To officially record the historical achievement of record levels of violence in UK prisons I have applied for a Guinness World Record for UK Minister of Prisons Rory Stewart.
In a bizarre turn of events the Ministry of Justice issued this press release which makes me question what reality the Ministry of Justice is experiencing because I doubt it is the same reality that 83,000 prison officers across the country are experiencing. Especially the officer that had his throat cut at a prison involved in the Ten Prisons Project:
Its worth noting that in a recent list of the top ten most violent prisons in the country, none of the prisons in the Ten Prisons project appear on the list. It seems to be the case that the phrase "Ten most challenging prisons" used to describe the prisons selected for the intervention is quite misleading to say the least. To not include HMP Aylesbury in the Ten Prisons project, recently described as the most violent prison in the country indicates the lacklustre of the intervention.
In stark contrast to the current catastrophic failings in the prison service, where apparently the primary £70 million pound intervention is attempting to reduce violence by:
Improving security (cameras etc)
Improving drug detection
Moving more experienced officers into the Ten Prisons (presumably from prisons with high rates of violence)
Coaching staff
Redecorating the prisons (improving "decency")
i.e. Not a single intervention actually aimed at reducing violence, I thought it prudent to add a diagram illustrating the results of a Cure Violence adaptation I implemented in HMYOI Cookham Wood (youth prison) within a year.
For those who are actually serious about reducing violence I have added a copy of the scientific evaluation of the Cure Violence adaptation which illustrates the methods with which we achieved historic reductions in violence.
It is also worth noting that by 2016, three years after the Cure Violence adaptation left the prison, HMYOI Cookham Wood earned its place as the second most violent prison in the country.
The text from the article below highlights the issue of looking at the children as criminals and thugs instead of individuals infected with the contagion of violence. When the Cure Violence adaptation was in place at the prison the public health participants, (the prisoners) achieved historic reductions in violence.
