HMP Birmingham

Richard Burgon Excerpts

Tuesday 4th September 2018 Commons Chamber

[Richard Burgon (Leeds East) (Lab)]

(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Justice if he will make a statement on his Government’s plans for HMP Birmingham.

[The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Rory Stewart)]

I would like to begin by paying tribute to the work of the chief inspector, in particular in relation to Birmingham, and indeed his entire inspection team.

The situation in HMP Birmingham was simply unacceptable. It was shocking in terms of the levels of violence, in terms of the response to those levels of violence, in terms of the drugs, and in terms of basic decency. The situation in Birmingham has of course been of considerable concern for some time; for that reason I visited personally in the week before the inspector issued the report. The Secretary of State for Justice, the Lord Chancellor, also made a personal visit to Birmingham, and the chief executive of the Prison Service also visited Birmingham.

The reason for this is that over the last few weeks and months we have been increasingly concerned about G4S’s inability to turn around the situation. The steps we took were initially to issue a notice to improve, followed by a second notice to improve. I then held meetings with G4S in London at which it replaced its governor—who had been in place for 18 months—and brought in a new governor. It then brought in a new team; we came up with a new action plan and a new team was brought in by the Ministry to work alongside it.

Notwithstanding all the steps that Birmingham and G4S took over those months, the conclusion that we reluctantly reached in the week before the inspector published his urgent notification was that G4S would not be able on its own to turn around the significant problems of Birmingham. Therefore the decision was made to take the unprecedented step of the Government stepping in and taking over control. That means in effect three things. First, we have brought in a highly experienced governor from the public sector, Mr Paul Newton, who has taken over as the governor of the prison. Secondly, we have reduced the number of prisoners in Birmingham prison by 300, which has allowed us to take key cells out of operation and renovate them. Thirdly, we have brought in an additional 32 highly experienced public sector prison staff in order to support the team on the ground.

All of this will be done with no cost to the taxpayer, and I want to take this opportunity also to say that, notwithstanding the very significant problems at Birmingham, there are dedicated, serious professional staff on the ground who have been facing a very difficult situation. There have been real challenges around drugs and leadership. We are confident that, with Paul Newton and the new team and the reduction in numbers, we can stabilise that prison, address the drugs and the violence, and turn it around and restore the confidence to the team.

I anticipate that this could rapidly become a debate over the merits or otherwise of privatisation, and I am expecting that the shadow Secretary of State will almost certainly go in that direction. For what it is worth, we on this side of the House do not believe that this is primarily an ideological battle. The situation in Birmingham has been serious for some time. It was a Labour Secretary of State for Justice who initially decided to proceed with the privatisation of Birmingham in 2010, although it was a Conservative Secretary of State who finally let the contract. The company concerned, G4S, has clearly significantly failed in Birmingham, but at the same time, as hon. Members such as the hon. Member for Bridgend (Mrs Moon) can confirm, it is running an impressive prison in Parc and at Altcourse in Liverpool, which is performing well particularly in education and work, while Parc is doing well on family services. The BBC has just produced a very positive report on its performance at Oakwood as well.

So this is not primarily about the difference between the public and the private sectors. Sadly, there have been significant challenges also within the public sector, at Nottingham prison, at Liverpool and at Exeter most recently. Indeed the chief inspector of prisons himself underlined that this is not primarily about public against private, but is about basic issues primarily around drugs, violence and management. We will be focusing on those three things above all through this step-in, and, as I have said, at no cost to the taxpayer.

[Richard Burgon]

I thank you, Mr Speaker, for granting this urgent question, and I thank the Minister for his reply. It is clear from the damning report on HMP Birmingham, as well as from the failings in the probation system, that the costly privatisation experiment in our justice system should be ended. Costs aside, one of the great failings of privatisation is that we in this House struggle to hold mega-corporations such as G4S to account. They use the cloak of commercial confidentiality until it is all too late, and then they need rescuing by the state. Despite that, I hope that we will get some straight answers to straight questions today.

Will the Ministry of Justice be imposing a financial penalty on G4S for its failures at HMP Birmingham? What additional funding will be provided to HMP Birmingham to remedy the current failings? Will any public funding be used to do that? If so, will this come from the current MOJ budget? Thirty additional officers are to be sent to Birmingham Prison. Will the Minister commit to giving all other failing prisons—including public prisons—the same percentage increase in staffing above current levels?

Why did the Government decide that HMP Birmingham would not be permanently returned to the public sector? Will the Minister today commit to an independent commission to look at the merits of doing so before handing the prison back to G4S? Will the Government now halt their plans to build new private prisons? If not, will the Minister at least rule out G4S bidding for them? And will the Government now commit to a wider independent review of the involvement of private companies in the justice system?

[Rory Stewart]

I thank the shadow Secretary of State for Justice for his questions. They are serious questions, and this was a serious failing in that prison. I shall try to answer them one by one. The financial cost to G4S of us stepping in will be very considerable. G4S already estimates that it is losing on this contract. It is to a great extent paid according to the number of prison places. Specifically, therefore, the removal of 300 prisoners from that prison will impose a direct financial penalty on G4S, which will be covered by G4S itself. I can also confirm that the entire cost of this step-in will be covered not by the taxpayer but by G4S, because we will withhold the payment we would normally make in line with the contract with G4S to cover those costs.

The shadow Secretary of State also asked whether we would put exactly 32 officers into the other challenged prisons. We are not in a position to specify the exact numbers, but the broad approach that we would take to Birmingham is the same as the approach that we would take to the other public sector prisons. That approach involves focusing first on the inflow of drugs into those prisons, through the use of intelligence disruption for organised criminal groups as well as through the use of scanners. We are putting nearly £6 million-worth of investment into drug interdiction and scanners.

Secondly, our approach involves focusing on basic decency, and nearly £30 million-worth of extra investment is going into living conditions in our prisons. Thirdly, there is a focus on education, and the Secretary of State’s education and employment strategy is central to this, giving prisoners purposeful activity within the prison walls and ensuring that they get jobs on release, thereby reducing reoffending and protecting the public.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly of all, we are focusing on supporting our hard-working prison officers with the right training in leadership and management skills. They are doing an incredibly tough job outside prison doors. They are facing unprecedented levels of challenges with the new psychoactive substances coming in, and we really need to support them. We are doing that through the Assaults on Emergency Workers (Offences) Bill introduced by the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) which will double the sentences for people who assault prison officers and other emergency workers. We are also doing it through additional training for prison officers before they go on the wings and supporting them through training as they continue.

The shadow Secretary of State asked about an independent commission. Respectfully, I would argue that we already understand very well what happened at Birmingham Prison, without the need for an additional independent report. The independent monitoring board has produced a full report on Birmingham Prison. The chief inspector of prisons has also produced a full report, and we have looked closely at Birmingham Prison over the past few weeks and months. Unfortunately, the story at Birmingham Prison is a relatively familiar one. It is about drugs, about violence and about management and training. There is no great secret there. The question of G4S bidding for future prison contracts is a hypothetical one, and no such contracts will be let for a number of years. However, we will of course, in accordance with all our rules, look seriously at the past record and performance of the companies involved, including G4S, before considering it for a tender.