Justice Committee

Meeting date: Tuesday, November 5, 2013

Official Report 487KB pdf

---

Commission on Women Offenders

Item 3 is to hear evidence on the Cabinet Secretary for Justice’s second annual report on the implementation of the recommendations of the commission on women offenders. Obviously, we will also bring budgetary issues into this discussion. I thank the cabinet secretary for staying with us and I welcome to the meeting Jane Moffat, who is the head of the rehabilitation and reintegration unit at the Scottish Government, and Colin McConnell, who is the chief executive of the Scottish Prison Service.

I seek questions from members.

Earlier, we touched on the capital budget implications for the SPS. I would be grateful if we could explore that a bit further and get an update on your plans for better provision for women offenders, with particular reference to what will be the new HMP Inverclyde.

I am happy to take that question. Thank you very much for the opportunity to provide the committee with fuller particulars. First, I make it clear to members that the budget is sufficient to do what we need to do, and that the commitment that I gave when I was last here discussing women in custody remains absolute. The improvements are well on track, the commitments that have been given are on their way to being delivered and, as I have said, we have sufficient resources overall to deliver against the Angiolini recommendations.

As far as HMP Inverclyde is concerned, we are in the process of designing and developing an approach to management of women in custody that will be an exemplar—certainly in the United Kingdom, if not Europe-wide. Whether we are talking about how the resource allocation is used or how we are redesigning our culture and approach, I am very satisfied that we are making good and appropriate progress and that, in due course, we will be able to evidence a fantastic outcome to the committee.

You said that the budget is sufficient and your improvements are well on track, but is HMP Inverclyde going to be delivered on time? When will it open?

It will open in 2017.

When in 2017 will it open? Can you give me a season?

I think that we are probably looking at spring to summer 2017. You will forgive me for not being exact, but planning is not an exact science. As experience of previous builds shows, the weather and other circumstances impact on plans, but I think that in summer 2017 we will have a fantastic facility at Inverclyde.

So, timescales have slipped a bit. This time last year, you said that you were confident that you could commission, design and build Inverclyde by the end of 2016.

12:00

Instead of saying that timescales have slipped, I would say that things have been reconfigured or rescheduled. We are learning more and more along the way and, of course, financial allocations have an impact. We have to look at Inverclyde in the context of the other 14 public sector prisons that we currently run, and we want the most decent facilities that we can have throughout the estate. On balance, given everything that we are doing and everything that we operate—indeed, you have just taken evidence from our partners in the community—getting a good and properly designed facility up and running by summer 2017 is an achievable and desirable aim that we can meet.

I will pursue that a little bit further. I note your comment that you have “reconfigured or rescheduled” because of budgets. Has there been a budget implication from what has happened.

Sure.

Perhaps, then, the budget is not sufficient, as you have suggested it is, if you have had to push Inverclyde back.

When we first met you 18 months or so ago, among the issues that arose were the lack of prioritisation of women’s prisons and the fact that capital resources were going into the male prison estate. Have you started to take the foot off the pedal a little bit in that respect? After all, you have just said that you have other resources that you need to support. Have you started to reallocate some of your funding?

Absolutely. You might want to explore this with me further; we are involved in the conceptualisation, design and early planning of not just Inverclyde but a new regional facility in Edinburgh, which Dame Elish Angiolini also recommended. At the same time, there is a far-reaching development programme at HMP Cornton Vale. I am pleased to respond to the question by making it clear that there has been absolutely no easing of our pressure on the accelerator pedal. That has been possible through shrewd and good management of our resources—the implication of which is that we have been reallocating and expropriating our resources towards women in custody.

I want to ask about the upgrading of Cornton Vale’s current facilities; the remand unit there has been a source of concern. Is it now fit for purpose?

Yes. Is the prison wholly fit for purpose at this stage? No—but we are getting there. That work is, of course, just part of an on-going refurbishment programme of all the living accommodation, which has already improved the prison’s facilities, including for the first time the establishment of a family centre and help hub, which Dame Elish Angiolini opened. We are just about to launch an improvement to the entry facilities, and the establishment now has video-contact facilities.

On the previous question about whether we are taking our foot off the pedal in our commitment to women, I have to say that we are absolutely not doing that. Those who have not recently had the opportunity to visit Cornton Vale should do so, because they will see a very different facility.

I welcome the establishment of the family centre. I assume that that will mean that prisoners will now be able to spend quality time with children, given that concerns were raised in various reports about offenders’ children growing up to be offenders.

One of Cornton Vale’s strengths, which because of all the negatives never quite got into the public consciousness, was the view that was taken there that women in custody who have children need that contact. The prison already had a good approach to keeping children in contact with their mothers; on top of that, we have been able not only to develop the prison’s excellent facility but, through the family centre and help hub, to transform women’s capacity to remain in contact with their young children.

I think that what was at issue was the amount of quality time, but I will not dwell on that.

I want to ask specifically about remand. It has been said that if such facilities had existed in Barlinnie there would have been a rooftop protest. Has that been addressed?

Yes it has. Ninety-two women are currently on remand in our system. I am pleased to say that, without doubt, facilities all round have improved, although of course I would prefer that there were not 92 women on remand. When you get the chance to go back to Cornton Vale, you will see a culture change, in that the women are looked at as individuals, rather than as a homogeneous group. Their needs are addressed in that way. Our regime is more flexible and sensitised towards meeting the needs of those of who are on remand and those who are serving sentences.

My question was specifically about the estate.

With all due respect, I say that I thought that I had answered it.

Women are being treated as individuals and there may be services that they can access, but the problem was a physical one—even of there being insufficient toilets. Has all that been addressed?

That has been addressed.

Cabinet secretary, how are mental health issues being addressed, given that mental ill health is such a huge problem among offenders in prison?

We have set up a variety of projects, through which we are examining different approaches to assisting women offenders who have mental health problems. Concept tests help us to see how specific methods can be helpful. Small-scale tests are run in criminal justice settings, which develop an evidence base about what works and how to implement change. Through those projects we are committed to sharing learning across Scotland in the arenas of criminal justice, mental health and substance abuse, which all interact.

That comes back to Colin McConnell’s point about looking at and dealing with the individual, working out what their problems are and giving them support, which is what we do with partner agencies in criminal justice, social work, the national health service and third sector agencies that deal with addiction and substance abuse.

Earlier, concern was expressed about throughcare and the ability to provide a comprehensive mental health service for women who are released from prison. Will you comment on that?

We are looking to work on that. Scottish prison healthcare has transferred to the NHS, which is intended to allow us to break from what might have been a logjam of people trying to access services on leaving prison. It is work in progress that is about getting health boards to take responsibility; in the main, they are doing so. Issues are being worked through as we see the transition from the Scottish Prison Service health service to the NHS.

A very small percentage of prisoners have mental health problems that are so severe that there is a question about whether prison staff can deal adequately with them. There is no equivalent of Carstairs for women prisoners. Has the Scottish Government looked at that?

A person who is unfit to plead would not be sent to a Scottish prison; arrangements would have to be made for them to be dealt with, in Scotland or elsewhere. People who are capable of pleading and are convicted or remanded but have additional mental health issues that are not factors in their capacity—I think that this is the point that you make—must be dealt with in prison because that is what the courts have imposed on them, usually with good reason. Staff do an outstanding job and try to work with the NHS.

That comes back to why we mainstreamed the SPS health service into the NHS, which was so that we could deal with issues for which we need the totality of the NHS. It is very difficult, because such people have challenging issues, but to prison they have been sent, so prison is required to accept them. It cannot turn them away. Prison staff and people from the NHS do what they can to work with such prisoners.

I will build on the cabinet secretary’s answer. This is in part about how we address the cultural approach in Cornton Vale. I would like to give two examples of how we are improving the situation.

Margaret Mitchell asked about the staff approach to managing women in custody—in particular, those who present mental health difficulties. I am pleased to be able to respond that we have considered in detail the professionalisation of our staff—we will talk more about that in due course—in particular in terms of the gender-specific training that we are about to provide for our staff who work with women.

I will quote so that I do not miss any of the detail. We are improving our

“training on mental health, trauma, mentalisation and borderline personality disorders”.

That is not to turn our staff into mental health nurses. That is a level of professionalisation and qualification that we could never reach and which, of course, our NHS colleagues provide. However, we can build in a foundation of receptiveness to the condition and some of the presenting behaviours and thereby help our staff to work better with women as agents, if you like, who link to the other facilities and professionals that can be brought to bear.

In looking ahead and building on that work, we are totally revising the approach to training all our future prison officers who will work with women in custody. By the summer of 2014, a completely revised training approach will have been implemented.

A lot of work that is specifically designed to address the concerns that Margaret Mitchell raised is under way.

Let us hope that that pans out because, as we all know, mental ill health is a huge issue in prison.

You probably do not have the information, cabinet secretary, but you said that if a person does not have the capacity to plead, they are sent to some other facility. How many women might that affect? Is it one or two? You might not know.

We do not have that information.

It would be useful to know, when there is not an appropriate facility in Scotland, where women are sent and cared for.

I can think of one prisoner who has gone to Rampton secure hospital. There are arrangements with other jurisdictions.

I just wanted clarification on that point.

Elaine Murray will ask a question on remand. Alison, what is your question on?

It is about mental health.

We will take the mental health question first.

I have been back to Cornton Vale to see the improvements, which I acknowledge and welcome, but there is still some way to go, especially in management of mental ill health. I appreciate what Colin McConnell said. I visited the unit that replaced the back cells. I do not know what the most up-to-date euphemism for it is. Is it management suite or isolation unit?

It is the intensive management support suite.

There is still very heavy dependence on putting people into isolation for what I fear are sustained periods, which raises human rights issues. Although I recognise why a woman might be put into such isolation—because there are profound issues of self-harming, for instance—I want to know what further thinking the service is doing and what the cabinet secretary thinks about the longer-term future for managing such women.

I share your views entirely. I would much prefer that we did not have women in custody who display those behaviours or about whom we have such concerns, but we do. We need to protect them, protect others and try to provide for them a reasonable environment in which other interventions can take place.

I was in Cornton Vale about three weeks ago and visited the intensive management support suite. There is undoubtedly a small number of women—particularly young women—who are extraordinarily distressed. It plucks the heartstrings, as well as raising professional concerns, that women find themselves in such condition, but they do.

However, in the Scottish Prison Service, we are absolutely committed to considering women in custody—everybody who is in custody, in fact—as individuals and to working in as joined-up a way as possible with our professional colleagues elsewhere. It is not about the Prison Service being able to do everything. We act as facilitator, gateway, conduit and advocate to ensure that everybody in our care, whether they are suffering from mental health issues or not, gets the appropriate level of care brought to them.

12:15

At what point does isolation compound the problem?

The governors, staff and I are very much aware of that issue. We take professional advice from our colleagues in the NHS who work in clinical psychology and psychiatry services, and from people in the third and not-for-profit sectors, who provide general support and counselling. A wide range of professionals and other interested parties are brought to bear in those circumstances. We try, through case management and reviews, to plot the best way forward in the circumstances for those individuals.

Will you give in writing to the committee the figures on the number of young women who are in isolation and how long they spend at any one time in isolation?

I would be very happy to do that.

I have a question about remand but, before I ask it, I want to mention my visit to Cornton Vale during the summer. There has been a fair amount of investment in that part of the prison estate. What is its future post 2017, when the new facilities are opened?

Our current position is that we will close Cornton Vale as we commission the facilities at Inverclyde and Edinburgh. However, as the saying goes, a lot of water must flow under the bridge between now and then, and we will keep that plan under review as the months and years roll by.

It seems a lot of money to have been invested in Cornton Vale for no other use to be found for it.

I take your point. We are spending a significant amount of resource in upgrading Cornton Vale but rightly so. We all accepted—no matter the means by which we got there—that it was simply not acceptable to sustain Cornton Vale in the way that it was. The new facilities will open in 2017, so it is only right that those who pass into our care have reasonable living circumstances between now and then.

I will come to my point about remand. Colin McConnell mentioned that 92 women are on remand, and the previous panel advised us that the average daily remand population of women is 107, most of whom are not then given a custodial sentence. Many of those women are on remand—they may be subject to bail supervision—because they have not been able to engage with whoever they must engage with as a consequence of their chaotic lifestyle.

Is there no better possible option for those women? Should they not be dealt with differently or otherwise supported so that, rather than be put into expensive prison accommodation, they are assisted in the community? Tom Halpin suggested that, for an investment of £500,000, supported accommodation could be provided that would enable those women to engage better and might prevent further offending.

Some of the planned services that have come out of the reducing reoffending change fund have specific plans to enhance provision of bail supervision—not all have such plans, but each proposal has been made by local bodies to reflect their priorities. In addition, funding is provided to local authorities via the CJA grant allocation for the provision of both bail supervision and information services, and local authorities are free to allocate that funding as they wish.

We will be looking to learn from what is working. How we do things in more rural or isolated areas must be different from city conurbations where there is a critical mass, and, to some extent, we will be looking to work out what works with each individual. That takes us back to Colin McConnell’s point that, in dealing with the individual, we must look at what is driving the issues. The purpose of the community justice centres is to bring together housing, social work, mental health and addiction services, so that the treatment, support and assistance required by the individual is available. Each one will have different needs and wants.

Are specific initiatives aimed at reducing the numbers of women on remand—particularly those who will not serve a prison sentence anyway? Is any such action being taken?

That is part of what we are doing with the reducing reoffending change fund and, for example, through the shine mentoring project. We are conscious that an aspect of work is mentoring and peer support, which is why Tom Halpin and Sacro are working—and doing a remarkably good job—on that.

We are trying to reduce the number of remands and to stabilise people as well as trying to reduce reoffending among people coming out of the prison estate; indeed, we have already discussed a number of such issues with regard to prisons. Obviously, we would prefer it if those individuals did not go into prison in the first place—and perhaps we might be able to provide greater assurance to the judiciary that they can be dealt with in the community—but there are still cases, apocryphal or whatever, of people being remanded to the care of the Scottish Prison Service for their own safety and wellbeing.

We are looking to work with the judiciary to ensure that it realises that remanding people is not the best or kindest thing to do. I have no doubt that, in those cases, it is done out of goodness rather than out of malice, but we need to make it clear that other facilities will be available and that judges do not have to resort to remand and all the medication, addiction, housing and other issues that follow and the difficulties that the Prison Service has to cope with.

In short, we are taking a multi-agency approach, working with the judiciary and ensuring that support facilities are available in the community.

How good is your communication to the judiciary about alternatives to remand or, indeed, alternatives to custody? I remember hearing at a Justice Committee meeting years ago that sheriffs might have been unaware of other alternatives that were available when they were making their decisions. How up-to-date is that communication to sheriffs, and can it be improved to ensure that there is no disconnect?

There are two points to make in response to that question. First, Sheriff Welsh and his colleagues at the Judicial Institute for Scotland are doing a remarkably good job not just in training those who are going to sit on the bench but in providing continuous professional development. Their outstanding and challenging work is helping those who might not have lawyers’ experience of individual psychology to understand why people act in a certain manner and what will work with them.

Equally, a lot of these matters have to be dealt with more locally and, in that respect, we look to the engagement of CJAs and sheriffs principal. After all, the clear lesson that emerged from the McLeish and Angiolini commissions was that things work remarkably well where there is a good relationship between the judiciary and criminal justice social work. Of course, some of that might come down to personalities, but we are trying to look at what works in certain areas and why it works.

Indeed, with regard to templates, I remember Lesley Riddoch going on about the benefits of what was happening in Falkirk. There was clearly a good relationship between Sheriff Caldwell and the criminal social work department, with one feeling that it could phone the other, ask what was available and seek support.

Of course, some of that work cannot be legislated for or directed by the Government, but we can encourage good practice, see where such co-operation exists—where, for example, one side feels that it can say to the other, “We’ve got someone and we need to do something with them. How can you help us?”—and roll that out across Scotland. However, it has to be a two-way process.

What I am trying to get at is whether things are improving. After all, we have been here before. Sheriffs were sitting, not knowing what was available in practice or whether, for example, someone had a house to go to or what support was available when they got out.

That is why we have put these things in place. I have certainly heard the same anecdotal evidence of sheriffs wanting to send people to the 218 centre, and we know that that works. In fact, we have taken what has worked best in that instance, which is getting people together, and replicated it in Edinburgh, Dundee and Aberdeen as well as in Angus and Fife, where the towns are smaller and the area to be covered is wider. The issue is being dealt with in different ways, but we are trying to ensure that we provide the template that we know a lot of sheriffs want access to.

Of course, the issue is not only the cost of remand but the fact that it is detrimental to the person, is counterproductive and only makes matters worse, along with all the cost implications of those effects. The committee will be looking for improvements in that respect: a reduction, if possible, in the use of remand and moves to maintain people in the community, with all the savings that that would incur and all the benefits for the person in question.

Is this just about budgets? Do local authorities simply not want to take on the cost of providing accommodation or the service, and are they leaving it to the Prison Service to carry those costs? Might silo budgets be an issue?

There will be a variety of factors. For some, it might be a lack of awareness or understanding of what is available, and for others it might be particular access issues. As I mentioned, some sheriffs have said to me that they would have welcomed the ability to send somebody to a facility such as the 218 centre, but they did not have one in their locality. We are therefore trying to address the issue: some of it is about knowledge raising, some is about ensuring that the judiciary and social work interact, and some is about making sure that the facilities are there.

It is not always a matter of building new centres, and the other things that we are rolling out are not residential per se. Keeping somebody in their own home and providing some support for them in their community is often the right thing to do. The centres that we have rolled out in the large urban areas are predicated on that, and there are slightly different styles—if I can put it in that way—in areas that do not have the same critical mass of population.

So it is not a question of local authorities protecting their budgets and saying, “We don’t want to take this, as it’s costly.” I am glad that they are not being unco-operative—let me put it like that—with the judiciary. Are you saying that there is no issue here?

There is no issue that I am aware of.

The panel are all shaking their heads.

Typically, the decision to remand someone is made by a sentencer, so there is often no conversation before the decision is made. What the cabinet secretary is saying is that, anecdotally, we know that a lot of sentencers want to have confidence that there are robust alternatives to remand, particularly—

I understand that. The point that has been made is that the robust alternatives are perhaps not on offer because certain budgets are being protected, but you are saying that that is not an issue.

It is not. However, part of what we are trying to do through the centres and the change fund is to increase the availability and consistency of that provision.

That is fine. You have settled my query about that. We will now have questions from Sandra White.

Cabinet secretary, I welcome the extra £3 million that you announced today to help women offenders in prison. I do not know whether anyone has done that yet.

You have probably already answered the question that I wanted to ask. You mentioned the creation of women’s justice centres in Glasgow, Dundee, Edinburgh and Aberdeen, which was recommended by the Angiolini commission. The convener talked about remand prisoners, and you mentioned the involvement of the justice system in that. We are talking about a one-stop-shop model in those cities. Does that relate to what Ms Moffat said about sheriffs knowing that there is an alternative? What is envisaged and which agencies will be involved?

The cabinet secretary also touched on the other eight projects, which include smaller projects in Angus and so on. Will you expand on them and say what they will offer?

I add that Mr McConnell and the Scottish Prison Service are doing an excellent job. Having visited Cornton Vale and other prisons and seen the changes, I think that there is great dedication to making things much better for women in the criminal justice system. I just wanted to put that on the record.

I think that you are now on the Christmas card list.

I will admit that I am very impressed by the work that is going on.

You are now obliged to send a Christmas card, Mr McConnell—I hope you understand that. We will give you the address later.

It is being written as we speak.

Dame Elish and her commission gave us a clear blueprint for how we should optimise the configuration of services in the community—namely that the women should be put at the centre and the agencies should come together, coalesce around them and provide a holistic approach. It is fair to say that we have got that work under way.

The centres that the cabinet secretary mentioned in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Dundee and Aberdeen will all have slightly different approaches in the short term, but ultimately they are all aiming to get to the same place, where we have all the multidisciplinary partners that we need in order to get the best possible outcomes for women. That will include colleagues from the Scottish Prison Service at some point, because we understand that, in order to truly crack the nut of throughcare, we need to ensure that everyone who is involved, in all parts of the system and all the way round, is involved in the throughcare.

We know that women and indeed others go round and round the system a number of times until they are ready to make the sometimes very difficult change that will ultimately result in them reducing their reoffending and perhaps leading a life free of crime. Initially, the partners will be the traditional ones that you would envisage, such as criminal justice social workers, third sector partners, health workers and addiction workers, but ultimately we aim to involve procurators fiscal, police colleagues, Prison Service colleagues, housing colleagues and anyone else who has an interest in ensuring that we can help women to turn their lives around.

Right. That issue seems to be dealt with.

12:30

I have a question for Mr McConnell and a couple for the cabinet secretary.

Mr McConnell, can you give us an update on the issue of developing induction packages for staff who deal with women offenders? I am particularly interested in the phrase in the paper that I have here: it is anticipated

“that training will also be extended to existing staff.”

Is there a shortfall in the training that existing staff have?

We recognise that our population is diverse and not a homogeneous group. As we learn more about how to work individually with women who pass into care, we are understanding that our staff need to be trained and developed in a number of approaches and techniques aimed at particular groups and populations—a similar project is under way with the young men at Polmont. The approach in future will be what other industries perhaps have, which is to have general training that is developed as staff move around and work with different populations.

That work is under way. Its leading edge is with the women at Cornton Vale and the thinking that is coming out of the Inverclyde and Edinburgh projects. It is also being informed by great work that is coming up on the rails: Education Scotland and the Prison Service’s developments for a secure college at Polmont. All that will inform richness in the development and training of prison staff.

Thank you.

Cabinet secretary, I welcome your report and the additional money, as my colleague Sandra White did. In the section of the report on examining universal public service involvement in offender reintegration, you state that you have started a ministerial group. Is that a time-limited group?

The group is about convening all my colleagues who share the issues under my auspices to drive things forward. We have been bringing together not just ministers who have portfolio responsibilities on housing, employment, health and local government, but other people. We have heard from those who are at the coalface, so to speak—in prison.

We are co-operating and have had our first meeting. The remaining meetings will be themed around matters that we think will provide the necessary direction. That is where we are at. I cannot give you the precise date on which we will conclude, but the group is meant to be a short way to look at and address the issue.

To what end?

The end is to make sure that we do at governmental level what we seek to do at coalface level. Those of us who have a ministerial responsibility have an obligation to ensure that when health is speaking to local government, the Prison Service or other agencies, we do that at ministerial level, too, so that things do not fall between two stools. Local government and health should be joined up with justice.

It is also a matter of driving home the message that the solution to many of the problems that we face cannot be dealt with solely by law enforcement. Some people are career criminals and, when they commit an offence, the only solution is for the police, prosecutors, courts and the Prison Service to deal with it. As you will know, Mr Finnie, from your life and work experience, there are others for whom invariably the solution lies not with the default option of the police or ultimately the Prison Service, but actually in education, health and housing. We are trying to get a governmental joined-up position so that we can parse the problem and drill down to get a solution at the coalface.

In relation to your announcement and the welcome additional money, you referred to four city centres and seven other areas. I will be parochial for a minute. I represent Highlands and Islands, which is a very large geographic area. You used the term “critical mass” earlier. Highlands and Islands is a geographic critical mass and sadly we have women offenders there. Outreach services—in Angus, for instance—have been mentioned. What assurance can you give that the Highlands and Islands and other areas will not miss out on the additional benefits that will accrue elsewhere?

We are working with colleagues in the Highland area. They were not ready to submit their bid under the timetable for the first tranche of money, but we expect a bid from them in December, which will be aimed at augmenting services for women in that area.

That is reassuring.

I would like a bit more information about the pilots of problem-solving courts, which are proposed to get under way in December. What matters will go before those courts? How will the courts work in practice?

We will trial the approach in sheriff summary courts, which will limit the offences that might be dealt with, as they will not deal with solemn matters. We cannot predict what offences will be dealt with until the proposals have been submitted.

CJAs have been invited to submit proposals on the basis of their in-depth knowledge of local issues and discussions with local judiciary. We will simply set targets and criteria to ensure that the right category of offender is involved, in areas where there are gaps in service provision and in courts that have the capacity and motivation to adopt the problem-solving approach.

We hope to press on as soon as possible, but we seek to get partners round the table, to ensure that the right members of the judiciary are presiding and that appropriate matters go before them—that requires the police and the prosecution to be tied in. We should have the appropriate systems in court when a sentencer deals with a case, so that things are dealt with quickly and—in the main—go back to the same sentencer. As Ms Moffat and others have said, that sentencer may have access to and knowledge of what is available to solve the problem.

For how long will the pilot schemes run before they are evaluated?

The evaluation will be on-going—we will suck it and see.

I am not looking at anybody, because we are—apparently—at the end of the questions. I thank the cabinet secretary, Mr McConnell and Ms Moffat for their evidence.