some very popular drama is quite recently actually about life inside how accurate they are God only knows but certainly actually quite illustrating some of these problems one of the things I wanted to pick up with you mark is I was a prison visit on myself up until about 2012 and for a number of years and I remember at that point perhaps in the beginning of the period of austerity you're talking about there was we talk about people spending time in prison and the object of prison we've already said that deterrence is perhaps marginal.

[00:15:56] But one of the ideas is that you reform people that people change their ways of looking at things that they become educated whatever it is and what was so noticeable in those last few years I was a prison visitor was the little change the lack of of that provision how it was just disappearing.

[00:16:11] Because I guess people weren't willing to spend the money to get in tuition or any kind of education or anything like that I mean is that has that been a trend.

[00:16:21] It is extremely hard for prisons to do the work of rehabilitation when they are under such pressure as they are at the moment.

[00:16:31] I mean, I think as well it's important here to talk about the impact of the pandemic and what happened to prisons during that period like every other sort of part of society during that time prisons experienced lockdown with prisoners in their cells.

[00:16:51] You know 23 hours a day very limited sort of access to sort of reassertiation time everything done on obviously because of the public health measures that needed to be in place.

[00:17:04] But then when we saw restrictions lived whilst in the rest of the community you know there was apparently rapid change from a period of lockdown and people not being out socialized etc.

[00:17:16] To sort of going back to their normal lives that didn't happen in prison and needs the prisons inspector has become increasingly concerned and worried in the visits that it has it is conducted into prisons that prisoners have continue to experience what amounts to lock down conditions spending large chunks of their time locked up in their cells with with little to do.

[00:17:44] Now what we think has happened here is that enjoying this period we had quite a high turnover of staff as well so lots of new staff coming in and many staff who essentially grew up in a prison system which was under lockdown.

[00:17:59] So it was part of the culture that people spent the long periods locked up in their cells and that continued post the end of the pandemic.

[00:18:08] It's also I think a product of the pressures on the system in terms of staff retention and the prison system has had difficulties in we have had an improvement in recruitment but keeping those staff on has proved very difficult indeed.

[00:18:26] And then we have the pressures of overcrowding as well which means that simply as a way of managing your population you are keeping people behind their cell doors rather than having them out either in free association engaged in personal activity or in educational training.

[00:18:43] So what are the consequences of that do you get to get increased violence as a result?

[00:18:47] I think you can do. I mean what we run an advice and information service for prisoners and I have to say that we have never experienced such a level of concerns coming through to our service around safeguarding around mental health, self harm.

[00:19:11] The volume of difficulty and distress which is now in the population I think is very worrying indeed.

[00:19:23] And I think this can be directly related to the pressures of overcrowding and the pressures of lack of staff which we are currently seeing.

[00:19:31] And presumably as a result of this any attempt at rehabilitation whatever what might make it less likely that they will reoffend.

[00:19:41] Presuming that's come down I mean do we know in any detail what the reoffending rate is?

[00:19:46] Well I've got some figures here which I mean there might be a little bit out of date they're from civitas which is the Institute for the study of civil society.

[00:19:55] And they reckon 70% of custodian might be a couple years out of date found this possibly predates the pandemic.

[00:20:02] 70% of custodial sentences are imposed on those with at least seven previous convictions 50% are imposed on those with at least 15 previous convictions.

[00:20:12] So if those numbers are right that's a huge reoffend rate isn't it and it shows those people are not really thinking too hard about whether they're going to go to prison or not.

[00:20:22] Yes I mean reoffending is a complicated area because it's actually a measure of reconviction which therefore involves the police and police practice.

[00:20:38] And so it's yes you do often hear some politicians either trumpet a slight decrease in reoffending or political opponents talk about increases.

[00:20:50] The reality is is first of all reoffending is a kind of drag measure and you don't know what the reoffending rate is until two years down the line because that's that's the point at which reoffending is measured.

[00:21:01] And secondly there are so many factors involved in the measurement of that which is a measure of reconviction.

[00:21:08] So that's you know the police having to pick up certain types of offenders and not others.

[00:21:14] So it's a slightly unreliable measure but in their ideal world you'd have somebody goes to prison for something they did wrong, but they go through a process they realize they made a mistake they don't do it again we don't get any reoffenders.

[00:21:26] I mean in this utopian vision of the world I'd like to live in but we're a long way from that.

[00:21:33] Yeah again I think we have to be sort of quite clear and objective about what does prison do in terms of increasing or decreasing the chances of someone reoffending.

[00:21:46] And what we do know around the evidence around reoffending is that there are protective factors involved in reducing someone's risk at reoffending.

[00:21:56] One of those is having a job another is having stable housing and accommodation having good contact with family on the outside as well.

[00:22:08] And what we certainly know about prison is that it can actually make those things worse.

[00:22:14] People can go to prison often lose housing and their jobs it puts severe, well it takes people out of their families it can destroy family contact.

[00:22:24] So when people have released they actually may be more likely to reoffend and we certainly see that with the short sentence to population.

[00:22:32] So people who are who are sent to prison on short sentences have amongst the highest rates of reoffending compared to any other form of disposal.

[00:22:42] And indeed the current justice secretary is trying to push through a change to legislation to create a presumption to suspend short sentences of 12 months or less.

[00:22:56] And this is on very good evidence around.

[00:22:58] Not going to win in many votes though is it?

[00:23:00] I'm here to talk about the evidence and you know it's politicians.

[00:23:06] Not politicians, we have evidence that they would be very little ground for disputing this measure.

[00:23:13] So you think there's a lot of people on short sentences then who shouldn't be in prison at all that if they didn't go to prison and there's some other way that they could be prosecuted

[00:23:22] which would allow them to stay with their family and keep their jobs.

[00:23:25] And then they wouldn't reoffend that would be the hope.

[00:23:28] Well, that's what the evidence shows and there are there are something called the community sentence treatment requirement which is a form of community sentence which essentially packages together a number of different types of disposed also mental health treatment requirements drug treatment requirements as well.

[00:23:47] And what we do know about this revolt what is called the revolving door population because as you said, it high level of high level of reconvenction and I'm offering in for sort of petty for petty offenses.

[00:24:04] A typical example would be sort of shoplifting and what we do know about this population is it is often driven by addictions or mental mental health.

[00:24:16] Do we get people to go to prison for shoplifting?

[00:24:19] You can potentially.

[00:24:22] What about the age profile in this one we haven't talked about that I mean young offenders it's one of those classic things where the suggestion is if people find themselves in confinement at young ages,

[00:24:33] one of the cliches is that you then basically preparing for a life of crime of in and out. I mean, is the evidence that young offenders young offenders who are convicted and then spend time in prison or young offenders institutions that they are more likely to reoffend or to be reconvicted.

[00:24:50] One of the sort of hidden success stories of the criminal justice system in recent years has been quite a mark drop in the number of under 18s in custody.

[00:25:01] So whilst the we adult population has been increasing, we have seen quite a significant drop in the level of youth custody.

[00:25:11] But in turn, that population itself has changed in its profile. So we are now seeing a lot larger proportion of the under 18 population being sent to prison to actually serve very long sentences.

[00:25:28] And also, unfortunately another factor has been the higher rate of need amongst this population often very complex levels of need in terms of mental health levels of social exclusion that sort of thing.

[00:25:43] So we have had seen a significant change and I think this has come about partly as a result of a consensus that prison for this group is particularly damaging.

[00:25:58] And what we also know from the evidence around reoffending is there's something called de sisters and the de systems curve.

[00:26:06] And so levels of offending sort of peak in early adulthood, sort of rising through adolescence, through to early adulthood and then fall.

[00:26:20] And so this is more or less sort of independent of what you do to these people, you send them to prison and you put them on a course.

[00:26:30] There's still this sort of very persistent de systems curve where people do just you know they're offending tends to drop off as the older people get.

[00:26:39] So some some theorists and academics have argued that you know what we need to do around if you want to increase the chances of supporting the resistance curve getting people not to reoffend it's not to put barriers in the way of act assistance.

[00:26:54] And when you hear these cliches around colleges of crime, etc.

[00:26:59] Around prison there's some truth in that because what you're doing is you are putting a young offender in an institution with loads of other young offenders and you are socializing them towards the values of that group.

[00:27:15] What we should be doing is is something else we should be supporting them away from crime and away from a funding.

[00:27:21] Well, if you if you know somebody's dealing in drugs, if you stick them in prison, the like they go well this is fantastic all of a sudden I got a whole load of new customers all in in close proximity to the area drugs aren't allowed in prisons but

[00:27:31] you know it happens but where do we draw the line then if you're saying that you know incarceration by itself is not stopping people from from reoffending.

[00:27:41] And so if it's a low level crime really what is the point and you made the point in fact of it's you know there's a chance that they will more are more likely to reoffend.

[00:27:50] So then that becomes well what's the role of prison then surely this just to protect society, you know that's its main function so does that is that the dissemnable factors to who goes to prison and who doesn't.

[00:28:00] People who should be off the streets in effect at least for a time yeah I mean it's some you know prison has to serve a number of different purposes and it ultimately serves the courts and the decisions of the courts and you know there are there are five purposes of sentencing public protection punishment is a part of sentencing rehabilitation.

[00:28:26] I forget the others.

[00:28:29] And the other two there in that right but it but that punishment one is an important one isn't because you might say for example fraud is a victimless crime and so should you should go to go to prison for that but there would be a lot of people who go well that would be

[00:28:43] you know a lot of a powerful rich people would go that's the worst thing could possibly happen to me bit of community service happy with that I'm still going to commit the crime whereas you know the fear of going to prison.

[00:28:54] Would be a determining factor on whether they commit the crime or not perhaps I mean I think it's right that punishment is part of sentencing you know and you know we have a justice system to ensure that people get their just desserts so you know I think

[00:29:08] I think I'm so I would say that the purposes of sentencing there is there is various debate about them and whether some are more effective than others in terms of you know and how they are applied by by the courts is often an issue of dispute too but

[00:29:25] but yes punishment is a part of sentencing and it is right that it is I think my argument would be whether whether that part of sentencing has become disproportionate in terms of the amount of attention we give to it what about the other parts of the purposes of sentencing as well what about rehabilitation and particularly if you look at something like a short sentence and the evidence we know around

[00:29:52] the poor outcomes of short sentences is enough attention being given to the court when they pass such a sentence to to the purpose of rehabilitation or was it just about punishment for the same.

[00:30:07] So you know from the prison reform trust what would be the reformed system or the reforms in the system that you think would really work I mean initially we've got a position as you say crisis of an ballooning prison population so immediately should we change sentencing should we build more prison should we improve the prisons we've got what are the priorities.

[00:30:30] The immediate priority has to be dealing with capacity crisis which we are currently facing it is an immediate and pressing concern that is putting the lives of prisoners in danger and the lives of staff in danger too

[00:30:43] And also means that if the government doesn't deal with it effectively it could literally run out of prison spaces and so the courts would not have anywhere to put people.

[00:30:53] So that is the most immediate and pressing concern which needs to be dealt with now what Alex chalk is introduced as a series of measures which will buy him some more time he's introduced an early release scheme

[00:31:07] and he there's also some legislation in train to introduce his presumption to suspend short sentences and to increase eligibility for something called home detention curfew which is a form of early release on an electronic license.

[00:31:27] I would say those two measures are absolutely pressing priorities which have to be passed because not doing so puts the system in immediate danger.

[00:31:39] So that's very much the kind of immediate concern is to alleviate these pressures of population to ensure that to the best it is able to under come conditions the system can hold people safely.

[00:31:52] So that's a sticking plaster essentially isn't it for the moment yes is I mean I mean we have a we have a crisis and you know when you're in a crisis you have to deal with the immediate issues caused by the crisis so.

[00:32:06] So that about his work which absolutely has to be done and is essential and you know reading the times today in the reports of the political bonfire taking place over the the sentencing bill you know I just hold my head in my hands really you know politicians need to behave responsibly in the face of a system which is in meltdown so you said the long term view then I mean while you go work on these things simultaneously obviously fixing the short term crisis.

[00:32:34] But do you think we need to revisit some of the legislation do we need to put more responsibility back on the courts when it comes to determining centers the sentence is.

[00:32:44] I think in the longer term we need to face up to the legacy of these decades of peanut populism and what it has done to our system and I think what we need is a thorough cross party look at the sentencing framework

[00:33:02] and whether it is really delivering to those purposes of sentencing which I which I mentioned earlier now I'm following enough in the 2019 conservative manifesto sort of hidden in the section on justice and home affairs there was a commitment to establish a royal commission on the criminal justice system.

[00:33:23] That never saw the light today and you know we're now coming to the end of this parliamentary term I in my view that was a missed opportunity.

[00:33:31] I think the state of our criminal justice system is absolutely right for some form of commission which could examine the impact of our sentencing framework on demands on prisons

[00:33:45] and also ask those questions about whether you know sentencing is really delivering in terms of the purposes and whether our prison system is fit to meet those demands I think that that's what we need we need a thorough proper review of the system arguably the last time that happened in relation to prisons was with with the war for poor in the 90s after the after riots which took place.

[00:34:10] We haven't really seen since then a kind of considered look at the system as a whole and whether it is functioning adequately so if that if that doesn't happen and penal populism continues you know so long as the murder presses around are we what happens when do we reach breaking point how does that mature right.

[00:34:32] I mean I think there's a good argument to say that we're already at breaking point you know when we have had the system is has been under emergency measures for over a year now in and you know we are we are having to.

[00:34:47] There have been a number of changes which the law chances introduced to deal with the immediate pressures on the system as I said we have you know extremely worrying there was a self harm in the in the system.

[00:35:01] Wiring and rising levels of violence problems the staff retention you know these are all flashing red lights on the dashboard of the prison system so to say that you know I think we're already in that situation now and we have a prison population which is projected to rise in a relatively short space of time sort of really staggering levels you know as I said it's high as a hundred and a half.

[00:35:31] 14000 by 2028. How much you figure it out now we were arguing over this number we thought it was somewhere like 90 95,000 some of the current the current population is about 88,000 so if you think about it that's a that's a rise of 60 huge.

[00:35:46] Yeah I'm sorry 26,000 potentially and you know that that's that's three prisons a year which are not being built.

[00:35:57] So the government has promised 20,000 places by I can never you know the day it always seems to recede into the distance I think it's 20, 20, 30 but it's just not on track to feel those numbers of places so.

[00:36:14] So more and more police on the streets does that make the situation worse or does that make any time you could argue both ways and more police on the streets and they've.

[00:36:21] Yeah they that's a deterrent to commit crime or does it make just people feel more comfortable or does it catch more and therefore we need more people in prison what's the what should take on that so one of the other factors and when I said at the beginning one of the factors which are contributed to the rise in the prison population was the kind of growth in in the.

[00:36:40] So there's a couple of other factors as well involved one is the rising numbers of police officers so this is what this is one of the factors which has led to the more immediate increase which we have seen in recent years.

[00:37:00] There was a commitment to 20,000 additional police officers I think and and indeed they have recruited more offices obviously what happens when you do that is you see an increase in arrests and convictions and numbers coming for the courts and obviously a proportion of those people go to prison so.

[00:37:20] So you have to argue that's a good thing well I mean with the fact that we don't want to we don't want to have prison populations declining because more people are getting away with it I mean that's not.

[00:37:31] I suppose you know whether it's good or bad is irrelevant what you have to do is resource the impact yeah we actually do it so say the only answer then is actually to invest more build more hospitals and then.

[00:37:43] High school prison sorry and then look at.

[00:37:46] And then look at the longer term picture about who exactly is going to prison yes I think it's a combination really so you know yes number of arrests and convictions you could argue that's there's a good thing in terms of meeting.

[00:38:02] There was a crime in the community but there is also a question what what you do with someone once they are arrested and convicted and certainly you know for those people who might get short sentences I would argue that there for many of that population there are better disposes in the community so.

[00:38:22] So that would be one thing I think another important thing say is you know there are also options for people even before they get to court and in terms of our court dispasals and indeed the police do make use of those dispasals and back and involve the diversion is someone into into treatment as well so so you know it just because you have more police offices and and you're having more.

[00:38:47] More people careful coming into contact with the criminal justice system that's is not an automatic pipeline into prison they get into the media we do to all shows is a complicated question because they get into the question about whether the police are handling mental health issues which are all of their.

[00:39:01] Another discussion because we draw this to a conclusion and we were the we're going to have a change government almost certainly.

[00:39:06] Do you think labor I mean are you guys lobbying the potential in coming labor government to try and do something rather different well we have we have regular

[00:39:16] and that's what across parties so so obviously we government ministers and also with the opposition as well.

[00:39:24] And yes of course you know we're a charity we have a we have a mission and we seek to fulfill that mission through through seeking to influence those who might have a handle on on prison policy by the now or at a later date so so yes we are having those conversations I mean I think that what I would say is which

[00:39:45] ever government comes in. In the next election.

[00:39:50] Will face the same problem which is a prison population projected to rise you know very rapidly and significantly and very little money and resource to to hold those that increasing numbers a problem that can't be ignored mark appreciate your time thanks for coming on today thank you so now next week I'm going all electric by the way you are I notice that as well as you know

[00:40:13] this morning a little to light was in on you yeah also getting electric car I do maybe by this time next week I've been waiting weeks and weeks and weeks for it for Volvo to deliver the car that I've already paid for in full not that I'm bitter about it

[00:40:30] and I think I'm beginning to detect why we're doing this subject next week.

[00:40:35] Well we're not here next week we're going to talk about the slow delivery times by Volvo.

[00:40:39] Now we're going to buy electric cars generally indeed and I feel like so I I've gone down that road because it's been a you know there's quite a ton

[00:40:46] down that road in electric car because those quite attacks incentive to do it right now so the government is pushing you to buy electric if you're running your own business or if you're running a business you need to get it as a salary sacrifice and you only pay 2% in kind benefit.

[00:40:59] So that's so there's a lot but you've got to charge it yeah it doesn't go that far even on a single charge yeah and getting better though but it's but there is definitely I think more demand than the supply as well so and then you know there is going

[00:41:14] to be demand for more you know if there are a lot more people there's going to be demand for more charge points around the country and they are moving

[00:41:20] they've been put out very very slowly and the price of these cars is going to come down right because the Chinese are going to start flooding the market.

[00:41:27] Yeah as they have you already begun to America yeah with cars that are much cheaper than the alternatives because cost is what's put a lot of people off.

[00:41:35] Yeah but in America of course they're talking about well there you know if the next president is Donald Trump he's saying 100% tariff so in other words he wants to double the cost of all their imports and he's you know pointing to the fact that the China is trying to build a car planting in Mexico

[00:41:49] they're going to have 100% tariff as well and electric cars can ascender all our data back to China as well.

[00:41:54] Obviously that's going to happen isn't it so we're well I'm going to be driving a Volvo that's made in China as well is it yeah.

[00:42:00] Oh right so we're all in all states that will be there actually back to China which is important but I'm sure for that.

[00:42:06] But yeah so what about electric cars are they catching up with everything else or is it going to be a long time before most people have them?

[00:42:15] And he's China going to dominate production because China is now making more cars than Japan you know what is it going to do to the geopolitical shift that's going to come from it.

[00:42:24] There's many different questions are they're going to be built around this or what is the road for electric cars like that I feel like I shouldn't say anything at all now we just all quietly go off the master at work.

[00:42:36] We'll see you next week that's the idea for this week thanks for listening.

[00:42:39] Bye.

[00:42:45] you