§ Mr. Dellasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) whether the prisoners who, on 2nd November 1973, had been wholly segregated for one year and 10 days from contact with other prisoners were so segregated on the authority of the Secretary of State; whether any conditions are enforced regarding the maintenance of some form of human contact; what consideration has been given to means by which such segregation could be avoided; and whether he will make a statement;
(2) what information he has as to the trend in the number of prisoners segregated under Rule 43 at their own request and for good order and discipline during the last five years; and whether, for any of the last five years, he has any figures of the numbers segregated under Rule 43;
(3) what he expects to be the duration of the research he is proposing into the 215W operation of Rule 43 of the Prison Rules; what types of information it is intended to collect; and whether it will include study of ways of reducing the use of Rule 43;
(4) how many of the persons segregated under Rule 43 on 2nd November 1973 were segregated from contact with other prisoners except at periods allocated for exercise; how many of those so segregated were so at their own request; and how many for good order and discipline.
§ Mr. CarlisleOnly one prisoner had been wholly segregated for one year and 10 days. He had been segregated on the authority, renewed every month, of the board of visitors of the prison. Contact with other prisoners is not enforced, but he is seen frequently by the governor, medical officer, prison welfare officer, chaplain and at regular intervals during the day by prison officers. Transfer to another prison was tried in the hope that he would give up his insistence on total segregation from other prisoners. It failed. The alternative is transfer to a unit in one of the prisons that offer special régimes for prisoners under the rule, but there is no reason to suppose that he would be any more co-operative in those conditions.
The research being put in hand will investigate the motives of prisoners who insist on segregation of one degree or another; the attitude of other prisoners; possible changes to reduce the need for segregation; and the special support needed by those prisoners who, whatever new measures may be possible, remain insistent upon segregation. The research is being arranged in phases over a period of between two and three years.
The specific information asked for about trends over the last five years and the current degree of segregation is not available. But recording procedures and methods of collecting information on a permanent basis are being changed and this should enable trends in the use of the rule to be identified more readily in the future. The research should disclose detailed information about current variations in degrees of segregation.