Drug problem for 1 in 8 at ‘complacent’ prison complacency

A poll of a quarter of all inmates at Durham Prison last year found 13 per cent had developed a problem with drugs since being held in the category B local prison.

The critical inspection also found that up to a third of prisoners were failing random drugs tests, more than a third thought it was easy to get hold of drugs and almost one in five thought they would still have a problem after being released.

Nick Hardwick, the Chief Inspector of Prisons, warned not enough was being done to tackle the problem which was linked to bullying and self-harm.

He said: “The availability of drugs was a significant cause of bullying in the prison. The supply reduction plan was out of date and there was a degree of complacency and a lack of rigour in tackling the problem.”

He went on: “Efforts to reduce demand were also weak. The drug treatment service was poorly staffed and lacked leadership. Many qualified staff had left recently.”

Inspectors also found “links between poor treatment and self-harm”, with the report showing there were more than 250 incidents of self-harm in the nine months before the inspection in October last year.

The survey of 216 of the 928 prisoners at the North East jail last September found that, on average, one in five inmates tested positive during random drugs tests in the six months to August last year.

But this rose to one in three in both February and June, the figures showed.