‘WE NEED a general strike before this government dismantles everything. The trade union movement must stand up as one. There is a breaking point for prison staff and it is coming,’ Joe Simpson assistant general secretary of the Prison Officers Association (POA) warned yesterday.
Simpson was responding to an announcement from Tory PM Cameron that he wants to give prison governors ‘more autonomy’. Cameron said in a speech yesterday that the ‘failure of the current system is ‘scandalous’.
He added that ‘current levels of prison violence, drug-taking and self-harm should shame us all’, with a typical week seeing 600 incidents of self-harm, at least one suicide and 350 assaults including 90 on staff.
Cameron said that he wants to use the school academy model and apply that to prisons. He also said that he sees prisoners as an ‘asset rather than a burden,’ and that they should be put to work.
Simpson continued: ‘We have seen many pie in the sky schemes from this government.
‘The last pie in the sky scheme came from Ken Clarke and his 40-hour working week for prisoners.
‘Suggesting prisoners could work for 40 hours a week was ridiculous because prison staff themselves are only rostered for 39 hours a week. We have been telling this government about the prison crisis since 2010. So I can’t understand when all of a sudden he says that prisons are in a deplorable state.
‘Serious assaults on prison staff are up 42%. Murders in our prisons have rocketed and suicides are going up again. This is a direct result of the cuts to prisons services. It is not the autonomy of the governors that will sort this out because the cuts are still there.
‘Cameron is just passing the blame, so that he is not responsisble. What prisons need is to be fully resourced and fully staffed. That is the only way to have rehabilitation.’
Simpson warned: ‘Private companies are not going to make things better. The state make the law, it is only right that the state should look after people that they put in prison.
‘The privatisation of the prison service is obscene. To make profit out of somebodies misery is absolutely deplorable. All of these proposals have come from former education secretary Gove, he is now the justice secretary and he believes that he can privatise prisons in the same way that he has privatised education with the opening of free schools and academies, and look how that has turned out!
‘We would never, ever, rule out strike action. They have pushed us too far, they are pushing and pushing and pushing. We had a special delegate conference called by the members in January where a motion to start industrial action, was almost passed, it was a very, very, tight vote.’
Steve Gillan, POA general secretary, said: ‘I am glad that the PM has recognised that there is a scandal and violence within our prisons. But what I would say to him is, he has presided over it since 2010 with the serious budget cuts which have left prison officer numbers depleted by some 7,000.’
Frances Crook, chief executive of the Howard League for Penal Reform, said: ‘Prisons are currently violent and overcrowded. As such, they fail everyone: victims, the public, staff and prisoners themselves.
‘Prison reform, however, is the tip of the iceberg. Prisoners are crammed in filthy institutions with no staff to open the cell doors. We need action now to tackle sentence inflation and the profligate use of prison.’
