Official Report 190KB pdf
I open the 13th meeting of the Justice 2 Committee in 2003, which is a joint meeting with the Justice 1 Committee. On behalf of committee members, I welcome the witnesses who are attending this afternoon. We are very pleased to have Dr Andrew McLellan, Her Majesty's chief inspector of prisons for Scotland, Mr Rod MacCowan, HM deputy chief inspector, and Dr David McAllister, HM assistant chief inspector. I thank you for coming. Members have received a copy of "HM Chief Inspector of Prisons for Scotland Report for 2002-2003" and are keen to take advantage of the opportunity to ask questions on its contents.
I hear what you are saying; I am used to being brief here in the assembly hall.
The fourth message in the report is to the Scottish public and it is: "Stop blaming prisons." Prisons are scapegoats for things that they cannot change and for the weaknesses of a society that we all share. An obvious example of such a weakness is addiction. It is quite unreasonable to expect that incarceration in the unnatural and controlled environment of a prison will help to overcome cravings and addictions that have been built up in some cases over many years, or that it will have a significant impact when the craving prisoner is eventually released. Another example is mental health. The only statistic that I will give you—apart from the one about Aberdeen—is that prisoners are, compared with the community as a whole, 50 times more likely to suffer from three or more mental disorders. It is just silly to think that prisons will cure that.
I am sure that I speak for us all when I say that that statement was a model of brevity, for which I thank you.
What a treat.
We will proceed to general questions.
Good afternoon, Dr McLellan. It is nice to have you here.
Thank you.
I found your report to be interesting and informative. As luck would have it, in the past couple of weeks I have just finished reading David Ramsbotham's book "Prisongate: The Shocking State of Britain's Prisons and the Need for Visionary Change", which covers much of the same territory for England and Wales.
I am glad that you were shocked and I hope that I will always maintain the ability to be shocked by what I see in prisons. That is an important reason for making a non-prison person the inspector of prisons.
You mentioned the resources that are available, which relate to my second general line of inquiry. The end of your report, which was interesting and worth while, says that the budget that is available to you is £315,000 and that you have four full-time staff. The report says that there are 6,500 prisoners, 19,000 remand prisoners and 16 prisons. Are your resources adequate for the job that is expected of you? To what extent have the criticisms and points that were made by your predecessor, Mr Fairweather, been dealt with and to what extent do you expect your reports to be implemented in future improvements?
We actually have five full-time staff from that tiny budget, so the Scottish Executive obtains good value for money from our department. I am the first full-time chief inspector of prisons for Scotland—I cannot conceive how Mr Fairweather did the job without being full time. That is one of many reasons why I want to pay tribute to him.
As with all departments, we have to work within a budget and to ensure that, as a team, we are structured to deal with the business that comes our way. As Andrew McLellan has said, we are adequately funded to deal with the number of inspections that we are able to plan. However, if other work came along, we might need to rethink how we structure the work and allocate different tasks.
A few of us visited Shotts prison, so I was looking forward to reading about Shotts; however, I am struck by the fact that the annual report does not contain a report on Shotts prison. I wonder why we cannot have an inspection of every prison every year. It is clear that we cannot do so on resources of £315,000 but, if extra resources were provided, why could not every prison be the subject of a report by Her Majesty's inspectorate of prisons every year?
In a moment, I will invite Mr MacCowan to comment on a specific aspect of resources. My hope is that, from now on, there will be a full inspection report or a follow-up inspection report on every prison every year. That is the timetable that we have set. I hope that you will appreciate that there was a little bit of a gap between Mr Fairweather's leaving the office and my taking it up. There was a month in which I did no inspections, because I did not want to spend my second week in office inspecting a prison. The fact that there was a bit of a lull explains why there were only 10 reports this year. I am confident that there will be 15 reports a year from now on.
Your expectation is that there will be a full report on every prison from next year onwards.
My expectation is that, in the annual report and on our website, there will be a report on a full inspection, which takes about a week or 10 days, of which we plan to do five each year, or a report on a follow-up inspection, which takes two or three days. Some of the reports in this year's annual report are of full inspections and some are of follow-up inspections. With the convener's permission, I was hoping that Mr MacCowan could say one more sentence.
We have established a number of associate inspectors, both from within and outwith the Scottish Prison Service, who can assist us with individual inspections if we feel that additional resources are required. While they are deployed to us, they work on behalf of the chief inspector, not on behalf of the Prison Service.
Would you like to see a full inspection of every prison every year? I take Dr McLellan's point—he said that he would expect there to be full reports on five prisons next year—but there are 16 prisons. That means that there will be five full reports and 11 follow-up reports. Is it possible to have a full annual report on 16 prisons every year?
That is not possible with the resources that are available to us, although I am not sure that what you suggest would be valuable. A follow-up report on a prison finds out what has happened with matters that were raised in the previous report, pursues new developments in the prison and picks up matters that have been raised in self-assessments. Such a report involves only a three-day inspection, but it would clearly detect any major change in a prison. It is fair to point out that Her Majesty's chief inspector of prisons for England and Wales expects to report on every prison only once every five years.
How many prisons are there in England?
There are 170.
Thank you. That has been a helpful outline of the general background.
Good afternoon, Dr McLellan. First, thank you for the clarity of your opening statement and your message about what has to be done. You will know that members here have in the past voiced their concerns about overcrowding and slopping out. I want to ask specifically about overcrowding. Page 5 of your report states:
The Scottish Prison Service uses four strategies: addiction management; programmes to address reoffending behaviour, such as anger management; education; and provision of a work habit and work that might lead to employment on release. Every single one of those strategies suffers because of overcrowding. In my view, the Scottish Prison Service ought to implement—it is trying to do so—individual management of prisoners by individual prison officers. There is a programme called the personal officer scheme, in which a prison officer has responsibility for the management and development of prisoners. That ought to be an essential part of preparing prisoners for release, but it is damaged by overcrowding, too.
It is helpful to know the strategies that are used. Could you give us more detail on the extent of the damage that is being done? Have you witnessed it? I note what you say about half-day timetables, but I presume that the work that is available to prisoners is only part of the addressing reoffending programme. Can you give more detail on what you have seen? How much time either is not being spent or should be spent on rehabilitation programmes?
Perhaps Mr MacCowan could answer that, and Dr McAllister and I will reflect.
Mr MacCowan is finding it difficult to formulate an answer. Can I ask for clarification? Do you mean do we have specific instances of time's being lost on programmes?
In your report you make it quite clear that the prison service is unable to address offending behaviour and that such programmes are casualties of overcrowding. You also talked about the programmes that should be on-going. If we take any prison, for example Barlinnie, can you tell me which programmes are being conducted and how much time is being spent on them? Can you give us any information that will allow us to see the extent of the damage that is being done? I ask because we have heard how community sentences are much more effective than prison. If prison is not providing the programmes that it should, we cannot compare the two. It is an important issue. Anything that you can give me would be useful.
Thank you for the clarification. You will be aware that each prison has key performance indicators by which its performance is measured. Among those will be an indicator for the numbers of programmes that have been delivered. In most cases, prisons achieve fairly high compliance with the indicators, therefore programmes are being delivered. We find that individual programmes are affected by staff shortages, so a planned programme might not run or there might be difficulties in running programmes on a structured basis, which might mean that programmes have to be run at the end of the year.
Are you saying in the report that you are concerned about access to work and personal development programmes?
The most significant impacts of overcrowding are on access to work and programmes and on personal management. I will give one or two illustrations of what we had in mind. In Her Majesty's Young Offenders Institution Polmont, where one would think that it is very important that young offenders develop work habits, it is possible for work to be provided regularly only on a timetabled basis; people attend work for only part of the day.
There has been a genuine attempt to detail what was found in the prisons that were visited, which is what we would expect the report to disclose.
My answer is in two parts. HMP Greenock is a good example of the difference that overcrowding makes. My report quotes the governor of Greenock prison, who says that Greenock has the facilities if it is not overcrowded. If the prison is overcrowded by 25 per cent, that means that 25 per cent of prisoners are not accessing the excellent educational facility that you described.
Interest is felt in having that coloured out a bit, in so far as it is practical for you and your department to do that within your budget.
People do not often ask me to write or say more.
The best way to solve the overcrowding problem would be to prevent crimes in the first place, but that is a distant possibility. New house blocks are being built at Polmont and Edinburgh and we are aware of the Executive's capital programme to build new prisons in the near future. Will those additional blocks and new prisons solve the overcrowding problem? If not, what would be required to solve it? Have you any idea how much that would cost?
A little modesty is called for on my part, as I have to say, first, that I do not know the answer to that question because I do not know what the position will be two or three years from now. I promise that I will deal with your question, but it is important for me to keep saying that what matters most at the moment is the bad conditions in which prisoners are living and in which prison staff are working.
So even with the programmes that are planned, in your estimation we will be in the same position that we are in today in several years' time. There is no silver lining.
It is possible for a nation—for the Scottish Parliament—not to believe that prison numbers will just keep growing indefinitely. There are countries in other parts of the world—the United States and Finland, for example—where prison numbers have clearly reflected political will. That is a matter for the Parliament. What is a matter for me is the fact that increasing prison numbers, and every new prisoner, make things worse for the prisoners who are already there.
I draw members' attention to the time. Without wishing to cramp their style, I ask members to keep their questions as focused as possible. I am sure that Dr McLellan and his colleagues will co-operate in keeping their answers as brief as possible.
I hear what you are saying, convener. I shall not mention Finland again.
We are anxious to cover as much ground as we can. If we keep our questions fairly punchy, that will help.
The next area for inquiry is remand prisoners. You write in your report that that was the area that you found to be most shocking, with 19,000 prisoners being held on remand. You make the valid point that those people have not yet been convicted of any crime. Given what you just said to Stewart Maxwell about Low Moss and Addiewell—or wherever the new prisons are going to be—not being the solution, how would you address that issue? What is the strategy for reducing the overall number of remand prisoners? I do not know what percentage of remand prisoners receive non-custodial sentences.
About half of prisoners who are on remand do not receive a custodial sentence. There are not 19,000 prisoners in Scotland who are on remand; there are only 6,700 in all. I referred to 19,000 receptions—people coming into prison—in the course of a year.
I would like to follow up two separate lines of inquiry.
Can you keep it brief, please? Other members are waiting to speak.
You make the point that remand prisoners find themselves, unfortunately, at the bottom of the heap and in some of the most squalid conditions. People are put on remand for X number of months, they are brought to court and they are found not guilty. What access do they have to compensation for the loss of their liberty?
I do not know whether that is a question for Dr McLellan. That is an issue for the wider governance of the Scottish Executive.
Does Dr McLellan have a view?
The answer to your question is that I do not know. However, I do not want to be on the record as having said that all remand prisoners live in the most squalid conditions. In fact, I said the opposite; I paid tribute to the efforts that have been made in the past four or five years to provide decent conditions for remand prisoners—Cornton Vale and Edinburgh prisons are two good examples of that. The wretched thing is that, because more and more prisoners are on remand, some of them spill over into the worst places.
Your report indicates that drug addiction dominates much of prison life. Is there concern about the current levels of transportation of drugs into prisons? How might that situation be addressed? Are harm-reduction, or methadone, programmes administered in the best way? Do you have any proposals for how to deal with the issues in an alternative fashion?
An immense amount of time, energy and intelligence is spent on the issue of drugs coming into prisons. I am glad about that because it is clear that the more drugs are kept out of prison, the safer prisons, prisoners and prison staff are. Where the issue is difficult—which is where I seek to take a not altogether popular line—is on the matter of visits. While I recognise the importance of security in prisons, I also recognise the importance of visits. The more that visits become the subject of excessive supervision, the harder it is for prisoners to maintain human relationships with people outside prison whom they love and who care for them, such as their family.
I can say something about the interdiction of drugs as we have observed it in prisons. The Prison Service uses closed-circuit television, particularly in visits areas, and passive and active drug dogs. The service also makes extensive use of intelligence in prisons to try to identify and target those who are most likely to bring drugs into a prison. On the other hand, a number of prisons have drug-free areas. Part of the regime for individuals in those areas often involves access to improved family visits, during which the level of supervision might be slightly more relaxed.
I want to question your use of mandatory drug testing figures as an indication of a prison's ethos. The report on Inverness prison states that, on the day on which the snapshot was taken, 20 per cent of prisoners tested positive for drugs. The resulting headlines were that that is worse than the figure for Barlinnie prison, but it is patently obvious to me that Inverness prison is not riddled with drugs. I am aware that a new report on Inverness prison will be produced shortly, and I hope that it will contain a different figure. I question your use of such statistics and the way in which you have used a snapshot to represent the ethos of a prison.
Mr MacCowan will respond to the specific matter of the Inverness report. The report that is quoted is one in which I did not participate.
I realise that.
If Mr MacCowan comments on that point, I will respond to the question on mandatory drug tests and the ways of responding to drug addiction in prison.
The figure that we quoted is not a snapshot of the day or days on which we were at the prison. HMP Inverness's positive random MDT sample figure of 20 per cent was for a reporting year and it was supplied to us by the Scottish Prison Service.
The prison governor called the figure a snapshot when I spoke to him about it. I think he felt that Inverness prison had been unfairly represented by the figure. However, as Dr McLellan said, that report is from a previous year.
Let us keep our questions on this year's report.
Perhaps Dr McLellan could tell us what measures should be used to tackle drug problems using the resources that are currently being used for mandatory drug tests.
On Thursday, I will publish a report on a recent inspection that I have done of Inverness prison. It might well be that there will be further things to talk about after that.
Thank you. That is helpful.
I want to follow up Maureen Macmillan's point about drug testing and the difficulties that it causes in prisons. It strikes me that there will always be a conflict in prisons. The reality is that many of those who are serving sentences are drug addicts and, while they are in prison, many of them manage to address their addiction problems.
May I respond, convener?
As briefly as you can.
That is a powerful argument for MDTs. I do not think that I ever said that MDTs are useless; I think that I questioned the amount of investment that is made in them.
I agree with you on—
Please make your question short. I am worried about members not being called to speak.
What could the Executive do on the issue of throughcare to ensure that inmates who leave prison are able to maintain their drug-free existence?
I am no more of an expert on society's problems than the next person. However, two things that throughcare must provide are somewhere to live and a job. Those are central to throughcare in dealing with addiction issues. I say that not just as a human being, but because prisoners always mention those two things.
I have two brief questions, one of which is on the same theme as Karen Whitefield's questions on drug testing and the availability of drugs. On my last visit to Barlinnie, I asked to see the solitary confinement unit. I spoke to the chap who was there and asked him what he thought about being there. He told me that he preferred to be in solitary confinement because it meant that he was not in the main prison and he could keep drug free. That surprised me. Have you had similar experiences of prisoners being able to keep drug free once they have been on the programmes?
It is true that prisoners sometimes struggle heroically—I do not use that word lightly—to remain drug free in difficult circumstances. The experience that you describe, of someone choosing to be in solitary confinement, does not surprise me. Mr MacCowan will have much more experience of such situations than I do. Prisoners can seek to manipulate the prison rules in order to feel safer, which is a terrific indictment of how they feel elsewhere. Nevertheless, that is something that the prison is right to resist.
In response to Karen Whitefield's question on throughcare, you said that you were no expert. However, you will be aware of the Executive's post-release policy whereby a prisoner has the right to 12 weeks' rehabilitation on release from prison. Have you seen any signs of that programme and how it is working?
Can you explain to me again what the policy involves?
When we spoke to the Minister for Justice about post-release programmes for prisoners, we were told that funding was being made available for a 12-week programme for people who had managed to get drug free while they were in prison. That is the key issue that you addressed in reply to Karen Whitefield's question. When people come out of prison, they go back to the same community and are faced with the same temptation; however, the Executive plans to get prisoners on to a programme for about 12 weeks following their release. I understood that funding was available for that, but you seem not to be aware of it.
Am I looking vague? I have no evidence of that programme; I am sorry.
Pauline McNeill raises an interesting point. You might wish to consider that issue with the Executive.
It is an absolutely central point. I shall be glad to consider it with the Executive.
I will attempt to roll three questions into one, because the convener will not let me back in.
I promise that you will get three answers.
There has been a lot of discussion about throughcare, which I will be at pains not to duplicate, but I want to explore the subject further. First, aside from tackling overcrowding—the impact of which on throughcare you are clear about—what are the two or three simple things that could be done to improve the quality and level of throughcare throughout Scotland?
The answer to the last part is that you need the Scottish Prison Service and you need me. Its job is to say, "Here is what we're doing." My job is to ask, "What good does that do?" Both are important, but it is clear from the terms of my appointment that the chief inspector of prisons—however well or badly he or she does it—has primary responsibility to ask not, "What do they say they are delivering?", but, "What does that actually mean for prisoners on the ground?"
But to return to Jackie Baillie's point, are we too focused on quantitative measures rather than qualitative measures? Are you satisfied with the mechanisms for assessing what happens to prisoners on release, in terms of whether their preparation for release has worked?
No. If you are agreeing with Jackie Baillie, I think that you are both right.
That is unusual, but thank you.
I want to develop the throughcare aspect in relation to chaplaincy and pastoral care, which are important aspects of the rehabilitation and reintegration process. When prisoners are first admitted, what access do they have to chaplaincy and pastoral care at that key point in their prison sentence? We know that people who are not religious in any way often seek out that kind of help and support when they have a crisis in their lives. You also mention in the throughcare section of the report that, for the first time, Low Moss has a throughcare chaplain. Could you expand on what the chaplain does? What kind and what levels of pastoral care are available in each prison? Finally, do you think that the resources are adequate or should more resources be put into that important aspect of throughcare?
I am so pleased to hear that question, as it is on a matter close to my heart. I have been astonished by how much chaplains in prisons are valued by secular authorities and by people who are not concerned with matters that are central to chaplaincy. They still recognise how important chaplains are in helping prisoners to deal with deep issues, particularly around guilt, repentance and forgiveness. Every prisoner has a right to see a chaplain and, in my experience, in almost every prison every prisoner does so as part of the induction process—they have the chance to see a chaplain almost as soon as they come in. In several prisons—most notably in Polmont—governors and prisoners have gone out of their way to say that the role of the chaplain in their prison is central.
What level of pastoral care can be expected in other prisons in Scotland? Is that determined by the number of prisoners or the seriousness of offences committed? How is it all worked out and rationed?
Providing chaplaincy in Scotland's prisons has been the subject of fairly vigorous discussions over the past two or three years between the churches and the Scottish Prison Service. I speak for neither the churches nor the Scottish Prison Service on that matter, but I am glad to say that in the past 10 days, an arrangement has been agreed by the churches and the SPS that will shift the balance towards providing full-time chaplains. There will not be full-time chaplains in every prison; there might be shared arrangements in some of the smaller prisons. Nevertheless, I welcome that move. It seems that prison chaplaincy is so demanding and specialised that it requires people who are able to give it their full attention.
So it is not an area that causes you concern. Do you think that the progress that is being made is adequate?
I did not go quite that far. Current circumstances, whereby some prisons do not have proper chaplaincy arrangements and some have chaplains who have other duties but who do their best, are not adequate. The new arrangements that have just been arrived at in the past 10 days will be adequate. They will show how seriously not only the churches but the SPS take chaplaincy.
So it is a case of so far so good.
The situation will get better.
My question is about staffing. Staffing levels at Inverness are described as a "growing problem" in the annual report. Do you feel that staffing levels are a problem in the prison service as a whole? What impact are staff shortages and absences having on the prison regime?
Staff sickness complicates the issue of staff shortages. In some prisons staffing is under complement, whereas in others it is at the expected level but staff are not there because they are sick. That puts extra pressure on staff. In almost every prison where I have been, when I have met the local branch of the Prison Officers Association Scotland, it has been clear that its members feel strongly the impact of staff shortages.
Does the SPS appreciate that and is it doing something to address the situation?
Over the past year, it has been interesting for me to observe—and no more than that, as it is not my business—increasing conversation and engagement between the various trade unions and the SPS. They have signed up to a partnership agreement, part of which is to seek to reach a common mind on a range of issues in a world in which industrial disharmony has, in the past, been significant. There has been a considerable step forward, in that it has been possible for the SPS and the trade unions to talk to each other. That might lead to their listening to each other as well.
Can I come in on that?
We are very pushed for time. You will be called to speak in a moment or two. Perhaps you can ask your question then.
In your earlier comments, you touched briefly on the issue of escort duty and the fact that it sometimes impacts negatively on the workings of the prisons. How do you feel that the proposed changes to escort duty will impact on the operations of the SPS? Do you think that there will be benefits from the changes? If so, what will those benefits be? Do you anticipate there being any difficulties, especially with regard to how staff feel about the changes?
The escort system will be of significant benefit to prisoners, provided that it is not used simply as a way of cutting staff in every other part of a prison. If, as is planned, the escort system releases prison staff so that they can be prison staff, that will have a significant impact on the matters on which Pauline McNeill engaged with me earlier.
Marlyn Glen has questions on women prisoners and specific issues to do with Aberdeen.
I will ask those questions separately. My first question is on the growing number of women prisoners and the consequent transfer of some women from Cornton Vale to Greenock. I would like you to expand on the suggestions in the report for reducing the number of petty offenders in prisons and on the suggestions that relate to selective early release with electronic monitoring.
I hope that my answer does not sound like a cop-out: the reference to early release of people in Cornton Vale for petty offences comes from one of the first five inspections, which I did not carry out. Although I did not carry out the inspection on Cornton Vale, I have been there many times and have inspected Greenock, where women are also imprisoned. It appears to me—although the statistics are the Scottish Prison Service's business, not mine—that persons are still imprisoned for minor offences, but the number of people who are imprisoned for fine default, as far as I can ascertain, are not as high as I had anticipated. The public concern about the matter has been well ventilated in recent years, and my understanding is that the number imprisoned in Cornton Vale for fine default at any one time will be in single figures.
Do you have concerns about the women prisoners who are housed in Greenock? Is there suitable accommodation for them?
I do not have concerns about them and I believe the accommodation to be suitable. It is attractive to prisoners to be near their families, and when I was in Greenock last, which was about four or five weeks ago, every woman to whom I spoke—which, of course, was not every woman—was pleased to be in Greenock prison. You understand what I mean by that.
You mentioned a 38 per cent overcrowding rate at HMP Aberdeen, which is an unfortunate low point on which to end my questions. Do you consider HMP Aberdeen to be properly resourced? What do you think needs to be done to address the continuing concerns about the prison?
Six weeks ago, I published a follow-up report to the report done by Clive Fairweather on Aberdeen. It will appear in the next annual report, but I am happy to speak about what it says. It acknowledges that Aberdeen has taken considerable steps on two aspects in particular: addressing safety, which is critical to any prison—Aberdeen is clearly a much safer prison than it was a year ago—and providing a drug-free area within the prison, which Karen Whitefield mentioned earlier and which has had a significant effect in giving a number of prisoners an improved morale. There is also no doubt that staff morale in Aberdeen has progressed significantly since the report that is contained in the annual report.
Some of the questions that I was going to ask, such as those on Cornton Vale, have already been answered, so I will ask two others. You talk about assaults in prisons and in your report on HMP Edinburgh you say:
My other question is on something else that you say about HMP Edinburgh in your report:
It is interesting that every question about an individual report has been about a report that I have not done.
I am sorry.
Your first question was about assaults. The report suggests that the number of prison assaults in both Aberdeen and Edinburgh is quite high.
In Inverness prison, there have been none.
It is a nice wee prison.
Are the other prisons any different? I suspect not.
It seems that prison assaults are the result of a combination of different factors. First, overcrowding sometimes plays a part, although Inverness is a highly overcrowded prison. Secondly, the history of a prison plays a part. There is no doubt that different prisons have different cultures. Thirdly, the kind of prisoners who are contained in a prison is immensely significant, and prisons differ greatly because of that. Fourthly, if a large number of people who have been involved in drug feuds outside prison—or who are the brothers of people who have been involved in drug feuds outside prison—find themselves in a prison together, that can have a significant effect.
No.
I am sorry, but I am not able to tell you what the visiting arrangements are in Edinburgh. It would be fair to say that on most matters on which we report—apart from the ones that I really care about, such as overcrowding and slopping out—prisons take very seriously what the inspectors say. I would be surprised if language as strong as that in an HMCIP report had not been acted on. However, prisons can do nothing about overcrowding, as they have to take whomever they are given.
You and I both hope that HMP Edinburgh has done something about that issue.
Can I say something about the visiting arrangements at HMP Edinburgh? I was there a couple of months ago, and the prison is now carrying out some innovative work with visitors. During induction, visitors are given the opportunity to meet prisoners, and members of staff take about half an hour to go through a list of issues, describing some of the rules and regulations in order to allay any fears or problems that families might encounter. The prison has acted on some of the issues that were raised in the report.
Colin Fox has a question about slopping out.
Slopping out is a huge issue, but I suspect that we are running out of time to do it justice. In one of your predecessor's reports, the Executive gave a commitment, or made the suggestion, that it would try to phase out slopping out by 2004-05. Do you believe that the Executive is on target for that and that we will see the end of that disgusting practice by then?
I do not know. The practice has been reduced considerably, but not enough. The difficulty is that, again—how boring I must sound—the issue relates to overcrowding. If a prison is overcrowded, where are the prisoners to be put while the hall is being refurbished? I am in no sense justifying slopping out—I hope that I am not perceived to be an advocate of slopping out. However, that is the practical, technical difficulty. If the prisons are absolutely full, how can the SPS get the plumbers in?
I must say that I was hoping for a bit more optimism. I hoped that you would say that the practice would be phased out by 2004-05. I sat in on the Napier case at the Court of Session—a case in which the Executive was taken to court for abuse of human rights. I am sure that we all agree with the Executive that slopping out is a practice that should be phased out. Is it a particular problem at Barlinnie? Are we likely to see it phased out elsewhere before it is phased out there? Where will be the last wall to fall?
It is a problem in Barlinnie, Perth, Edinburgh, Peterhead and Polmont. However, Peterhead is the only prison in which slopping out happens universally. There is no facility for any access to night sanitation for any prisoner at Peterhead.
Are you satisfied that progress is being made as quickly as it ought to be made?
I do not understand how you could possibly hear in what I have said that I am satisfied that progress is being made as quickly as it could be made. I want the practice to be stopped now.
Maureen, do you want to press your question on women's issues, or has it been answered?
We have talked about Cornton Vale and Greenock, but there are women in local prisons in other parts of Scotland, such as Inverness and Aberdeen. I am concerned that they are being overlooked.
What is your question for Dr McLellan?
Do you think that we should pay more attention to what is happening in those other prisons rather than concentrate on Cornton Vale and Greenock?
That is an important point. I promise the committee that I do not ignore the circumstances of women in Aberdeen, Inverness and Dumfries, where there are small numbers of women prisoners. Small numbers make it difficult to provide the kind of regime that the women need. There are advantages to their being in a local prison, as they are nearer to their family, but there are disadvantages in terms of costs. However, it is important that the women in small, local prisons are treated with justice and fairness. I am very conscious of that.
Dr McLellan, on behalf of the committee I thank you and your colleagues, Mr MacCowan and Dr McAllister, for being with us this afternoon. You have answered our questions fully and the committee has welcomed the opportunity to flesh out the report with your presence here. We appreciate your attendance.
I have found the committee's questions very searching but courteous. Thank you.
We now move into private session for consideration of our draft report on the budget process.
Meeting continued in private until 15:37.