Women: Deaths in Custody

Baroness Linklater of Butterstone Excerpts

Tuesday 16th November 2010 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Northover]

My Lords, the noble Baroness is right; there are high levels of self-harming among women prisoners. I point her in the direction of my previous answer. The first thing is to address the disproportionate sentencing of women to prison, and I hope that that can be looked at in the context of the sentencing review. I hope that noble Lords, like the noble Baroness, will play a full part in looking at that and ensuring that it addresses the issue of self-harm. If we can divert women from prison, that will be very helpful. For those who are in prison, there has been a positive shift to address the issue, led partly by the moves of the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, to ensure that prisoners are covered by the National Health Service rather than by the Prison Medical Service. There is a mental health White Paper coming down the track from the Department of Health, and that too should help to address the issue.

[Baroness Linklater of Butterstone]

My Lords, given the high levels of social, psychiatric and emotional disorders among the women prison population, does the Minister agree that much more needs to be done to improve the training of prison officers and people on the front line who are dealing with these girls on a daily basis?

[Baroness Northover]

Yes, that is the case. Quite a lot of investment has gone into training prison officers; if I can find the page in my brief, I will find how many have been trained. I seem to remember that something like £600,000 has gone into supporting them and a large number of prison officers are now trained to look for the tell-tale signs. Clearly, though, that is still insufficient.