Prisons minister disagrees with conclusions of catholic bishops

-10/12/04

The prisons mi


Prisons minister disagrees with conclusions of catholic bishops

-10/12/04

The prisons minister, a well known Christian, has said that he disagrees with many of the conclusions of a report produced by Roman Catholic bishops which yesterday denounced the prison system as a “public scandal”.

Paul Goggins, a former director of Church Action on Poverty, welcomed the report, which he described as “well researched and underpinned by government statistics”. However, he said that he disagreed with many of its conclusions and argued that the prison service was already addressing many of the problems it exposed.

His comments come as differences between the churches and the government over criminal justice policy appear more pronounced.

The report also urges the government to give prisoners the right to vote, except in the most serious of cases. Pressed on why the government had failed to implement a recent European court ruling that this should be the case, Mr Goggins argued that those who had offended society enough to receive a prison sentence had also lost the right to decide who governs them.

‘A Place of Redemption’, was launched at Brixton prison in south London. The Archbishop of Cardiff, Peter Smith, said prisons were failing both offenders and victims.

The report calls on the government to make major reforms in penal policy and says that money is going into expanding rather than improving the prison system.

The report’s authors contend that prisons are considered as “the ultimate backdrop for all society’s problems”.

“Prison must not be a dustbin for the problems society fails to address elsewhere,” it says.

It adds that jails “without hope” are mere storage pens and that the current penal policy is little more than a sentence of banishment.

The prison population in England and Wales reached a record high of 75,544 earlier this year which is almost double the 1991 figure.

The 115-page report highlights what the authors see as major failings in penal policy. These include the need for better mental health care for the large percentage of prisoners suffering from mental illness, and an end to overcrowding – which it says causes the system to neglect the need for rehabilitation and reform and become “essentially punitive”.

The report follows criticism from other church leaders including the Archbishop of Canterbury who branded the government’s penal policy “scandalous”. Rowan Williams accused the three main political parties of “point scoring” in the debate on criminal justice.

Britain’s first senior black bishop, the Bishop of Birmingham, has also called for new “restorative justice” approaches to crime and punishment, helping bring offenders and victims together to produce “truth and reconciliation”.

The report also says that parts of the prison workforce – including at leadership level – need renewal and calls upon the authorities to “root out those elements … whose vision has been corrupted or jaundiced to the extent that it constitutes an impediment to change”.

It goes on to praise “some remarkably dedicated staff, for whom the term prison ‘service’ has real meaning”.


Prisons minister disagrees with conclusions of catholic bishops

-10/12/04

The prisons minister, a well known Christian, has said that he disagrees with many of the conclusions of a report produced by Roman Catholic bishops which yesterday denounced the prison system as a “public scandal”.

Paul Goggins, a former director of Church Action on Poverty, welcomed the report, which he described as “well researched and underpinned by government statistics”. However, he said that he disagreed with many of its conclusions and argued that the prison service was already addressing many of the problems it exposed.

His comments come as differences between the churches and the government over criminal justice policy appear more pronounced.

The report also urges the government to give prisoners the right to vote, except in the most serious of cases. Pressed on why the government had failed to implement a recent European court ruling that this should be the case, Mr Goggins argued that those who had offended society enough to receive a prison sentence had also lost the right to decide who governs them.

‘A Place of Redemption’, was launched at Brixton prison in south London. The Archbishop of Cardiff, Peter Smith, said prisons were failing both offenders and victims.

The report calls on the government to make major reforms in penal policy and says that money is going into expanding rather than improving the prison system.

The report’s authors contend that prisons are considered as “the ultimate backdrop for all society’s problems”.

“Prison must not be a dustbin for the problems society fails to address elsewhere,” it says.

It adds that jails “without hope” are mere storage pens and that the current penal policy is little more than a sentence of banishment.

The prison population in England and Wales reached a record high of 75,544 earlier this year which is almost double the 1991 figure.

The 115-page report highlights what the authors see as major failings in penal policy. These include the need for better mental health care for the large percentage of prisoners suffering from mental illness, and an end to overcrowding – which it says causes the system to neglect the need for rehabilitation and reform and become “essentially punitive”.

The report follows criticism from other church leaders including the Archbishop of Canterbury who branded the government’s penal policy “scandalous”. Rowan Williams accused the three main political parties of “point scoring” in the debate on criminal justice.

Britain’s first senior black bishop, the Bishop of Birmingham, has also called for new “restorative justice” approaches to crime and punishment, helping bring offenders and victims together to produce “truth and reconciliation”.

The report also says that parts of the prison workforce – including at leadership level – need renewal and calls upon the authorities to “root out those elements … whose vision has been corrupted or jaundiced to the extent that it constitutes an impediment to change”.

It goes on to praise “some remarkably dedicated staff, for whom the term prison ‘service’ has real meaning”.