Prisons and Probation

Heather Wheeler Excerpts

Wednesday 27th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[Heather Wheeler (South Derbyshire) (Con)]

I rise to speak in this very important debate as the queen of prisons. I have the women’s prison of Foston in my constituency, and Sudbury open prison and Marchington prison on my border, so the area of Derbyshire and Staffordshire is well placed for prisons and for understanding prison problems. I do not agree with the motion on the Order Paper, as there is no real understanding of the changes that have been made to the prison system.

I will focus my remarks on Foston women’s prison because it is the one in my constituency. A number of changes have been made. There is help for the ladies who have financial problems, and care for those with mental health issues. There is also advice for those who know they will leaving, and what that will mean in terms of their family—whether they can still stay with them or whether they need to make new arrangements. They have also been given tools to help them not only with their numeracy and so that they are better equipped for reading and writing but, even more importantly, to cope with financial pressures when they come out of prison.

All that has been made possible by tremendous innovative thinking and, specifically, the excellent work of my local citizens advice bureau. We found that people were making repeat visits to the CAB, so it built up a dossier of the needs of women leaving Foston prison, after which it put together a bid, which I was delighted to support. The scheme has now gone out to other prisons throughout the country because it is working so well. The programme is totally cost-effective and it is not fluffy bunny stuff. Talking as the South Derbyshire MP, I can say that unless such a scheme is tried and tested, offers value for money and helps people in our society, it will not get my signature, but the programme ticks all the boxes.

I am proud that our Government are taking such an innovative approach because we do not want people to reoffend. We want people to go back to having a family life. We want them to give something back to society because that is a meaningful part of rehabilitation not only for them, but for their victims. The scheme should be considered even more deeply and I hope that more prisons throughout the estate will get the opportunity to adopt it.

In the couple of minutes remaining, I shall talk about victim support in the context of parole boards and prisons. Regretfully, I know of a horrendous constituency case, of which the Minister is aware, in which owing to a mess in the civil service, an inmate was allowed a second go before a parole board, despite having previously been turned down. He passed the second time, and of course went out and created mayhem, as we knew would happen. Fortunately, he has now been locked up again. I have not heard that the civil servant responsible for the mistake has apologised or been sacked. Even now, I have not heard any apology from the civil service for the fact that the prisoner could get out and create mayhem. I do not want the Minister to apologise today because that would not be fair on him, and that is not what we are here for—we are here to vote against this ridiculous motion. We are here because we want to ensure that people learn from mistakes and that victims are supported to the same extent as inmates through rehabilitation.