About the New Bridge

Selected Articles from Inside Time Issue No 41 Summer 2022

'They can shoot the messenger but not the message.' by Rachel Billington.

In his last new weeks as HM Chief Inspector of Prisons, Sir Davide Ramsbotham talks to Rachel Billington and John Bowers of Inside Time. Report by Rachel Billington.

In 1995 General Sir David Ramsbotham took over from Judge Stephen Tumin as Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Prisons. Presumably, the gossips said at the time, a military man would be more used to taking orders than a judge. Could that be the reason why the Conservative government had chosen an outsider Chief Inspector with no previous experience of prisons?

On 31st July Sir David will be removed from his position by a Labour government after more well-targeted and hard-hitting words about our prison service than even his predecessor produced. Indeed he does not deny that his term of office has been concluded because of his unpopularity with the Home office. 'They can shoot the messenger but not the message' is his bullish response.

We meet for the interview in the Home Office. The Chief Inspector is tall, upright, impeccably suited, formidable but not formal, preferring to sit with us on comfortable chairs rather than hugging his desk. He is, it becomes clear, a man with a mission who believes that in the course of the last six years he has successfully analysed the causes of failures within HM Prisons and wishes to see changes implemented. He does not abandon ship willingly.

In answer to our first question about his now famous shock-horror reaction at his first visit to Holloway, he reveals that he had visited one prison before his appointment - the sheep-processing dept in San Carlos, where Argentinian POWs were held during the Falklands War. 'I have to tell you that the sheep-processing depot was cleaner and there was a greater sense of purpose about what the British soldiers were doing with Argentinian prisoners-of-war than I saw in Holloway'. He continues: 'Nothing was happening. There was nobody in education. There was nobody in the gym. Nobody was doing ANYTHING.'

His conclusion from this visit was that in the aftermath of Parkhurst and Whitemoor, the Home Office had become obsessed with 'security, security, security...' repeated three times for emphasis, and were therefore ignoring the fundamentals that prisons are for prisoners. 'You're dealing with people, and having been a soldier all my life dealing with people, you don't deal with people as if they're commodities ... somehow they had forgotten what it was about, which was all about people.'

People and management become two important themes as our interview progresses. We ask him about the running of the Prison Service and his is, as usual, definite, making ti quite clear that he does not believe the Home Office should be in charge. 'The Civic Service is all concerned with the cult of managerialism, conformity with budget, compliance with rules, key performance indicators, key performance targets - those are measurements of process, not measurements of outcomes for prisoners. Where this falls down is if you try to apply the cult of managerialism to the deal with people.'

This leads him into a third theme: 'inconsistency', which he fingers as one of the most flaring weaknesses in the service. 'The word that I've used all the time is "inconsistency" because where I think the Prison Service has got it wrong is that they have not got people who are responsible for ensuring consistent treatment and conditions for prisoners of the same type.'

He is just as direct about drugs, against mandatory testing but in favour of testing every prisoner as he enters the jail. 'Then I believe from that moment on the prisons should separate those that test positive from those that test negative and treat them differently.' We move on to discuss whether so much criticism, often highlighted by the press, disguised good initiatives. He pointed out that he's published 2,700 examples of good practice but only about 100 have been circulated round the Prison Service. On the other hand, criticism is necessary 'to help an establishment improve its operational efficiency.' Often a prison - he gives Brixton as example - simply cannot improve itself in its present situation. '... if they haven't got any workshops, haven't got an education centre, and tis gymnasium is outside the fence. That's not Brixton's fault. Therefore in order to help the prison improve its operations efficiency I must draw the attention of the ... Ministers, who have the ultimate power of the purse - and the Prison Service, which is responsible for managing the prison.'

Yet, consistency will only come if each prison learns from each other's good practices. 'The point about spreading good practice is that at the back of good practices is a good staff who have done a good job and need to have it recognised. I keep on saying to the director general: "for goodness sake, I'm not saying it's the best practice, and the only one, but I'm saying here is an example of people doing it well who others might go and look at".'

Sir David is pleased that the Youth Justice Board was established during his term, '... for the first time you've got an organisation which is responsible for co-ordinating and directing all those people who are in any way involved in the treatment and conditions of those under the age of 18 who come into the hands of the criminal justice system: prisons, probation, education, social services, health, local government and everything else.' The only drawback is that money has been taken from the next stage, the 18-21 group, which is the group where there has been a rise in suicides. Eyes flashing wrathfully, he describes this situation as 'intolerable!.

Our next question centres round the ever-rising numbers in prison. Sir David has been quoted elsewhere as saying you could reduce the numbers by 20,00. He tackles this in two ways. Firstly targeting the misuse of money in a situation where nobody has every costed what proper treatment for a prisoner should cost. Secondly, identifying some of those wrongfully jailed, 'people who shouldn't be in prison, they might be somewhere else , for example, asylum seekers, immigration detainees and the mentally disordered, who should be in the hands of the NHS and not in prisons. Also under-18s - there is absolutely no reason why the Prison Service should look after children ... The role of imprisonment within the criminal justice system should be like hospitals and the health service where treatment takes place.'

Despite everything, Sir David is optimistic about the future. He describes as 'prisons on the move' Wandsworth, Chelmsford and Brinsford, and praises 'the hands-on' work with drugs and other groups. He points out 'prisoners have got to respond and I think they are responding.' We briefly discussed the Board of Visitors and Sir Peter Lloyd's new report.

He agrees the name and make-up should be altered but he believes in its importance as an outside watchdog and says he's responded sic times to calls from a BoV chairman and found their anxieties well founded. On the political input to running the Prison Service, he has little but criticism, summarised as: 'personally I always wish that prisoner were out of the party political agenda ...''

Sir David is already briefing his successor, Anne Owers, and says he will continue to take an interest, particularly in the treatment of young offenders. Asked which of his messages to the Home Office he suspects they have found hardest to swallow, he at first laughs: 'you'd better ask them!' but then becomes more serious: 'I think it is this business of consistent management, but then you see I've been an operational manager so without being pompous, I think I know what I'm talking about and I know the benefits of that, and of course they haven't. I've seen the same mistakes over and over again and I've identified a way out, yet I meet rejection - they haven't tried the other way, except when they have tried it, for example in the high security prisons, it's worked. They've got fed up and so I suspect they'd like me out of the way, but as I say, the message won't go away.'

This is straight-talking soldierly stuff, last words from a Chief Inspector who combines a clear-sighted view of management with a practical and sympathetic approach to the position of prisoners. It is hard to believe that the Home Office have made the correct decision in moving him on.

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