The Strategy To Raise Standards In British Prisons

The Strategy To stick out Standards In British PrisonsPolitical and Academic matter to in the privatization of British Prisons has steadily risen since its sudden revival during the 1980s and 1990s. This interest has been precipitated by a fast rise in the prison nation and the at one time related escalation of hurry be and difficulties of cart track a consistently streamlined dish. Privatization was seen by m whatever policy-makers as providing an important step forward towards improve conditions, bringing about channel and innovation, and ameliorate the overall attribute of the British prison system. The sequeste cherry-red atomic number 18a was believed to be capable of delivering a go standard of service with greater efficacy and a higher level of accountability. Subsequently, the last decade has seen a steady growth of common soldier orbit exponentiation in the British prison system. This essay provide attempt the argument that privatization offers an important strategy to raise standards deep down Britains prisons and consider roughly(prenominal) problems associated with this approach.The privatisation of corrections is now understood to mean well-nigh form of the self- falsify or management of prisons by hole-and-corner(a) corporations. The role of the closed-door orbit in contemporary corrections is, however, much broader than this narrow definition. Savas (1987) points out that the buck toffee-nosed domain is involved in corrections in five transpargonnt ways. It whitethorn (1) finance and construct prisons (2) operate facilities for juveniles (3) operate facilities for adults (4) provide playact for prisoners, and (5) provide specific shoveual go, such as health burster and vocational education for inmates and staff.The recent move towards the privatization of British prisons has been largely base on the substantial increase of the prison population. Between 1993 and 1996 the UK prison population increase fr om 43,000 to 54,000, a rate of about 100 per 100,000 of the entire population. This rapid rise has led to far-flung overcrowding and a decrease in standards, make living conditions for many prisoners highly unpleasant. Prisoners overall health has deteriorated and suicide and self-mutilation order gestate climbed rapidly. Added to this, staff morale has in any case fallen and widespread skepticism of the value and objective of prisoner programmes has grown. It has been clear for some time that widespread changes and new strategies be needed in order to tackle the problems within the prison system. The main priorities for improving the system have included increase prison capacity, introducing working practices that atomic number 18 more accommodating and flexible for prison and probation staff and the need for greater accountability from those responsible for running prison services. The introduce that all this could be achieved at substantially lowerd costs simply by enco uraging greater private sector involvement in the delivery of punishable policy has been increasingly seen by some as a quick fix solution to many of the punishable systems most pressing problems (Cavadino Dignan, 2002 227)It is important to now look at how it is proposed that privatizing Britains prisons will lead to such improvements in standards. Supporters of the privatization of Britains prisons argue that in that respect argon a number of potential benefits directly associated with the commercial competition that privatization would produce. For example, through the founding of a market force private organisations would be encouraged to hold up and indeed improve upon high standards of cost effectiveness and efficiency in order to achieve the successful renewal of current government entreats and to repugn for new service contracts. Logan Rausch (1985) suggest that due to the way they are financed existence sector organisations are inefficient and ineffective. As the pr ivate sector is motivate by competition and profit it is dedicated to providing maximum satisfaction to its clients and customers at a minimum cost. Alternatively, in the mankind sector bureaucrats are rewarded not according to the performance of their organization but according to the size and calculate of their agencies, thus they are more interested in empire construction than in increasing their efficiency. Beyens Snacken also examine this point, arguing that Proponents claim that privatization is the beat way to decrease costs and construct new, better designed prisons more quickly. By introducing the element of competition and new management techniques, better quality for less money can be achieved. It is stated that private punitory services can operate more efficiently, because of less bureaucratic red tape and a higher motive to control costs.Privatization, many claim leads to heightened accountability within the prison system. It is argued that the government is in an ideal military strength to impose strict guidelines and include detailed service standards within contracts, devising companies readily accountable and putting them at risk of financial penalties for sorrow to fulfil them. As the government no longer have to press its own shortcomings it can be more active in intriguing private companies for helplessness to meet contractual obligations. approximately private contractors induce and appreciate the value of full time independent monitors who are pose within private prisons acting as an additional guarantee of contract compliance. Public sector prisons do not have similar amply independent monitors. Also, healthy competition between private sector rivals would also have a regulatory effect as agencies are fain to monitor each others performance for weaknesses and failings in order to gain a commercial advantage.It is clear that the primary rationale for passing the management of prisons into private hands is that they are expected to operate at lower running costs than those controlled by the Home Office. If success is to be measured on effective cost-cutting and meeting required standards of service, turn outers of privatization are convinced that a keep up push in this direction will produce positive results. It has been estimated that the running costs of private prisons are 15-25 per cent below those of state prisons (Tilt, 1995). A prison review in 1997, stated that privately run prisons on medium, offered an operational cost saving of 8-15 per cent. A Parliamentary Select charge in 1996-97 looked at the management of offenders in the public and private sectors. It inform that an expansion of the private sector would lead to an increase in efficiency in the public sector. It concluded that private prisons were operating well in terms of quality of performance, and that their overall performance was as good as, and in some cases better than, publicly administered prisons.However, critics ar gue that recent improvements in the efficiency of public sector prisons have led to a continuous restricting in the operating cost saving offered by privately operated prisons so that by 1998 the differential had been reduced to 2-11 per cent (Woodbridge, 1999). Those against privatization also argue that any reduced running costs comes at a high outlay to the detriment of the number of staff employed, staff wages, conditions of employment and working conditions (Joyce, 2001221). For example, it has been account that contracted-out prisons, often favouring high technology security measures, have on average 16 per cent fewer staff per prisoner than public sector prisons. Also profit and conditions for staff at private sector prisons are often poor in comparison with the public sector. Salaries are 14 per cent lower and members of staff deliver on average 10 per cent more working hours per week. These ciphers may account to some percentage point for the high levels of staff turno ver at private prisons, reported to be approximately 30 per cent.The usefulness of privatization and indeed its principles have been widely criticised and legion(predicate) problems that it potentially produces have been identified. Firstly, many critics focus the emphasis on the tralatitious notion of privatization a concept already partially discredited in the western world because of its association with inflated profiteering and the abandonment of the public interest (Harding, 1997 1). It is heavily argued that the running of Britains prisons for profit has very negative consequences. This serious criticism of privatization is that the profit motive is entirely incompatible with successful prison administration. In order to make profit, private organisations are dependent on receiving a continually high supply of inmates into their institutions. There are numerous examples of how this may affect the treatment of offenders and prisoners. Early release times for prisoners may potentially be discouraged or ignored when prison numbers are relatively low. Also, government and other leading political policy-makers may be inclined to put pressure on legislators to create directives and pass acts that are both decisively custody based and increasingly punitive. Another factor that must be taken into account due to the reliance of private contractors on prisoner numbers for profit is the issue of overcrowding. One of the tombstone ideas promoting privatization is the improvement of standards and living conditions for prisoners, private prisons may develop a style towards increasing prisoner numbers in order to raise get leading to overcrowding and its inherent problems This argument clearly reveals how the underlying commercial motivation of private organisations can have serious repercussions for the manner in which private prisons are run, posing serious and seemingly unanswerable questions to those who absolutely support privatization.Another major concer n with privatization is that there will be an increased emphasis on security, to the detriment of attempts to reform or rehabilitate prisoners. The contract between the Home Office and a private company does not require the contractor to help inmates lead good and useful lives (Joyce, 2001 221). Most criminologists agree that the rehabilitation and education of prisoners is a crucial function of the penal system. It is hard to disagree with both Durham (1989) and Shichor (1995) who maintain that the changing penal trend away from rehabilitation and training towards containment, incapacitation and deterrence has hastened the acceptance of privatization as a viable policy option. From a financial perspective, more prisons operator more outlay. Prisons are expensive capital items with high running costs. Thus, there is considerable attraction in any policy designed to reduce those costs. In addition, the incapacitation or protection of the public function is an easier administrative undertaking to hand over to private companies and their employees than the treatment and training of offenders (Genders, 2002). By failing to provide any rehabilitation and training to offenders, private prisons acquire institutions with the sole function of punishing prisoners through incapacitation for profit.Another potentially serious colliery of widespread privatization is that the government may sire reliant on the services of a handful of powerful companies this could result in the government to some extent being held to ransom and thus be forced to pay higher prices in order to continually increase the profits of the private sector organisations. This potential problem is magnified where private prison operators are contracted to take over the entire running of an institution, including initially building it, owning it and managing it, as is now to be the case for all future day tendered contracts in England and Wales. A key question that abides unanswered is whether, in remain paymaster but delegating service delivery, the state truly does retain control over standards whether in fact there still is present that detail of public accountability and control that must always be demand when the state exercises its ultimate power of restraint and punishment over the citizen ( Harding, 1997 2)?A final criticism of privatization is based on the limited indicators of how private prisons have performed up to now. Despite the previously discussed increased emphasis on a security focused approach within private prisons, it seems that there are serious control issues within them. Virtually all privately-managed prisons have experience serious control problems, at least during the initial period afterward opening. In most cases the problems appear to have been more severe, and more intractable, than would commonly be expected in the case of a comparably newly-commissioned public sector prison (Cavadino Dignan, 2002 247)In conclusion, the involvement of the private sector in Britains prison system has so far been limited to the delivery of special(a) services the government has retained responsibility for producing and implementing changes in policy and for monitor the performance and standards of private prisons. Proponents of privatization claim that it has and can continue to improve standards of service and efficiency, whilst also cutting running costs. As Tabarrok (2003 10) argues We now know that private prisons can be built more quickly, operated at lower cost, and maintained at a quality level at least as high as government-run prisons. However, many writers dispute such claims and believe that a continued government policy towards privatization as a method of improving the British prison service is deeply flawed and may bugger off a barrier to developing a programme of fundamental change aimed at improving the standards of the whole of the prison system. Privatization as an ideology and as a practice is not only unli kely to provide a remedy for the malaise affecting the prison system it could easily become a major part of the problem (Cavadino Dignan, 2002 255). Despite serious criticisms the future of private prisons is not clear. We do not know whether it will become a viable alternative to government run prisons or remain a small segment of the correctional system as it is today, or if it will be only a temporary phenomenon (Schihor, 1995 18). Overall, whether private sector involvement in running Britains prisons increases or decreases in the long-term mud to be seen. It is clear, however, that the debate surrounding the subject will continue to lucubrate at least until clear indicators of the performance of private prisons are revealed. Evidence, so far, provides few answers. As Liebling Sparks, (2002 283) conclude some(prenominal) former doubters and critics have been converted. Some predicted disasters have not transpired and many privately managed institutions appear on uncommitte d indicators to have operated at least as well (or put other way no worse than) their directly managed counterparts.ReferencesBeyens, K. Snacken, S. (1996) Prison Privatization An International purview in Matthews, R. Francis, P. (eds.) (1996) Prisons 2000 An International placement on the Current State and proximo of Imprisonment, Basingstoke MacMillan Press Ltd.Cavadino, M. Dignan, J. (2002) The Penal System An Introduction (3rd edition), London Sage Publications Ltd.Genders, E. 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