Music in Prisons

Shailesh Vara Excerpts

Tuesday 29th April 2014 Westminster Hall

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mr Shailesh Vara)]

It is a privilege to serve under your chairmanship again, Mr Chope. I would like to thank the hon. Member for Cardiff West (Kevin Brennan) for securing this debate on such an important subject. It is abundantly clear from what he has said that he has great expertise and knowledge on the subject. I assure him that I will ensure that what he has said today will be conveyed to my hon. Friend the Prisons Minister. Also, I am more than happy to facilitate a meeting for him, to the extent that he feels one is necessary after I have said my piece.

This is an important debate. I welcome the opportunity to speak about the important role that music plays in our prisons and set out the position regarding prisoner access to musical instruments. Let me be clear: facilitating access to musical instruments for prisoners is an important part of their rehabilitation. Whether individual prisoners learn to play musical instruments or music is played in a shared environment, such as a prison chaplaincy, music can provide focus, encourage positive social interaction and provide constructive activity.

In chaplaincy, we see activities involving and using music in a range of ways. As well as music being used as part of some of the main acts of worship, a number of chaplaincies have choirs or chapel bands, which allow prisoners to be part of a creative shared experience. They can also help prisoners to develop listening and communication skills and engage with others in a positive way.

In education, there is significant provision for learning about music. The offender learning and skills service, which has been commissioned jointly by the National Offender Management Service and the Skills Funding Agency, works with offenders to identify their learning needs and advise on what learning and training opportunities are available in prisons. Vocational opportunities are available towards the end of a prisoner’s sentence, to ensure that any training undertaken is current and relevant to the local job market on release.

The offender learning and skills service—OLASS—also funds personal and social development, which may include recreational learning, such as music activity. Personal and social development is particularly helpful when engaging with resistant learners who might not participate in more formal learning. In the 2011-12 academic year, there were 580 enrolments on OLASS courses that included music as part of the course title. A range of courses are available, including the awards for music practitioners, in music theory and in sound engineering and music technology.

Aside from learning, prisoners are also able to listen to music in their cells by listening to CDs in their possession or to the radio. As well as the availability of national radio, prison radio is now installed in 102 prisons.

[Guy Opperman]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Minister for giving way. I have appeared on prison radio and experienced its quality in Brixton prison, which is one of the hubs for prison radio, so I would like to say first of all that it is doing a fantastic job and should be supported by the Ministry of Justice. Secondly, I can assure the House that although my book, quite rightly, cannot be posted at random to a prisoner by any person, however esteemed, it is available in prisons via the usual channels and is being read.

[Mr Vara]

I am sure that those prisoners who are regular and avid readers of Hansard will take note of that plug for my hon. Friend’s book, which is easily available in the relevant prison libraries. I note what he said about the prison radio service, which is available in many prisons. The Prison Radio Association delivers national prison radio, and prison radio tutors work with prisoners to develop new and innovative content. As well as output that is focused on reducing reoffending and encouraging engagement with education, training and opportunities in prison, music is broadcast. Many individual prison governors also engage with local community and voluntary sector organisations, which facilitate music-based activities.

There is plenty of music to be heard in our prisons. I recognise, however, that the hon. Member for Cardiff West is particularly concerned about changes that we have made to the incentives and earned privileges policy framework and what those changes might mean for prisoners who want to play guitars. It important that I explain the intention behind the changes and what they mean in practice.

The policy on incentives and earned privileges underwent a thorough and detailed review, the first such review for more than 10 years, to ensure that the revised framework would properly address reoffending and that the public could have confidence in it. The review of the policy included extensive consultation with prison operational staff.

Since the changes came into effect on 1 November 2013, the absence of bad behaviour has no longer been enough to earn privileges; now prisoners must also work towards their own rehabilitation and help others. The focus on rehabilitation resulted in numerous other changes to the framework. For example, prisoners can no longer sit in their cells watching television when they should be out working or in education, and they can no longer spend much of their days in the gym.

An important part of our changes was ensuring that prisons operate to a consistent standard in allowing privileges to prisoners who have earned them. That is why we introduced the standardised facilities list, which identifies and limits the items of property that prisoners can retain in their cells, subject to their IEP level. The list is available for each governor to select from as they consider suitable to the specific population, physical fabric and regime of the prison.

The changes have not prevented prisoners from playing musical instruments. The greater the commitment a prisoner shows to the requirements of the IEP framework, the more money they can earn from working, the more they are allowed to spend and the greater the range of property they are allowed to have. Prisoners who work hard, engage and achieve standard and enhanced levels can purchase a musical instrument to keep in their possession at the governor’s discretion. Prisoners who do not engage are not permitted to possess a musical instrument. The standardised facilities list sets out a number of different instruments that prisoners can purchase: for example, a flute, a harmonica or an acoustic guitar.

The hon. Member for Cardiff West is particularly concerned about the position in respect of prisoner access to guitars and the type of strings permitted. Prisoners on the standard and enhanced levels of the IEP framework can be allowed an acoustic guitar with nylon strings. For the bass notes, that can include nylon strings with metal coiled around the outside. Guitar strings can be issued on a one-for-one basis, subject to risk assessments. Full metal guitar strings are not permitted. As I have mentioned, the revised policy was subject to a significant amount of consultation with the operational line and other interested parties. The consultation extended to the contents of the standardised list itself. In the light of security concerns, a decision was made not to allow full metal strings.

[Kevin Brennan]

I am grateful for that information. As far as I am aware, that is the first time that Ministers have mentioned any security concerns. If that is the case—incidentally, I hope to persuade the Minister that there need not be with regard to nylon strings—why is that not indicated in the National Offender Management Service list of items and restrictions, and why is there no security “S” flag on the document?

[Mr Vara]

I am not saying that there is no security risk with nylon strings, because I think it is acknowledged that there is. It is just felt that there is a greater risk with metal strings. As for the specifics that the hon. Gentleman requires, I am mindful of the time limit on this debate and keen to put as much on record as I can, but I am happy to return to the issue later.

[Kevin Brennan]

Before the Minister moves on, there are six minutes left and this is the heart of the matter. The NOMS document does not say that there is a security concern. I would be grateful if, following this debate, he would send me the details of the concern and of how it was raised during the consultation, and perhaps indicate why it is not signalled in the NOMS document. However, I am grateful for his earlier offer of a meeting with the Minister to discuss it further.

[Mr Vara]

I am certainly happy to follow up on this debate by supplying the information that the hon. Gentleman has requested and providing the explanations that he has sought.

I am keen to get everything on the record in the limited time that I have. The hon. Gentleman referred to electric guitars, particularly with reference to a letter that he had received. The standardised list does not allow prisoners to have electric guitars in their possession. It was certainly not the case before the standardised facilities list came into effect that prisons routinely allowed prisoners to have electric guitars in their possession; it has always been more usual for prisoners to have access to electric guitars in a supervised setting. I know that charities such as Jail Guitar Doors have donated numerous electric guitars to prisons over the past few years. Those guitars are most often kept in educational or chaplaincy departments for prisoners to use in a supervised environment, rather than kept by individual prisoners. It is important to be clear that none of the changes involved in IEP should have affected the use of electric guitars and other musical instruments in a supervised setting. The changes to IEP involve the property that prisoners can possess in their cells.

Inevitably, when deciding what items prisoners can possess, there will be a variety of views on whether particular items should be allowed. We are clear, however, that the items that we have included on the standardised facilities list provide a suitable range from which governors can select so that prisoners can be rewarded consistently and appropriately for engaging with the requirements of the IEP policy framework and that, with appropriate access to musical instruments, the quality of their lives can be improved and their chances of successful rehabilitation enhanced.

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman again on securing this debate, and I reiterate the assurance that I made at the outset that I will facilitate the meeting he requested with the Prisons Minister and follow up with the outstanding information mentioned in this debate.