HC Deb 09 March 1995 vol 256 cc448-9
7. Mr. David Evans

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what plans he has to make the prison regime more rigorous.

Mr. Howard

Prison regimes should be rigorous, demanding and constructive. This year the Prison Service will be introducing a new system to ensure that privileges are earned by good behaviour and lost by bad behaviour. I have taken steps to strengthen the prison discipline system.

Mr. Evans

I thank my right hon. and learned Friend for that reply. Will the Home Secretary put a stop to Sky Television and nine-hole golf courses in our prisons, together with the practice of inmates sending wardens out of prison to get steak and chips? Senior citizens in my constituency of Welwyn Hatfield are concerned when criminals want to get into prison and not out of it. They also want to know—[Interruption.] —if the lot opposite ever got into power, would the nation be subject to hard labour like it was in 1979, with a 98 per cent. tax rate and 27 per cent. inflation?

Mr. Howard

I have no doubts about answering the last part of my hon. Friend's question in the affirmative. I think that the other points that he raised were covered in my original answer.

Mr. George Howarth

Is it not time that the Home Secretary understood—as everyone else does—that tough words and no policy are no substitute for a proper approach to our prisons? After almost 16 years in power, does he not realise that the Government have failed to produce a drug-free and secure prison system which keeps offenders properly locked up? Is he aware that failure is being trailed by Lord Tumim, the chief inspector of prisons, and the boards of prison visitors? When will the Home Secretary do something to ensure that our prisons have proper work-based regimes and are drug-free? We need prison regimes which work and positively rehabilitate people, rather than the mess that he has got the prison service into at the moment.

Mr. Howard

If the hon. Gentleman were remotely interested in what is happening in our prisons, he would know that we have already started our mandatory drugs testing programme, that we are taking firm action to deal with the all too prevalent problem of drugs in prisons, that we are implementing the security recommendations in Sir John Woodcock's report and that we are dealing with these matters. Effective action is indeed being taken.

Sir Ivan Lawrence

In view of the successes in relation to recidivism, will my right hon. Friend consider introducing into Britain a pilot scheme along the lines of the American boot camps? Will he bear in mind that they provide training in discipline and respect for other people, which we have lost since the abolition of national service, training in the work ethic and respect for other people in society—particularly families—and that the advantages of those camps are beginning to percolate the American system and ought to be imitated here?

Mr. Howard

I know that my hon. and learned Friend and the Select Committee on Home Affairs visited a boot camp in the United States, as have I and a number of Prison Service officials. We are currently evaluating the study that has been undertaken of boot camps in the United States. I share my hon. Friend's enthusiasm for some of the facets of the boot camp system and I hope to make an announcement shortly.