New Year’s Eve… and other Prison Traditions

As this will be my last blog post of 2014, when I look back over my time in prison I’ve been reflecting on how many strange traditions prisoners observe. Like many ‘closed’ institutions – boarding schools, the armed services, universities, private members’ clubs – our jails have their own codes of behaviour, customs, superstitions and jargon, most of which are familiar to anyone who has spent time inside, but which would mystify most outsiders.

Waiting for midnight to chime...

One of the stranger aspects of this is the way in which some of these traditions seem to be pretty much identical across the closed prison system. For example, in every jail where I spent New Year’s Eve, there has been the custom of cons waiting until the midnight chimes of Big Ben sound out on the television before hammering violently on the inside of their cell doors for a few minutes. The noise can be absolutely deafening, so there isn’t really any point in trying to get your head down before the New Year begins.

The way that most prisons are designed, especially the older, Victorian-style wings, is to have three or four landings around a central well with very high ceilings above. The combination of the metal cell doors, bare floors and the echoing space outside on the empty landings – with no carpets or soft furnishings to absorb the noise – creates what amounts to an enormous echo chamber. It really can be overwhelming to witness.

I suspect that the ritual of banging cell doors to mark the passing of the old year and the beginning of the new is played out in pretty much every closed prison in Britain. It has become a nick tradition, although when it started no-one seems to know. 

Big Ben gives cons the signal

The night screws on duty on New Year’s Eve obviously expect this percussion-only concert, so no-one really fears that a riot is about to take place. There is also much shouting – including a curious mixture of expletives, some very funny quips and, if you can hear above the racket, quite a few lads wishing their mates in other cells a “Happy New Year, bruv!”

After a short while, the deafening noise dies away and although there might be a bit of residual shouting, each wing fairly quickly settles down for the rest of the night. Soon the prison is almost silent again as cons get back to watching TV or sleeping (or drinking prison-brewed hooch or taking drugs). I suppose New Year is worth celebrating for most cons because at least another year of their incarceration has gone by.

Goal... another reason to bang doors

In many closed nicks, there is a similar door-banging ritual every time a major football match is on television and a goal is scored. This extends to various team rivalries – often because a fair amount of covert gambling is going on between cons (and occasionally even a few football-mad wing screws just can’t resist getting involved themselves). 

Rival supporters take it in turns to hammer on their steel doors whenever their team scores. Even if you aren’t interested in the match – and are trying to watch something else on another channel – you can’t avoid knowing what the score is just by listening to the banging and cheering going on around you.

Of course, there are various other prison traditions – and jail superstitions. Cons can be a very superstitious lot. One of the universal traditions concerns the eating of your final breakfast early in the morning on the day of your release. According to common prison lore, if a prisoner omits to eat his last breakfast he will return to prison again to eat it during his next stretch inside. 

Prison breakfast... or more porridge!

This superstition is so strong that even in a Cat-D (open prison), friends of a prisoner who is about to be discharged will constantly remind him that he must make sure he has breakfast before he reports to Reception to sign his discharge papers and collect his stored property. It’s fascinating to see even middle-class, white-collar cons (ex-bankers, bent solicitors, sticky-fingered accountants) who have never been inside before – and probably never will be again – scrupulously observing this odd prison tradition, even if they only eat a few mouthfuls of cereal or porridge.

Another popular prison saying concerns writing one’s name on prison property, for example inside a locker or on a cell wall. According to this legend, anyone who scrawls their name up will certainly be fated to return to prison “to rub it out”. Although I suspect that this particular superstition may have been invented by canny prison managers in a bid to cut down on the amount of cell graffiti, it has achieved widespread currency. Unsurprisingly, marker pens are prohibited contraband in closed prisons.  

Prison cell door graffiti

Funnily enough, it doesn’t seem to stop people – especially the younger lads – from signing or scratching the walls, usually with a nickname and the name of their home town. For example: ‘Smudger ov Worksop’. It’s always ‘ov’ – never ‘of’ – and that’s yet another prison custom. Some cons also add the dates of their sentences, just in case one of their mates or associates sees the graffiti at some point in the future. 

Of course, there is a long tradition of such cell graffiti – even in medieval castle dungeons or wartime prison camps. Prisoners always seem to have been inveterate vandals when it comes to marking or personalising the walls that confine them. I seem to recall from some television documentary or other that there is some historic graffiti in the various cells of the Tower of London scratched into the stonework by early ‘celebrity cons’ from earlier eras. Sadly, most of them didn’t end well, so perhaps scrawling your name really doesn’t bring good luck. 

I must admit that I never really felt the need to add my own name or dates to the long list of past occupants of any of the cells or Cat-D rooms I lived in myself during my own sentence. After all, perhaps the superstition about returning to prison to rub the graffiti out might prove to be correct...

In my last blog post of 2014, I’d like to take this opportunity to wish all readers a very happy New Year. I am still very pleasantly surprised and encouraged by just how many people are interested in prison issues, even when some sections of the tabloid media continue to peddle lies, smears and misconceptions about life inside. 

For those who have family or friends in prison then I hope that 2015 will see the current difficult situation improve for the better (although I’m not holding my breath, I’m afraid). At least we can hope that loved ones and friends inside stay safe. Never underestimate how much support from those outside prison means to those who are banged up inside. It can prove to be life saving – at times literally. 

If you work in a prison, or with prisoners in some other capacity, then thank you for reading these blog posts and the many comments beneath. I hope that at least some of these insights will have been useful or enlightening about how some prisoners and ex-prisoners see things from the ‘other side of the door’. I’m always pleased to read contributions and comments from serving or past prison staff or probation officers who are willing to share their own points of view. 

HM Chief Inspector Nick Hardwick

It’s also been great to have had exclusive contributions on the blog from HM Chief Inspector of Prisons, Nick Hardwick. In my own view it is an absolute tragedy that he will not be continuing in a vital role monitoring what is going on inside our crisis-hit prisons and reporting fearlessly on what he and his inspectors find even if it angers those in the government who prefer to pretend that everything is going well despite all the objective evidence to the contrary. We await to see who his successor will be in 2015.

Special thanks also to those readers and contributors who are ex-prisoners. No one’s prison experiences or perceptions are ever identical, so thank you for sharing your own views and thoughts on the various subjects that have been covered so far in these blog posts. 

By sharing our individual experiences of prison, positive as well as negative, I do believe that we are, gradually, playing a small, but significant role in informing the wider public about how taxpayers’ money is being spent – or misused – by politicians and bureaucrats who know little about how prisons really work in practice and seem to care even less. I hope you all have a great New Year and I’ll be back blogging in 2015 – assuming Chris Grayling doesn’t try to get me banged up again first!

Why We Need Our Open Prisons

It sometimes seems that if there is one thing the tabloid newspapers hate more than actual prisoners, it is open prisons (Cat-Ds). As far as most Daily Mail hacks are concerned, being incarcerated in an open nick is similar to a stay at a Butlin’s holiday camp at the taxpayers’ expense. Having spent nearly a year in one of these open establishments, I beg to differ, but then I do have first-hand experience.

In England and Wales we currently have a total of 42 prisons for adult males and 13 for adult females. Of these, ten are open prisons for adult males and two for females.

HMP Kirkham: Cat-D in Preston

The more ill-informed elements in our media like to attack open prisons because they are seen as a soft option for disgraced professionals – especially shamed former politicians – as well as offering an opportunity for villains to do a runner. Back in June, for example, one national tabloid ran a story with the worrying headline: ‘One Prisoner Escapes from English and Welsh Open Prisons Every 43 hours’. 

However, the actual article did go on to make clear that these days the number of prisoners who abscond has fallen very significantly: “Between April 2012 and March 2013, 204 prisoners absconded from open prisons in England and Wales. While we shouldn’t dismiss this number as insignificant, it is still dwarfed by a peak of 1,301 absconds in the year 2003/04.” So maybe the headline should have read: ‘Massive decline in prisoners absconding from open prisons’, but that sort of positive story would never do, would it? Not when there is the welcome opportunity to give cons and open jails a good kicking at the same time.

HMI Annual Report

As well as attracting negative media coverage, open prisons are the poor relations of the custodial system. Routinely under-staffed and under-funded for years, the latest rounds of budget cuts have had a severe impact on resources available for education and resettlement – a point that was highlighted in the most recent annual report issued by HM Inspectorate of Prisons.

So what should be the role of our Cat-Ds? In my experience, while it’s difficult to see the difference between a Cat-B and a Cat-C prison (both have bars on windows, locked cells, high perimeter walls), an open prison is a very different sort of nick. For a start some don’t even have fences, while one even has a signposted public footpath winding right through the middle of it. Although occasional casual ‘visitors’ passing through can cause nightmares for the security screws, at least they get a chance to catch a glimpse of what goes on inside an open prison.

HMP North Sea Camp: a former Borstal

Some of our open prisons resemble old military camps because that is precisely what many of them previously were. A few others started life as Borstals for juvenile offenders, then later converted to detention centres prior to being re-roled as adult open prisons. 

A fair number are well past their sell-by dates in terms of physical structure and although some have been given a cosmetic make-over (mainly external cladding), there are various underlying structural problems – including the presence of asbestos – that are storing up serious trouble for the future. Due to the current overcrowding across the prison estate, some open prisons have also expanded the numbers they accommodate without having any additional facilities.

In fact, most of the day-to-day maintenance in Cat-Ds is done by prisoners who have the relevant skills, under the supervision of civilian staff. If it wasn’t for this group of skilled cons, it’s doubtful that many of our older open prisons would still be standing. Almost all adult prisons seem to have a significant pool of qualified builders, painters, mechanics or electricians, but only open prisons really seem to make use of their expertise in an appropriate manner. Some open nicks also have a group of drivers who ferry goods, equipment and other prisoners around the local area in vans and minibuses.

HMP Sudbury: ex-US Airforce base

Given the much lower staff to prison ratio – and the routine use of cons in maintenance and catering roles – it’s hardly surprising that Cat-D establishments cost far less to run than closed prisons. According to Ministry of Justice (MOJ) figures released in October 2013, it costs an average of £26,000 per year for a prisoner in open conditions, compared to £33,600 in a Cat-B, £30,600 in a Cat-C and over £60,000 in a high security prison (Cat-A). 

No prisoner arrives directly at a Cat-D straight from court. Every one will have done a stint in at least a Cat-B local prior to being categorised as a Cat-D. This process tends to be automatic for prisoners who are first time offenders and whose crimes, by and large, are non-violent. That’s why open nicks are full of bent solicitors, dodgy accountants, fraudsters, crooked journalists, ex-MPs caught fiddling their expenses and diverse other former professionals who have been convicted and sent down. According to the current rules, the longest period any prisoner should serve in open conditions is two years (with very occasional exceptions), but most short-termers will only be there for a matter of months or sometimes even a few weeks.

However, although large numbers of prisoners serving relatively short stretches for non-violent offences do end up in Cat-Ds, there is also a fairly high proportion of lifers, as well as cons who are coming to the end of long sentences and also prisoners who are still serving the now notorious Indeterminate Sentence for Public Protection (IPP) which was abolished in 2012, although not retrospectively. Most lifers are in for murder for other very serious offences, although some IPPs are serving indeterminate sentences with a short minimum tariff for much less heinous crimes, usually because there was a pattern of repeat offending.

HMP Leyhill: Gloucestershire

These two groups – lifers and short fixed-termers – often co-exist very uneasily together in open conditions. Lifers tend to dislike non-lifers (including IPPs) because they have a completely different mindset towards their sentences and often fail to appreciate the stresses and tensions lifers live with on a daily basis. 

For a life-sentenced prisoner the only chance of eventual release on a life licence is to jump through all the hoops set out in their sentence plan, including convincing psychologists that their risks are now manageable. A life sentence is divided up into ‘stages’ and progressing from a Cat-A high security prison (where most, although not all, lifers start serving their terms) to lower security category establishments is an essential part of a process that can take anything from eight years to well over 30, occasionally even longer.

I’ve shared cells and rooms with ‘real’ lifers – people who have already done 20+ years inside – and I’ve learned a fair amount about the perils and pitfalls they face from them. My pad-mates have explained just how hard it is to make any progress, yet how easy it can be to see years of effort and good behaviour wiped out because of a careless word, a minor behavioural slip-up or a thoughtless argument with another con or a member of staff. These set backs can add years onto a sentence, even when the con has already served far longer than the minimum tariff that was handed down in court. 

It’s very common these days for a lifer whose minimum tariff was – say – ten years to end up serving 15 or even longer. An approximate rule-of-thumb would be take the minimum and then add on an extra five years or so, assuming nothing disastrous occurs during the sentence. Of course, in some cases, particularly notorious cons can end up serving decades beyond their tariffs. 

HMP Ford, Sussex: ex-Fleet Air Arm base 

It is easy to see why those prisoners who don’t have any release date often despise and detest their fellow cons who are doing a matter of months inside. The latter group all have a fixed release date and can make plans for their lives after prison. Just listening to these cons talking about what they will be doing in a matter of weeks or months must be mental torture for lifers.

Moreover, it is also true that some short fixed-termers can be real pains in the backside for everyone, staff and cons alike. They often have only a few months to serve by the time they get transferred to a Cat-D, so they don’t really have much to lose if they are caught drinking, taking drugs, smuggling contraband, bullying or fighting. In most cases, the worst that will happen is that they get sent back to the Cat-B local (‘being shipped out’) for the rest of their sentence. This happens pretty much every week in most open nicks. Even doing a runner by absconding from an open prison just might get them a few extra weeks on top of their current sentences.

If a lifer or an IPP sentenced con behaved like that (and it must be noted that a few do) they could easily add an extra five years inside – the equivalent of a ten year fixed term sentence – to their stretch. It’s also getting much more difficult to get back to a Cat-D for a prisoner who has previously ‘failed in open conditions’ through misbehaviour or absconding. For some lifers, there really isn’t any light at the end of the tunnel.

HMP Kennet: Liverpool

Under revised rules for Cat-Ds introduced earlier this year by the MOJ, any prisoner who already has a history of escaping or absconding can only be transferred to an open prison in exceptional circumstances. This has the potential to turn some life sentences into true whole-life tariffs, although the government claims that other arrangements will be made, such as making use of what are sometimes called ‘semi-open’ conditions (often a designated wing in an existing Cat-C prison). Prisoners in these conditions are still kept behind walls and fences.

This raises the key question of what should we be using scarce Cat-D places to achieve? Should open conditions be mainly used to test lifers and other indeterminate sentenced prisoners in more relaxed conditions as part of a progressive process leading towards their eventual release or should these nicks be filled up with non-violent bent lawyers, crooked ex-MPs, ex-magistrates in for drunk driving and journalists who’ve been caught hacking phones?

Clearly, the government position is that Cat-Ds should be mainly focused on the lifers, as part-time Prisons Minister Andrew Selous made clear when he answered a Parliamentary Question on 4 September 2014: 

Open prisons have been used since 1936, because they are the most effective means of ensuring that prisoners are suitably risk-assessed before they are released into the community under appropriate licence conditions. When a prisoner moves to the less rigid structure of open conditions an assessment can be made in a relatively safe environment of how the prisoner will adapt to increasing responsibility. For many prisoners, in particular those such as life sentence prisoners, who have spent a considerable amount of time in custody; these are essential components for successful reintegration in the community and therefore an important factor in protecting the public.

Of course, there is an argument to be made that it is waste of taxpayers’ money to keep non-violent offenders or those who pose minimal risk to the public in closed prisons. I would broadly agree with this. However, my own question would be whether there is any real point in sending non-violent, low-risk people to prison in the first place, especially first-time offenders? 

HMP Blantyre House: Kent

If these individuals are considered safe enough to be transferred to open conditions in the first place, particularly just a few weeks into their short sentences, why not simply release them on a longer licence period with recall to closed conditions should that prove necessary? This would then free up much needed Cat-D places for prisoners who really do have a need to be tested in open conditions in order to provide evidence to the Parole Board that they are ready for release on life licence. In addition this could save a significant amount of public money.

There is also the reality that many of our current Cat-Ds are close to the end of their useful lives – or in certain cases even well beyond them – since a proper programme of renovation would cost millions and the cash simply isn’t available. Sooner or later, some wings and units will be condemned as unfit for human occupation or just simply fall to pieces.

HMP Lindholme: Cat-D closed

Perhaps one solution will be the use of ‘cluster’ prisons, where various security categories can be housed in different units within a single prison perimeter. Some nicks, notably HMP Brixton – a Cat-C – already offers Cat-D facilities that allow prisoners to have release on temporary licence (ROTL), do voluntary work in the local community or even take approved paid work, subject to a 40 percent victims’ surcharge on weekly net earnings over £20.  

However, a similar experiment at HMP Lindholme, a Cat-C near Doncaster, ended in catastrophe when it was closed after having been savaged by HM Inspectorate in 2013. According to the report the Cat-D wing at the prison was “the worst establishment seen for many years” and had been awash with drugs and alcohol during the inspection. Perhaps the real problem was a lack of budget to actually make the open wing function properly.

On the other hand, since the present government has effectively abandoned all real pretence of delivering rehabilitation in the rest of our prison system, it can hardly be expected that our existing open prisons will be given sufficient resources to enable them to focus on resettlement and preparation of prisoners for release. And that’s a tragic waste of potential opportunities to achieve positive change and support prisoners’ reintegration back into society. 

Twas the Night before Christmas… in the Nick

This is the fourth and final part of my ‘Christmas in prison’ series of blog posts. I hope that each one has been interesting and informative in its own way, especially for those readers who have never had to experience being in prison at this time of year.

In many ways Christmas Eve is where the real magic of the season starts, at least while we are still children – or have young kids of our own. I remember the eager anticipation of the countdown to this night over the years. Putting out pillowcases (no miserly stockings in our house!) and then trying to get to sleep despite the excitement of waiting for Father Christmas.

Twas the night before Christmas...

When I was slightly older, it was about going to Midnight Mass in the local medieval church, followed by the walk back home in the early hours of the morning, particularly magical if it had been snowing. And then waking up to Christmas Day itself. 

We always used to spend the day with my grandparents – now both deceased for over a quarter of century – and for my sister and myself it was the undoubted highlight of the year. Even Easter (seemingly endless chocolate eggs) and birthdays couldn’t compete with Christmas and all the trimmings.

These are the memories that stay with us for the rest of our lives and it’s these bitter-sweet recollections that may haunt many prisoners who find themselves inside during the Christmas period. To be honest, I think I found Christmas Eve even more miserable than the following day itself. 

Two years ago, for example, we were unlocked at 08.45 in the morning and my pad-mate and I went to the gym for an hour. The rest of the time before lunch we just talked about anything other than Christmas. In the afternoon we watched TV and I phoned home. Then it was early bang-up with a stale baguette and a bag of crisps (the usual weekend regime). Luckily, my pad-mate and I had bought a few extra treats ourselves from the canteen specials sheet to share. Even so, neither of us had much to celebrate.

Not much to celebrate inside the nick

As I lay in my bunk that night after lights out, I couldn’t help but think back to my own generally happy childhood and all those Christmas Eves past. If I closed my eyes I could visualise how things used to be years earlier when life had seemed so simple and so exciting. Now I was locked up in a tiny concrete box with nothing but those memories.

Still, I considered myself to be very lucky. Not all my fellow prisoners had such happy childhoods and for some the memories are more about family conflicts, poverty, alcohol and drugs, and – for far too many – beatings and other kinds of abuse, some of it absolutely horrific. 

I’ve written in earlier blog posts about a friend I met in prison who was brutally abused by the various drug addicts that his own mother brought into their lives. He was forced to smoke dope from the age of six or seven, probably to knock him out so he couldn’t resist when he was being raped. Christmas was never a time when there was much he really wanted to remember. In fact, it was the things that he couldn’t forget that made him scream in his sleep in his cell during the night.

Prison 'hooch': can be deadly

Like many cons, he was on heavy doses of prescribed medication. He also ‘self-medicated’ with other peoples’ drugs that he’d obtained by buying them or through bullying those who’d collected them from healthcare. Anything to help him get through his sentence by coping with the memories that were slowly destroying him. His situation is far from being unusual among cons.

Christmas is also a time when there is a noticeable spike in the consumption of various other types of substances, including illegal drugs, so-called ‘legal highs’ and the infamous prison-brewed ‘hooch’ (fermented liquid). In my experience this is not really about celebrating Christmas or New Year; it’s mainly about taking the edge off the pain and depression. Perhaps, above all, it’s about trying to forget what’s going on outside or in your own troubled past.

Ingredients for 'hooch'

Prison-brewed hooch can be a very dangerous substance. It stinks and some of the ingredients don’t bear thinking about, although in the main it’s fermented fruit juice with bread (or Marmite – for the yeast) and lots of sugar added during the brewing process. In the worse case scenarios it can lead to alcohol poisoning, blindness and even brain damage. I’ve never known anyone actually die from drinking it, but that may also have happened at sometime.

In the absence of ordinary alcohol – which is also occasionally available at a very high price if smuggled in by bent screws or other prison staff – hooch is very popular over Christmas and New Year as it helps cons to ‘get their heads out of the window’ as it is sometimes called. For many inmates it helps to cope with the boredom of long hours of bang up at this time of year.

A bad batch of hooch on any wing is a screw’s nightmare. Having to call out the medics to deal with acute poisoning due to this noxious stuff is bad enough, but it can also spark off drunken violence and other serious misbehaviour. 

HMP Ford: not such a happy New Year

The infamous prison riot at HMP Ford, an open nick in Sussex, on 1 January 2011 was due to a major crackdown on the illicit consumption of alcohol by inmates, including midnight raids by the staff on New Year’s Eve when they intended to test prisoners to find out who had been drinking. The eventual outcome was a riot, the burning of part of the prison and damage amounting to £5 million. 

I’m hoping that this Christmas and New Year our prisons are peaceful and that there are no casualties – either prisoners or staff – due to violence, drugs, hooch, suicide or any other disorder. However, the situation doesn’t sound very positive. I’ve just received a letter from a friend who is still in a Cat-C prison and he reports that conditions are grim at the moment, with very restricted regimes, constant staff shortages, regular cancellation of activities and a general sense of frustration and anger on the wings.

Anyway, despite that less than seasonal note, I’d like to wish everyone who reads this blog all the best for Christmas. Since I launched this site on 2 July 2014, I’ve been genuinely amazed at just how much interest there is in prison issues. It’s also great that so many readers have contributed with comments or shared their own experiences of prison – either as someone who may be facing imprisonment, as an ex-prisoner or as the family or friends of someone who is inside at the moment. Thank you all for reading and for contributing.  

Home for Christmas (on ROTL)

My previous seasonal blogs have been mainly about how Christmas impacts on prisoners in closed prisons. However, for some prisoners who are serving their sentences in a Cat-D (open) establishment there is the prospect of being granted Release on Temporary Licence (ROTL) over the Christmas period so that they can spend up to four nights at home with their families.

HMP Ford: going out on ROTL

If getting recategorised to D-cat status – and then actually being transferred to an open prison – is a major milestone for lifers and those prisoners who are serving long sentences, then getting ROTL over Christmas is probably the jail equivalent of winning the lottery. In the months leading up to the festive season, some cons talk about little else than their chances of being out at that time of year.  

Getting approved for overnight ROTL has never been an easy process. It’s highly bureaucratic and involves all kinds of risk assessments, internal reports, support from Probation, approval by the local police in the home area and often a face-to-face interview with a governor grade. Many apply, but few actually get approved. That doesn’t stop anyone who might be eligible from putting in an application in hope.

ROTL news: no ROTLs here!

In theory, ROTL used to be available to prisoners in Cat-B, Cat-C and Cat-D establishments, until recent changes to the rules in August. However, in practice, unescorted leave was always pretty much limited to Cat-Ds. I well remember one inner city Cat-B local prison that had a very large ROTL noticeboard on every wing. However, when you got close to it there was only one small typed notice pinned right in the middle. This read: “HMP ***** does NOT offer ROTL”. 

The existence of this totally pointless noticeboard with its negative message still makes me smile as it is a typical example of prison mentality, even pre-Chris Grayling. Regardless of what a Prison Service Order or Instruction (PSO or PSI) might permit in theory, what actually happens in practice is usually very different and this is a lesson every con needs to learn very quickly.

In a Cat-D, however, being granted ROTL is more than just a theoretical possibility and most cons will bang in a few applications by filling in a ROTL-1 form, although a sizeable number do need help to even complete the paperwork, particularly if their literacy skills aren’t very good. Also, the rules that surround ROTL can be very complex, even for members of staff to understand. 

In the open prison where I spent nearly a year, it was part of what was called a “progressive process” ahead of eventual release. This means that you had to have been at the establishment for at least two months (more recently increased to three) without any disciplinary problems or negative reports before you could be considered for ROTL. 

ROTL-1: application form

Next you had to have had a minimum of three successive town visits for a few hours (Resettlement Day Release – or RDR) before being assessed for home leave on Resettlement Overnight Release (ROR). If you were granted overnight leave, then it usually started with two nights, before being increased to a maximum of four. The frequency also depends on which type of sentence a prisoner is serving. Lifers and those on Indeterminate Sentences for Public Protection (IPP) have much more restricted eligibility. Some cons will probably never be granted it.

Finally, in order to qualify for Christmas ROTL, you needed to have had at least one successful previous home leave, preferably two. Also, you couldn’t have had any overnight leave in at least the previous 28 days. I well recall the amount of careful calculations that we all had to do with printed calendars in order to make sure that we’d ticked all the boxes. A discrepancy of just one day could put an end to all your dreams of spending Christmas at home with your family.

Another key issue was that final decisions tended to be left until very close to the scheduled time of departure. Governors didn’t want to approve ROTL and then have to rescind it because of some security concern or because of a disciplinary complaint against a prisoner. Even if you’d passed the face-to-face interview – and quite intensive grilling – by a governor grade, then you probably wouldn’t get your magic ROTL-5 paper that confirmed whether or not you’d been approved until a few days before the actual date of departure. It’s now become even more complex as other paperwork, up to a ROTL-7, is required and since new, much more restrictive rules for ROTL were issued in August 2014.

But will mum or dad be home?

This means that it can be very difficult for prisoners’ families to make any plans because these could be (and often are) dashed at the last moment by a decision not to approve ROTL. This can be particularly hard on children who are hoping that a parent will finally be coming home for Christmas, sometimes after years of being away, only to be told a few days before that their daddy or mummy won’t be there with them after all. I’ve known a few terribly sad cases where tensions over last minute ROTL refusals can actually be the final straw that breaks up a relationship.

The handing out of the ROTL-5 by wing screws at evening roll-call just before Christmas was particularly nerve-wracking. The question that was on everyone’s lips was: “Did you get it?”

If the magic words “ROTL approved in principle” had been circled on the paper, then the recipient skipped down the main corridor looking as if all his birthdays had come at once. On the other, hand, if “ROTL not approved” was the final answer, then there was deep depression and even tears – especially from some of the younger lads or those cons who had young kids at home. Being honest, the success of others can easily fuel resentment and bitterness at times like these.

The big day for Xmas ROTL

Assuming that your application had been successful and you’d finally received your eagerly awaited ROTL-5 (the ROTL-7 is usually issued on the day of departure), then you still faced a couple of tense days hoping and praying that nothing would go wrong. A fellow con absconding or some other major security alert could also lead to a blanket ban on prisoners walking out of the gate on 23 December.

I’d estimate that at Christmas 2013, only around one in ten prisoners at my Cat-D nick actually got granted ROTL, although around half of the inmate population of several hundred might have applied. Some were judged to be too high risk, especially if their offences had been linked to consumption of alcohol – always considered to be a risky issue around Christmas and New Year. Others failed to qualify for other reasons: a negative report from a wing screw, a veto from security or Probation or even a bureaucratic miscalculation by the Offender Management Unit (OMU) of how many days it had been since the prisoner’s last overnight leave. You also weren’t eligible for ROTL if you only had a month or less before your final release date.

Holdall packed and ready to go

As departure day – 23 December – approached, the atmosphere in the nick was a curious mixture of eager anticipation and misery. Those who were definitely going home were busy packing their holdalls and getting ready to walk out of the gate. However, for those left behind, it was going to be a long and grim few days without much to do other than watch TV. Even the prospect of a decent Christmas lunch (since the prison had its own farm) couldn’t lift the spirits of the lads who would be going nowhere that year.

I was one of the lucky ones. It was my fourth overnight ROTL and I’d made sure that all my previous dates were in order. On previous home leaves I’d always made an effort to be back two hours ahead of the deadline just in case of any travel delays, so I’d never had what is technically known as a ‘ROTL failure’ (arriving back late). And I don’t drink alcohol, having been teetotal for over 20 years, so that wasn’t a concern either.

My poor room-mate (no cells or barred windows in a Cat-D nick) hadn’t been so lucky. He had two young kids at home and they were desperate to see their dad as he had been their principal carer before he ended up in the nick. However, his previous home leave had only ended 27 days earlier and, despite initial indications that he might be granted a special concession by the governor, in the end the system was absolutely inflexible. He was staying behind in the slammer and I really felt for him. He was so crushed that if I could have given him my own ROTL-5, I probably would have done so since I don’t have a young family. However, like MPs’ speeding points, ROTLs just aren’t transferrable. 

Catching a train: a citizen again

So it was me who walked out of the prison gate at around 09.00 am on 23 December along with about 30 other lads. Temporary home leave is always a strange halfway house for any prisoner. You suddenly go from being an inmate in a jail to being a normal human again. You get collected by car or catch a train from the local station and no-one knows that you are a serving con. It is the first real step towards reintegration and for a prisoner who has done a long stretch, ROTL is an essential part of preparing for eventual release back into the community. That’s why I believe recent moves to restrict temporary leave, as a knee-jerk reaction to a small percentage of serious ROTL failures, are so shortsighted.

Being back home for Christmas on ROTL was very odd. Everything was just as it always had been and the decorations were already up, although we’d decided to forego presents that year since the new Incentives and Earned Privileges (IEP) scheme meant that I wouldn’t be allowed to take back anything whatsoever with me, not even a new pair of socks. Of course, in practice, most people out on overnight leave did take the opportunity to switch their old worn-out underwear with new items and as far as I’m aware no-one in Reception ever really bothered to check. 

For a few wonderful days you get to sleep in your own bed again, on clean sheets that don’t stink of the prison laundry and other men. You eat normal food with your family and there are no roll-checks, searches or curfews. And no prison ID card hanging round your neck like a dog’s name-tag that marks you out as the property of HMPS. You feel almost human once more. 

Your own front door

Of course, like any other type of ROTL, being home for Christmas will always be overshadowed by the fact that you will have to return to prison on 27 December. The night before leaving you pack your holdall, make sure there’s nothing in there that you didn’t bring out of the nick (clean underwear excepted) and the following morning you say your fond goodbyes as you take a last quick glance at the tree and the decorations. Then you pet the dog who can’t believe you’re leaving again so soon. I won’t deny that it is a very hard thing to do. 

Finally you catch the train back to prison where you cease to be a citizen again. You’ll be body-searched, have your holdall turned inside out and then go back to being an inmate with a number and an ID card hanging round your neck once more. 

The key thing is that you do have the self-discipline to return to jail under your own steam and voluntarily submit to your further punishment, whether it’s deserved or not. After Christmas 2013, every single one of us on ROTL at our nick did come back on time. And that’s really what ROTL is all about, particularly at Christmas: testing an inmate’s compliance, self-control and ability to observe the rules. No matter how much Chris Grayling would like to please readers of the Daily Mail, I believe we’d be absolutely daft to abandon such an important tool for rehabilitation and resettlement.

Christmas Day in the Jailhouse (2)

In my previous blog post I shared some general thoughts about the Christmas season and the impact it can have in our prisons. This post focuses more on my own experiences of being incarcerated at this time of year.

Seasonal sales

Even in our overwhelmingly secular society it is sometimes hard to stomach the blatant commercialisation of what remains, in essence, the celebration of a religious festival. At least in our prisons it’s not as in-your-face as it is on the high street, although some establishments do seem to make a bit more of an effort to mark the occasion.

Ahead of my first Christmas in the nick I really didn’t know what to expect. To be honest, I hadn’t given the subject much thought. Of course, I’d read some of the tabloid drivel about ‘luxury treats’ being laid on for cons, but never really believed it. Just as well, I suppose, because the reality was very different and I hate to be disappointed. 

The first sign that we were heading into the festive season was the appearance on one of the foyers outside the wing offices of an artificial Christmas tree. This nod in the direction of ‘normality’ – complete with a plastic star, fairy lights and a bit of tinsel – made for a bizarre contrast between the austere institutional décor, barred windows and polished lino floor. There it stood in glorious isolation for about a week or so. 

Seasonal cheer?

The tree must have been put in place and decorated by wing screws or chaplaincy staff while we were all banged-up, since it appeared suddenly, without any fanfare. Just after New Year it silently disappeared again. 

I had mixed feelings about the whole idea. On one hand the Christmas tree was a sign that the establishment was making an effort; yet on the other it served as an unhappy reminder of what was going on in the world outside. I think those cons who were affected most negatively were the lads who had young children at home. Every glance at the decorations must have reminded them of what they would be missing this year – and possibly for many more years to come.  

As far as individual cells were concerned, no-one would have thought of doing anything special, other than sticking up a few cards from family and friends on the pinboards above the bunks using prison toothpaste as an adhesive (both sticky tape and Blu-tack are contraband items in jail). Even this practice could be divisive in a shared pad (cell), since one con might have a big stack of cards, while his pad-mate might have received none. There are a fair number of prisoners who have lost touch with family and friends, so rubbing their faces in their own isolation isn’t a very kind or diplomatic thing to do.

Not exactly how the canteen works

Something that does change slightly ahead of Christmas is the availability of ‘special offers’ on the DHL canteen sheet. Even in the slammer, the commercial aspect of the festive season can’t always be ignored. The extra items – usually listed on a printed flyer about a month beforehand – included Christmas cards, mince pies, different types of confectionary and tangerines. Of course, in order to purchase any of these treats a prisoner needs to have sufficient funds in his or her spends account. This is one of those times of the year that those cons who get regular financial support from their families have a significant advantage over those who don’t. Even prison wings are deeply divided between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots’.

For two Christmases running I pooled the credit in my spends account with a good mate and we sat for an hour a couple of weeks before Christmas Day coordinating our canteen purchases. This meant that we could share what little we were able to buy between us during the evenings when we were banged-up in our cell. 

Instantly recognisable to any con

At the same time – and this might amaze some readers – a fair number of prisoners actually buy small gifts for each other from the Christmas canteen sheet. It might only be a 50p bar of Euro Shopper chocolate or a disposable cigarette lighter, but in the slammer that can represent a fairly sizeable percentage of a weekly prison wage. Officially, the practice is prohibited under the Prison Rules, but it still goes on. 

At Christmas 2012, one of my mates was on the punitive Basic regime because he was finding it very difficult to cope with life inside. He was facing a pretty bleak time of it because his girlfriend had died a year earlier and he was still grieving. Like many cons he smoked heavily and found he had about £1.50 in his spends account. It promised to be a long holiday period banged up alone with no ‘burn’ (tobacco) to calm his nerves and no chance of buying any from the canteen.

Unknown to him, three of us clubbed together and bought an ounce of cheap rolling tobacco and some roll-up papers from the canteen sheet. During afternoon association on Christmas Eve the three of us sidled up to his locked cell door while no wing screws were around – he was being held on his own on the top landing – and quietly opened the flap over the spyhole. There he was, sitting on his bunk, head in his hands – a picture of dejection and utter misery.

Better than gold, frankincense or myrrh 

Like the three wise men bringing gifts, we closed the flap, knocked on the cell door and said “Santa’s here!” Then we slid the packet of tobacco and papers under his door. 

I won’t repeat what he said word for word as it contained a lot of joyful expletives, but it was about as close to “I love you, guys!” as any con will ever say to another. If we’d been caught in the act by a screw we’d probably have all been given a warning or even a nicking (put on a charge) for trafficking contraband to a lad on Basic regime, but I’d do it again in an instant. 

One year I was given a small maroon cloth for cleaning the lenses of my reading glasses by a fellow con. I still have it here on my desk as I’m typing this and I use it everyday. The most practical presents – and the ones that can mean the most – don’t have to be expensive. In fact, this one was a freebie from the local optician who visited the prison, but it still meant a lot.

Typical Christmas lunch in prison

Looking back in my prison diary for 2012 I can see that my Christmas lunch that year consisted of two half slices of processed ‘turkey roll’, roast potatoes, under-cooked sprouts, watery mixed veg and gravy. There was also what passed as Christmas pudding with a spoonful of custard. We were then handed the evening meal in a plastic bag and this included a Mars Bar, a can of fizzy pop and a slice of fruit cake, in addition to the usual stale bread sandwich made with bright yellow margarine. It was edible, but definitely not some kind of luxurious spread that the Daily Mail would like its readers to believe prisoners will be getting over the holiday season.

The rest of the day was spent either queuing for the wing payphones, playing Scrabble or watching television before early bang-up at around 4.30 pm. Once they had phoned home, quite a few cons opted to bang their own cell doors shut early, mainly because they really had no appetite for any forced Christmas ‘cheer’. Many, particularly the young lads, were missing their families desperately and couldn’t wait for the holiday period to be over so they could get back to work or education to take their minds off their loneliness.

To be fair, the members of staff who were on duty during the day were among the best that HMPS employs. Most of them were ex-armed forces and understood only too well what it means to be away from home over the Christmas period. I’d actually been out in the Balkans at the same time as one of the wing screws, although we’d served in different units. We even had a couple of mutual acquaintances in common, a fact we kept between ourselves.

A simple handshake at Christmas...

On Christmas morning one of the duty screws opened us up and asked how we were doing. Later, he stood by the office and shook the hand of every single prisoner as they went by and wished each one of us a happy Christmas. That might not sound much, but when a screw shakes a con by the hand in prison, it is a significant event. You suddenly start to feel human again.

Building these personal contacts helps to maintain the sometimes uneasy truce between the screws and most of the cons that enables our prisons to operate with a degree of consent and understanding from both sides. Without it, most closed nicks would quickly become very dangerous and unmanageable places for everyone, staff and inmates alike. Unfortunately, current staff shortages, restrictive regimes, new and petty rules imposed by the Ministry of Justice and long periods of bang-up are fast undermining the tacit, unwritten agreement that keeps the majority of our prisons running smoothly, at least most of the time. 

The Christmas holiday can be a very unhappy and tense period in any prison. This year could be much worse than usual and I can only hope that the sentiment of peace on earth and goodwill to all extends onto our prison wings, despite the criminal mismanagement of the system by politicians who really don’t have the first idea about how prisons really operate or the complex dynamics that keep the lid on these potentially explosive pressure-cooker environments.

My next blog post will be on my first Christmas back home on Release on Temporary Licence (ROTL) while I was still a serving prisoner.

Christmas Day in the Jailhouse (1)

Almost without fail every year in the run up to Christmas one or other of the tabloid newspapers will run a feature slagging off the Prison Service for giving cons a special meal on Christmas Day. I suppose that it’s become as traditional as Father Christmas, turkey and mince pies and the Queen’s Speech. Well, it just wouldn’t be Christmas without giving the lags a good kicking, would it?

The Daily Mail's idea of a con's Xmas

Apparently, this is also a well-established custom in the US where the right-wing media likes to have a pop at prisoners having special food for Thanksgiving or Christmas. However, I suppose that in austerity Britain these stories do play to a particular audience, mainly comprising the fully paid-up members of the hang ‘em and flog ‘em brigade. I am rather surprised Nigel Farage hasn’t jumped on this bandwagon yet, though not doubt he would, had the thought crossed his mind.

In the past, we have also had media outrage at the very idea of cons being given any type of entertainment over the festive season, whether that be in the form of carol concerts, competitions, quizzes or sporting activities in the gym. Personally, the idea of a con being awarded a bar of cheap chocolate or some Lynx shower gel for winning the wing pool tournament on Christmas Day doesn’t really get me riled – and I’ve been a taxpayer pretty much my whole adult life, other than when I was in the slammer myself.

Having been in prison myself for a couple of Christmases, I’ve come to realise that anything the prison management lays on in the way of special meals or entertainment is actually a diversionary tactic to distract cons’ attention in a bid to try to reduce the amount of suicide and self-harm that goes on around this time of year – something that no experienced wing officer or governor ever underestimates. In fact, Christmas – like birthdays or family anniversaries – can serve as a trigger that may send men and women (and some young people) who are living on the edge, over it – sometimes with tragic consequences.

Christmas inside: another year

The problem with major occasions in the calendar – like Christmas – is that they also mark the passing of yet another year. For some prisoners, particularly those serving life or other indeterminate sentences, it’s a stark reminder of how many years in confinement they have served with no end in sight. 

I recall one lifer telling me that last Christmas was his 27th in prison. He’s still inside, so this year will be his 28th. He’s been in jail since he was 20. Another will be marking his 33rd Christmas as a con. 

I’m making no apologies or excuses for either of them. Their offences – which they’ve both admitted – were horrendous, but if anyone has doubts about the effect of a life sentence, physical and mental, then slowly ageing in a concrete box for several decades or longer with no realistic prospect of release probably fits the crime much better than quick capital punishment ever could. Slow retribution that grinds a human being down is so much more effective. Some might argue it’s also less humane than a speedy end, although personally I’ve been opposed to the death penalty myself for many years.    

Experienced wing screws know that Christmas can be very tense time of year. For some cons serving shorter sentences or just starting out on much longer stretches, it could be the first they’ve ever spent away from their family and friends. The stark contrast between being at home with your family (even if it might be a fairly dysfunctional one) and being locked up with hundreds of strangers can cause breakdowns or trigger deep bouts of depression around this time of year.

A time for grief, loneliness and regret

For others it can bring back bitter or sweet memories of Christmases past, perhaps with loved ones who’ve since died while they have been in prison. I know from having supported fellow cons at Christmas time that this is when the death of a partner, a parent or especially a child can come back like an overwhelming tsunami of grief and despair. Memory can, quite literally, be a killer in prison.

I’m going to deal in more detail in my next blog post with the Christmas routine in those prisons I’ve spent time in, but one of the overwhelming emotions among many prisoners during the long holiday period is sheer boredom. Other than a few key workers (kitchens and cleaners, mainly), the vast majority of cons typically spend the period over Christmas and the New Year on a restricted, lockdown regime, often depending on the security category of the establishment. 

Even before the current staffing crisis really started to impact significantly on the running of normal regimes in our prisons, the festive season was a time when the shop was being minded by a skeleton team. In a typical quiet Cat-C nick this probably meant having a duty governor grade in, a couple of senior officers and maybe two screws on each wing or houseblock, plus security spread pretty thinly. The library, education department and gym would all be closed. 

"I got caught breaking in!"

In a Cat-D (open) prison, the numbers of staff on duty might be half that, mainly because until last year there was an established practice of trying to get as many cons as were eligible under the rules out of the gate for Release on Temporary Licence (ROTL) so they could spend four nights at home with their families (23-27 December). The prospect of getting Christmas ROTL was so strong that no-one who had a realistic chance of going home wanted to screw up in the months leading up to the moment that he or she received the magic ROTL-5 form signed by the governor that authorised them to go. 

Any negative entry in a prisoner’s record or a disciplinary charge could easily derail the whole application, so ROTL could be a very effective tool for control and behavioural modification, even for a con who was otherwise a jack the lad or a complete numpty. However, since Chris Grayling tightened up the rules for ROTL following some very high profile incidents when prisoners committed further offences while on temporary leave, I doubt that there will be as many D-cat inmates out and about this Christmas.

At least in an open nick there’s no bang-up as such, just a unit or wing curfew. To be honest, you could probably run most Cat-Ds with a skeleton crew of a few experienced screws, a gate officer, a kitchen manager and a half-dozen ‘red-bands’ (inmate trustees). The real impact of the current chronic staff shortages will be felt most acutely in the closed prisons, especially the Cat-Cs where the cons to screw ratio has now got very silly. Transferring staff to plug gaps in other establishments – so-called ‘detached duty’ – over the coming holiday period is going to make matters even worse.

Closed over the holiday period

My prediction is that some very restricted regimes will be run across most of the closed prisons between Wednesday of next week until at least after New Year. Staffing ratios at Cat-A establishments are always higher for obvious security reasons, so perhaps the day-to-day running of the high security dispersal nicks won’t be affected too badly (although it would be great to hear from any staff who may know otherwise), but I am willing to bet that a fair number of Cat-B and Cat-C establishments will be on effective lockdown over Christmas. 

Staff shortages also mean that it’s not going to be easy to monitor prisoners who are already on the ACCT (Assessment and Care in Custody Teamwork) system owing to them being at risk of self-harm or suicide. Some prisons may resort to moving these high risk inmates to higher security establishments – usually from a Cat-C to a Cat-B – where they might find themselves placed in Care and Separation Units (ie down the Block). I actually know a couple of specific cases where this practice was used between Christmas 2012 and New Year 2013, causing massive disruption for the individual concerned, including cancelled family visits.

And of course, if there is a suicide or serious incident of self-harm on a prison wing during the Christmas period, then that is likely to result in a lockdown while the person concerned is being dealt with, their cell cordoned off, reports written and the mess cleaned up. Meanwhile, all the other cons will be locked behind their doors, many seething with resentment.

Legal and illegal highs: easy to get

Given the current easy availability of drugs, both legal and illegal, on most prison wings, I imagine that there will be an upsurge in consumption, particularly among younger cons who will try to smoke or swallow almost anything in a bid to beat the long days of boredom during the holiday season bang-up. This will fuel debt, bullying and possibly violence, although some screws may well turn a blind eye to anything that will leave prisoners sleeping soundly on their bunks, rather than kicking off or pressing their cell call bells incessantly. On the other hand, there may be quite a few overdose cases to sort out or perhaps even a con choking on his or her own vomit after smoking Black Mamba, Spice or some other synthetic high. 

Not a substitute for phoning home

If there are sufficient wing staff available and no intelligence of any trouble brewing, then there could be perhaps a couple of hours of association during which time prisoners will be able to join the long payphone queues in order to call home at their own expensive or else take a shower or have a quick game of pool or table-tennis. Otherwise, cells will be opened for meals and then it will be bang-up again. I’m guessing that most wing managers will want to get everyone behind their doors by about 4.00 pm so the day shift staff can get off home to their own families. 

Perhaps I’m being overly pessimistic, but I suspect that there will be a lot of frustrated and disgruntled cons over the next week or so and no amount of ‘goodie bags’ containing a stale sandwich, a can of pop, a Mars Bar and a slice of fruitcake is going to compensate for not having had an opportunity to phone loved ones on Christmas Day because there aren’t enough ‘kangas’ (officers) to open the doors and to oversee association. That’s where there could be trouble ahead… 

More on Christmas in prison in my next blog post.