Crowded jails and cuts ‘mean
justice reforms doomed to fail’

David Cameron said all but a small number of high-risk prisoners will receive help to turn their lives around and break the cycle of reoffending by the end of 2015.

But the long-awaited speech comes after chief inspector of prisons Nick Hardwick said politicians wanting a rehabilitation revolution faced a stark choice – “reduce prison populations or increase prison budgets”.

He highlighted conditions at Britain’s largest jail, Wandsworth prison in south-west London, where excellent workshop facilities stood empty while prisoners watched TV in their cells because there were no resources to move offenders from one to the other.

Vicki Helyar-Cardwell, director of the Criminal Justice Alliance said prison overcrowding and budget cuts mean that rehabilitation is being undermined.

Mr Cameron admitted there was “no blank cheque” and there was “much less money than there used to be”.

But he said the Government’s ambitions could still be realised through intelligent reforms.

Speaking earlier on a visit to Wormwood Scrubs prison in west London, Mr Cameron said: “We have got to do more for less.”

As part of what the Prime Minister called a “tough but intelligent” approach to criminal justice, he said there will be a major extension of payment-by-results for companies, charities and voluntary groups who help offenders escape a life of crime.

He said it was such a good idea, “I’m going to put rocket boosters underneath it”.

But Harry Fletcher, assistant general secretary of the probation union Napo, said: “Making community orders increasingly punitive instead of building on rehabilitation will result in higher non-compliance rates, more breaches of orders and therefore more offenders being taken back to court and given short periods of custody as a result.

“The coalition’s strategy will therefore intensify the repeated cycle of crime and reoffending.”

Ms Helyar-Cardwell added that the real strength of the Prime Minister’s 2006 “hug a hoodie” speech was that it recognised criminal justice and social justice were inextricably linked.

But in a major speech in London Mr Cameron stressed he never uttered the phrase “hug a hoodie”.

Serious crimes must be met with long prison sentences, he added, saying: “Retribution is not a dirty word. It is important to society that revulsion against crime is properly recognised.”

But he insisted he was not trying to “outbid any other politician on toughness”.

“It’s not a case of ‘prison works’ or ‘prison doesn’t work’ – we need to make prison work,” Mr Cameron said. “And once people are on the outside, let’s stick with them, let’s give them proper support, because it’s not outer space we are releasing these people into. It’s our streets, our towns, among our families and our children.”

Labour accused the Prime Minister of “empty rhetoric” designed to keep Tory MPs onside.

Shadow Justice Secretary Sadiq Khan said: “There is nothing intelligent or tough about cutting frontline police officers, reducing the power of judges to give
tough sentences or cutting
support for innocent victims of crime.

“This is nothing more than a smokescreen to try and cover up Andrew Mitchell losing his job on Friday and 29 wasted months of dithering on law and order.”

The Prison Officers’ Association (POA) warned the plans to rely on private firms and payment-by-results schemes were “doomed to failure” when more than 50 per cent of British prisons were seriously overcrowded.

Comment: Page 12.