Salisbury Democracy Alliance

Tag: prisons

  • Democracy Café

    December 2024

    The question ‘Why don’t socially progressive politics get more traction in the UK?’ with an added thought that could the UK turn into a fascist state? won the vote today. In explaining the topic it was asked why people and the planet don’t matter more than profit? Isn’t what matters is the whole of society not just a select few? Wealth concentration seems just to benefit a minority. The notion of ‘trickle down’ has not worked: inequality has increased year by year.

    One reason is that the wealthy have the ear of government. They are able to stir up fears of progressive policies. Remember the fuss around minimum pay? There was a dangerous combination of power and vested interests. An example might be farmers who have protested a lot recently concerning government plans to widen the scope of the capital gains tax. They own 40% of the land yet contribute only 0.6% to the national income.

    Labour won a big majority in the recent general election yet how progressive are they in fact? The plain fact is that the Tories keep winning and have been in existence for 2 centuries. Labour had to water down their policies to enable them to win it was claimed. They had ‘caged themselves in’ it was said. Politicians played to the media. It was politicians who dominated the airwaves. Rory Stewart’s book was mentioned and his unsuccessful attempts to improve policy making.

    Was it another example of media power. A handful of wealthy owned much of the print and online outlets and sites. Oligarchs were not known to be fans of progressive policies and their publications echoed that. It was claimed that the civil service were ‘not keeping up with the times’ and that ministers could not rely on the successful implementation of policies. A remark very similar to those made by the Prime Minister recently in his ‘managed decline’ speech. However, it was easy to blame the service someone said but were we clear about its value?

    An anomaly was the court system which was clearly falling apart. People are waiting years for justice and cases are abandoned because of the lapse of time. The courts are there to protect the establishment yet they are failing. The judges are a powerful component of the elite yet they have not been able to improve matters.

    Was tax an issue? People clearly want the NHS to be fixed, to get dental care and the potholes to be filled in but they do not want to pay higher taxes. Any politician saying ‘I will do these things but I’m going to put 2p on your income tax’ is unlikely to get voted in. The problem was that people who were already poor would resent paying more. The question was how to tackle the wealth issue and the idea of a maximum income. An aspect of this topic was that the wealthy do not use buses for example and therefore have little interest in their provision or efficiency. (Mrs Thatcher famously never used a bus). Cutting public spending was popular and the president of Argentina Javier Milei was quoted as being an enthusiastic cutter of public spending. (Argentina does have massive economic problems and one of the highest inflation rates in the world. Strange to think as an aside that the country was once tipped to become one of the wealthiest in the world. The name derives from the Spanish word for silver which was found in abundance by the colonists). Back to the plot …

    ‘The message of the rich is always in the ascendant’

    We talk of ‘trickle down’ it was noted but what about ‘trickle up’? It was about the distribution of wealth. Currently, considerable wealth was in very few hands and much of it was invested or went overseas rather than spent. If wealth was better distributed then more of it would be spent thus increasing the size of the economy. Perhaps, sardonically, it was noted that ‘trickle down’ obeys the law of gravity whereas ‘trickle up’ requires a revolution. Well, maybe not so sardonic. The message of the rich is always in ascendant. The same speaker spoke favourably of Marxism.

    The tax point was taken up and the fact that economics was not taught in schools – a point discussed at previous meetings. We needed a more literate society in these matters. There was a need for both economics and politics to be taught. The problem with the latter is that politicians were fearful of ‘lefty’ teachers indoctrinating children – a ghastly thought.

    Scandinavia was mentioned as a society which was more egalitarian and where there was high levels of tax to pay for welfare. Finland was the country with the happiest citizens.

    We got onto neoliberalism and the history of the project. It started in the University of Chicago with the ‘Chicago Boys’ and their first ‘experiment’ was Chile where a revolution was instigated by the CIA to oust President Allende and install President Pinochet. It was all about a small state, low taxes and free market ideas. The UK was next under Mrs Thatcher and it spread thence to the USA. The UK was little more than a vassal state to the US it was claimed yet it was something which seldom appeared in the media.

    There was a brief diversion discussing Syria (Assad had been deposed this week and it was the main feature of news programmes).

    Finally, the protests in Westminster by farmers protesting about CGT. It was noted that despite blocking chunks of the capital with tractors and disrupting traffic, no one was arrested. Contrast with climate protestors some of whom are in prison. Yet no outrage in the media about the disruption. Odd that. Who’s interests are being protected someone asked?

    A concluding remark was to say that complex problems are reduced to binary issues. Then to demonise one part (immigrants for example or the ‘workshy’). We were left with the original question – where is the compelling narrative from progressive politics? This perhaps was a clue to the problem. Society is complex and the problems are complex also. Solutions had to be nuanced and were unlikely to be simple let alone able to fit the binary narrative. This made ‘selling’ them to the electorate challenging.

    The second half debate was on prisons and the question was ‘Why do we go on locking up more and more people and for longer?’ Prisons, and prison overcrowding, are much in the news presently and the new government was forced to release many prisoners early to find space. Is sending people to prison a deterrent? Someone who visits prisons said research has shown that it doesn’t work. By this we meant that the recidivism rate was extremely high. Many came out with crime skills enhanced rather than reduced by better behaviour.

    Politicians like Ken Clark and Rory Stewart were mentioned along with David Gauke and Lord Timpson all of whom in different ways have realised that the system is ‘broken’ and we cannot go on simply stuffing more and more people into already overcrowded gaols. Attempts to reform the system have quickly failed because of various prime minister’s fears of public reactions. This was summarised by the phrase ‘tough on crime’ and all politicians are nervous that any reform will dent their reputation for toughness. The public are fearful someone said (of criminals I assume they meant) and this was driving a lot of media hostility.

    There were good ideas and Lord Timspon, the Minister of State for prisons, was a hopeful appointment. His firm appointed many ex-offenders in their shops we were reminded.

    The current 2024 Reith lectures were mentioned as they discussed aspects of this problem and in particular the issue of evil. It was argued that therapy could change people. People have to want to see changes it was said (quoting Lord Timpson). Some US states – including some Republican ones – were adopting these principles. If the prevailing view however, was ‘lock ’em up’ then change was unlikely: actually, not ‘unlikely’, it won’t happen. If you dehumanise people in prisons (and many were infested and there were two prisoners in each cell in many cases), it was no surprise they came out worse.

    We were fortunate to hear from someone who works with sex offenders coming out of prison. Most had made up their minds not to reoffend. Their work was to help them stay away from reoffending by offering them help and support. They would like some of the experiences fed back to influence policy. It was noted (and almost passed unnoticed) that this work was being done by volunteers. The inference being (I am suggesting) that this should be an organised programme of activity, not something that depends on a small charity which has to scramble for funds to survive. We were reminded that many in prison had emotional problems, were abused as children and literacy rates were low.

    Perhaps we should try the Socratic method it was suggested. Ask the prisoners: is it doing you any good?

    The discussion moved to causes. In a sense, imprisoning people is the end of the line of society breakdown. If inequality is rising and people are living in poverty there is a tendency to criminalise social conditions. We need to explore the underlying causes not endlessly talk about symptoms. If you reduced the ‘input stream’ as it was expressed, you reduced the ‘outputs’ of criminality.

    There was a problem however. The discussion was focused on rational argument. The assumption being that by establishing facts and finding out what worked, policy could be changed for the better. As already noted, some ministers have tried this and come unstuck, as in sacked. Prison policy was fixed on emotional reactions and, as someone said, vengeance.

    It was noted that when John Glen first became MP, he was asked about voting for prisoners in their final year or two of their sentence, say. He did not agree with this. David Cameron, the then Prime Minister, said ‘it made him sick’. It was subject to a long-standing row with the EU.

    Finally, religion made its entrance and Old Testament beliefs. There was the doctrine of original sin although this was a late addition to the Christian faith. The Quakers were in the forefront of prison reform and the Methodists were active in the anti-slavery movement.

    These were two good debates and it was interesting that a key element in both was the issue of how the media treated the various topics. Whether it was around how society is run or the reform of the prison system, if people are bombarded by negative attitudes, if argument is reduced to simplistic notions and the owners of newspapers and social media sites can exert such power, change will be difficult to achieve.

    [Added 6 January 2025] On the question of tax, the following link was suggested https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/

    Peter Curbishley

    Next meeting on Saturday 11th January 2025. Seasons greetings to all our readers!

    Latest posts:

  • Democracy Café: July

    July 2024

    This was the first café after the recent general election so the question of how representative the voting was and whether democracy was working as it should was a key topic. The first question to be discussed however, concerned prisons: what do we want them to do and how effective is the penal system anyway? This arose because the incoming Labour government has inherited a fearful mess with prisons full and the system at crisis point.

    The first point to be made by someone who regularly visits a prison is that they were pleased the new minister had grasped the issue and in the circumstances, early release was probably the only option to ease the crisis. We were locked into the process of sending more and more people to prison and once there, there was violence, bullying and drugs – mainly spice. The staff were mostly young and inexperienced. Very little was done to prepare inmates for their release back into society.

    It was noted that we locked up more people than other European countries and in this connection, the Netherlands were mentioned who were actually selling off some of their prisons. The appointment of James Timpson as prisons minister was very much welcomed. He had said that one third of those who are in prison should be there, one third not there at all and one third needed rehabilitation.

    It was noted that we do not have the correct balance between punishment and rehabilitation. The emphasis, post Tony Blair’s time, was on punishment. The point was made that the problem was much bigger than the prison system itself and we had to accept that many of the public wanted punishment – indeed they were ‘hell bent’ on it.

    Echoing what was said earlier, once they were inside, there was nothing for them to do and precious little help on offer when they came out. It was small wonder recidivism was so high. Another problem was there was no government focus with several departments involved but which were not coordinated. Someone who visits Erlestoke prison, said it was far from being a ‘holiday camp’ and said it was the loss of liberty in every sense and having to wait long periods for medication and even post. Michael Gove was quoted as saying that the deprivation of liberty was the starting point although I was unable to source this. I did come across several speeches by Gove however in which he emphasises redemption and returning people to useful lives after release.

    Rory Stewart’s book was mentioned who had been a prison’s minister and how difficult he found making changes to the system. He spoke of the terrible conditions and infestation in some of our prisons so it is hardly surprising that people are brutalised. [This book is a must read for those interested in how government works].

    One issue that determines policy and leads people to be keen on prisons is that it acts as a deterrent. However, it was noted that those who commit crimes – at the moment of their criminality – do not think of being caught or life behind bars as a result. [The speaker might have noted they were not too far wrong since detection rates are very small and most crime goes undetected]. Solving crime was therefore important if prison was to be a deterrent.

    Someone said that right wing governments had a predilection for punishment whereas left wing governments were more about solving the problems. Since we now have a Labour government perhaps we could be optimistic. However, as someone has already noted, the Blair government was keen on locking people up so that theory may not hold. Indeed, it was suggested we may be risking getting a rather ‘rosy’ view now we had a Labour government. It was a political hot potato and we still have right wing papers keen on prison and the Reform party which is likely to have a very hard line on penal policy (one of its members was quoted saying ‘bring back the noose’). Many people thought that life in prison was far from the fearful experience we perhaps thought it was a ‘cushy number’, ‘a holiday’ and they had television as well.

    This prompted the question why so many in the public were so keen on punishment. Was it a cultural thing? It was surprising since we have the Howard League for Penal Reform which has successfully campaigned for a century and a half for a more humane and efficient system. Yet many people (and politicians) were stuck in the mentality of more and more people being locked up. We were reminded that not so long ago there was another period of crisis and soul searching about the prison system: the population then was 40,000! Now is over double that.

    One member said he had just spent some time in Asia and visited village communities whilst there. There we no police and they policed themselves. If there was crime of some sort, the elders would dispense justice. He noted that on a bus in parts of Asia, people will offer food to you, something unknown in the UK although sharing a hamburger might be a trifle difficult. He suggested we now have a ‘me’ based culture as opposed to a ‘we’ based one. This made it easier to ignore issues, such as child poverty, and to abdicate responsibility.

    One comment was that people could not imagine what a difference would be like. This was in connection with child poverty and drug abuse. I think the point was that change was difficult if people could not be persuaded that it would bring a better world. Change did happen we were reminded for example we no longer imprisoned children and we don’t punish homosexuals. The play The Mousetrap was based on a real life child abuse case.

    One member said they had taken a 12 year old around Shepton Mallet prison which was now closed but had re-opened to enable people to experience what prison was like. The child had come out shocked by the experience.

    Almost to sum up, it was noted that the whole question of prisons was too toxic a problem for politicians which meant they could not handle it. Was it in fact an opportunity for a citizen’s assembly? This would bring in views from a wide spectrum of people and experts. One did demure however suggesting that the national nature of the problem might make that difficult.

    The question of whether there was a select committee of any kind for prison reform was in existence (there is)?

    An interesting debate and in researching references for things said during our debate, it was noticeable that there are reformers and a realisation among some of the political class that the system is not fit for purpose and is in need of reform. Yet somehow it never goes anywhere and seems just too toxic, as someone said, for reform actually to take place. An answer might be the widespread belief that prisons are holiday camps a view supported by some of our media.

    It was perhaps no surprise that coming only a week after the general election, the question of our democracy and how it works was suggested for debate. There were three topics: do we need to reform the electoral process; did democracy deliver (in the election)? and what to do about Reform and civilising political discourse. It was noted straight away that the Labour party had two thirds of the seats in parliament but only one third of the vote. Also, only 60% voted it was said although the figure appears to be 52%. Reform received 14% of the vote but got only 5 seats whereas the LibDems did only slightly better but were rewarded with 72 seats. It meant that many did not get what they wanted although it was noted that many voted tactically mostly with the aim of removing the Tories from power.

    There was discussion around this and the difference between seats and vote share – considerable in this parliament. It is likely that Reform will argue during this parliament for a fairer system since the current one does not reflect the wishes of the electorate. It is likely that other parties including the LibDems and the Greens will push for some kind of system of proportional representation. There were many in the Labour party who wanted reform so it was not just a minority party issue. Reform of the House of Lords was also mentioned with discussion about a system based on citizen participation briefly discussed.

    The question of Nigel Farage’s behaviour was brought up including his maiden* speech in parliament in which he referred to the previous speaker of the House, John Bercow as ‘a horrible little man’. It was also questioned why we had a company with just two shareholders instead of a political party. Perhaps more significantly someone noted was that Farage secured a high degree of media coverage in contrast to the Greens for example and other smaller parties.

    We discussed the one vote, one person system which was in fact relatively new it was claimed. Did it deliver [good government]? It had given us the Nazis, Donald Trump and Boris Johnson all of whom or which had been voted in at some time.

    One of the principles of our system was that once voted in to be an MP for a constituency, the person so elected represented all the constituents not just those who supported him or her in the election. How do you ensure that an MP actually does this in parliament since from the moment they arrive, they are subject to whipping and have little say in what happens? The reality is we do not really know and as an example, the local MP Mr John Glen often speaks of ‘his postbag’ highly selectively since the known views of those who have written to him never seem to get a mention. Democracy seems to stop the day after an election.

    “democracy seems to stop the day after an election”

    An interesting suggestion was made – why not make elections a two-stage process i.e. with a second vote? This happens in France although that might not be a promising exemplar in view of what is happening there currently. Another interesting comment was that no one asked people why they don’t/didn’t vote. One speaker spoke of a friend who proudly said ‘I never vote’. Voting should be an obligation and indeed it was noted (again) that it was compulsory in Australia.

    One comment was to the effect we should not underestimate the awareness of the young especially in relation to climate change. Many want climate change immediately.

    There were the familiar comments about the media during the course of the debate. Serious matters reduced to a sound bite and various debate programmes never really tackling fundamental issues. One thought the IFS had too inflated a reputation consisting one said of ‘bean counters and neo liberals’.

    As if to round off the days two debates was the question ‘should prisoners have the vote?’ This had caused a rift with the European Court since in many countries they do but the coalition government were adamant not to allow it. David Cameron, the former prime minister said the thought of it ‘made him sick.’

    Two interesting debates with the prisons crisis a product of a dysfunctional government unable to decide on a difficult topic. Would any democratic system solve the problem of politicians unequal to the task? A question perhaps for a future debate.

    Peter Curbishley

    Books mentioned or relevant:

    Against democracy, Jason Brennan, 20106, pub: Princeton University Press

    Adventures in Democracy, Erica Benner, 2024, pub: Allen Lane

    How Westminster Works … and why it doesn’t, Ian Dunt, 2023, pub: Weidenfeld & Nicolson

    Politics on the Edge, Rory Stewart, 2023, pub: Jonathan Cape

    *It might not have been his maiden speech but a debate on electing the speaker.

  • ‘Politics on the edge’

    A memoir of Rory Stewart’s time as an MP and minister

    December 2023

    Politics on the Edge: a memoir from within* is the title of a book by Rory Stewart who was an MP and a minister during the time of David Cameron and Theresa May’s premierships. He stood against Boris Johnson in the leadership election and left politics soon after. 

    It is a well written book and unlike many political memoirs which can descend into self-justification, it is an honest view of the political system, parliament and life as a minister. He does not shy away from his own failings and it is sufficiently revealing to make you realise he was at times a trifle naïve in his views and ways of doing things. He does describe however, a system of government which has many grievous failings and which fundamentally is incapable of providing the leadership which we desperately need as a nation. 

    Early on in the book he describes the process of becoming an MP which can involve years of applying for seats, sitting on local councils or just being a member of the party doing ordinary stuff like delivering leaflets door to door. You have to be liked by the local selection committee which essentially means agreeing with their points of view. There is little interest he writes in whether the candidate has ability in formulating policy, management skills or understanding great issues of state, more how he or she seems to fit in with the local party and understanding the needs of the – mostly elderly – members of the local party. It is a matter we have discussed in our Democracy Cafés, since a local MP once elected, can find themselves as a minister, or even secretary of state, of some department or other yet be possessed of next to no relevant experience of being in charge of a large organisation. Not only that, but they are unlikely to have any relevant knowledge of the department itself and further, may only be there for a year or at most two after which they are either sacked or moved on somewhere else. Since many MPs now go from University to a think tank or into the party apparatus and never doing a ‘real’ job, it is unsurprising that chronic failure is the norm and the only wonder is that it isn’t worse than it is.

    Life as a minister is if anything worse. The civil service would like a minister just to be the spokesman for the department and to speak in parliament when necessary. With echoes of Yes Minister, there is considerable resistance to a minister who want to make changes to the established policies. The chapters on his time as ‘prisons minister’ are particularly enlightening not to say shocking. The system is in crisis. An ever mounting prison population, cells built in Victorian times for one man, now with two, rampant infestation and diminished staff numbers after the Cameron/Osborne cuts means it is a system which is brutalising its inhabitants and failing to rehabilitate those leaving at the end of their sentences. His attempts to effect change are largely unsuccessful.

    On the subject of prisons he discusses the problems of a minister trying to change how something is done. The civil service doctrine is that ministers are about policy formation and getting funds from the Treasury: they should not concern themselves about delivery i.e. the how. But in many areas of our political life the how is the crucial issue. Whether you are talking about schools, health, transport or indeed the prison estate, how policy is actually carried out is extremely important. Having a wonderful set of policies and a chunk of Treasury cash is useless if the system is inefficient, morale is low, or management weak or almost non-existent. The system is almost designed to prevent a minister altering it. 

    Another topic we have frequently discussed is the role of the media. Attempts to get their interest in serious topics and to discuss change are usually frustrated by a focus on trivia, personalities and catchy headlines. He often refers sneeringly I feel to the Guardian which does cover items in depth from time to time, but as a Conservative I suspect he is swept up with criticisms of the party as a whole. He has little time for the Telegraph either referring to one debate where the journalist chose to talk about what people were wearing. 

    His challenge for the leadership essentially as a ‘stop Boris’ candidate is interesting on many levels. It does reveal his naivety as I say, thinking that people would be interested in policy and how things could be changed. He did not seem to understand that the hundred thousand or so Home Counties members who were doing the choosing are not interested in prison reform for example many believing they are holiday camps already. Neither were they interested in the effects of Brexit, only wanting it to be ‘done’ safe in the belief that trade deals with the rest of the world would follow easily.  We discovered this week that there is no chance of a trade deal with the USA [and it is interesting that the papers who sold people this lie made little or no mention of this serious failure which will have damaging effects on our economy]. 

    Johnson with his collection of misleading statements, false promises and downright lies was popular and won the vote easily. We now know the consequences. He and the other candidates, all promised lower taxes, a perennial favourite ploy of politicians. It seems to be the ultimate fantasy and in the various programmes during the leadership race, it was a favourite question of the TV hosts ‘are you going to put up taxes?’ To answer ‘yes’ was an immediate death sentence for a candidate: indeed there would be little point in standing in the first place. The combination of the fantasy belief of being better off with lower taxes egged on by the print media and infantile TV hosts means any kind of serious discussion of this topic is out of bounds. To debate how much tax and who should pay what is never discussed. The billions that disappear to tax havens is also a no-go topic. Since this is at least £30bn a year and probably double that since HMRC has given up on a number of scams, it is a major issue that never sees the light of day. It could possibly be that the people at the top of our media empires have curious tax arrangements themselves and don’t want that particular light to be switched on. So much easier to pillory a benefit scrounger who could never afford to mount a libel action. 

    There seems to be a disconnect between the services we are getting – or not getting like almost a complete absence now of NHS dentists – and low taxes seems to be beyond the understanding of many. The unsafe schools with Raac concrete roofs will not now be repaired until after the election sometime in 2026. Could this be a cynical ploy to land the Labour government (one assumes) with a multi-billion bill while going into the election with the promise of tax cuts? Surely not. 

    As the sleeve note says ‘Stewart learned first-hand how profoundly hollow and inadequate our democracy and government had become. Cronyism, ignorance and sheer incompetence ran rampant.’ 

    It is a book worth reading along with others on our political system today. Both illuminating and depressing the worry is that there seems no sign of a movement for change. At the next election we will have the same dysfunctional set of wannabe MPs, telling us what they are going to do but without raising any taxes to do it (correction: the non-dom tax proposal by Labour which will raise next to nothing). Our local MPs will be re-elected with few problems. The broken system will trundle on as it is today with a different set of characters at the wheel, except locally.

    Peter Curbishley

    *Jonathan Cape 2023

  • Democracy Café

    September 2023

    Met during a blisteringly hot day, probably a record breaker for September, and we were pleased to welcome two new members to the fold. The most popular topic concerned the state of the prison estate. The situation in our prisons had made the news this week following the escape of terror suspect Daniel Khalife from Wandsworth prison a couple of days ago where he was being held on remand. Coincidentally, he was recaptured while we were meeting. Many statements about our prisons were made which few could disagree with. We were reminded of Douglas Hurd’s comment that prison simply made bad people worse.

    The rapid movement of prisoners around the estate meant training programmes often went uncompleted making rehabilitation largely ineffective. The high absence rate – said to be 30% at Wandsworth – combined with high staff turnover, meant the proper management of prisoners and their rehabilitation was compromised. The language of some of our judges at sentencing drew some criticism. The majority of our prisoners were from poor backgrounds and often had poor literacy skills. This was not to excuse their behaviour but did seem to point to a range of social issues behind crime. Many were ‘damaged people’ someone said.

    The Nordic model was mentioned several times. The example of the Netherlands was quoted and the fact that the country was busy selling off its prisons and reducing the number of prisoners. That has not led to an increase in serious crime levels which remained largely unchanged. This seemed to demonstrate quite clearly that the notion of ‘prison works’ is fallacious. Other Nordic countries were doing much the same.

    So why did we stick to the prison works model and continue to pack our prisons with more and more people sometimes two to a cell? We have just under 86,000 prisoners in England and Wales and the highest per capita prison population in Western Europe (House of Commons statistics [accessed 9 September]). Insanity is doing the same thing over and over but expecting different results. Yet we go on packing our prisons. Why is this?

    The role of the tabloids immediately came up and several thought that it was political suicide to seek to reform the system, reduce the prison population or try other sentencing options. Any politician daring to reduce sentences, and hence the size of the prison population, would likely face immediate screaming headlines suggesting the public would not be able to venture safely out of their homes or be murdered in their beds, followed by the swift departure of said minister to the backbenches or Northern Ireland. To spend money on the estate and to replace Victorian era prisons was deemed almost impossible some thought summed up in the quote “you’re going to spend money on the man who robbed me not on my pension”.

    As ever in these debates, the causal factors are what interests. Politicians follow the tabloids and the tabloids follow public opinion. So why do the public adhere to the idea of more draconian sentences and a desire for vengeance? One answer was a need to educate the public. If the facts of prison life and our high rate of recidivism was made more evident then maybe people could be weaned off the kneejerk ‘prison works’ model. That prisons are ‘holiday camps‘ is still a sentiment expressed including by some politicians. All was not gloom however and it was suggested there was a slight shift in tabloid comments towards victims and away from the criminals. The New Zealand model of confronting offenders with victims was mentioned. But changes in opinion can happen and the example of homosexuality was put forward: where once it was a crime and homosexuals suffered persecution and criminalisation, the Sexual Offences Act (1967) changed the climate considerably in favour of toleration. In the context of prisons it was strange that the Howard League for Penal Reform seldom gained a mention.

    Rory Stewart was mentioned in connection with his attempts, as the Minister concerned, at reform by reducing the number of pointless short sentences and introducing more rehabilitation efforts. He did not last long in post. The privatisation of the probation service by his predecessor Chris Grayling MP was a disaster and had to be undone. Why was not more use made of parole? someone asked.

    It was noted that even in Republican states in the US, positive reforms can take place. A cross-party consensus was clearly needed in the UK to ‘depoliticise’ this issue. Select Committees can also be effective it was noted. So this session did end with a soupcon of hope: that the tide of ignorance promoted by the likes of the Daily Mail – seemingly reflecting public opinion – may not in fact be the majority view and with education attitudes might be encouraged to shift. It was perhaps a topic which a Citizens’ Assembly could tackle? Bringing together evidence and experts is just the kind of exercise which a CA could bring about change.

    So overall, a sense of despair mixed with some optimism that things can change over time the key being sufficient numbers of the public to realise that the current system, in addition to being expensive and inhumane, was simply not working.

    Our second topic was something of an abrupt change and concerned Saudi Arabia and the planned visit by Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) to the UK. Should we treat Saudi Arabia as a partner? was the question. The proposer listed the problems of the country: the poor treatment of women and gays; the lack of free speech; the war engaged by Saudi in the Yemen and later in the discussion, the murder and dismemberment of Jamal Khashoggi, allegedly on the orders of MBS. It was pointed out that Saudi has now executed 100 people so far this year.

    The reason for this courtship as someone expressed it was twofold: Saudi was a major purchaser of our arms and secondly, they were a major oil producer which, following problems with Russia, was an important factor. Since arms sales were one of the nations growth industries, good relations with countries like Saudi were important. It was not just arms and oil someone said. Saudi was a kingdom and there were close relationships between MBS and our royal family with gifts of valuable bloodstock between the two.

    In relation to the Khashoggi murder, it was pointed out that the CIA had carried out a number of murders over the years so it was not all one-sided. We claim to have a special relationship with the US so how genuine was the outrage expressed about the Khashoggi murder at the time?

    In relation to arms sales, the UK’s role in promoting arms sales at the DSEI exhibition was noted. Also, it was often said that ‘if we didn’t sell arms, others would’ but a recent report by Campaign Against the Arms Trade questioned that. It reveals that sales of arms by both Russia and China have fallen recently: in Russia’s case because of the war in Ukraine which is consuming large amounts of military materiel, and by China because it is building up its store of weapons probably in preparation for an invasion of Taiwan. Further details can be found on the Salisbury Amnesty site in which these issues are discussed in more depth.

    The nub of this debate concerned government’s role in relations with other countries especially those where human rights were weakly observed or not observed at all. To what extent does – or should – morality be a consideration? We need to sell arms it seems if we want money to spend on schools and hospitals. We need oil to run our economy and to enable us to drive our cars. Saudi has a big role to play in each. Can we afford to adopt a moral position is the key question? As with the previous debate someone suggested we needed to look for that small event which might lead to significant change – a hint of the butterfly effect if you will.

    In sum, and not just in relation to Saudi, there was a real risk to democracy someone thought, perhaps a topic for a future debate. We did agree it was a hard subject.

    Finally, with a little time to spare, we briefly discussed the conviction and sentencing of Lucy Letby the nurse convicted recently for murdering babies in a neo-natal ward in Chester. The proposer made the point it was obvious she was an extremely sick young woman. There has been nothing about a psychological assessment or her future treatment. She will have to go on Rule 43 because of the likely risks from other prisoners.

    There was a call for her to be executed as an ‘evil person’ but this was not supported by those present. There was a risk of starting to find excuses for her behaviour: some people were just ‘evil’.

    Someone with hospital experience said that a feature of neo-natal units is that they are based on team working since premature infants needed constant attention. They thought others must have noticed which in fact did happen to an extent. It was noted that the hospital concerned was more interested in their reputation rather than investigating the incidents properly. Although every hospital was different, it was an example of ‘silo working’. Those who had medical friends did sometimes note the hostility that is sometimes expressed by clinical staff towards managers. There did seem to be a gulf between them and the Robinson programme on the BBC some years ago was mentioned where this hostility was amply illustrated.

    There did seem to be a similarity between the NHS and the prison system. Both organisations needed reform and investment yet did not get more than token activity by a succession of ministers none of whom seemed able, or were in post long enough, to tackle the major issues involved.

    Three interesting debates.

    Peter Curbishley

    Note: a claim about how Vancouver sentenced people was made but we have not been able to verify this.