Sir, There can be few more important and demanding jobs than governing a prison. After a highly critical snap inspection of HMP Woodhill by the Chief Inspector of Prisons, the existing governor has departed (report, Feb 7) and a new one has arrived to pursue good order, basic safety and constructive activity.
To do this the Prison Service has hauled out the governor of Wormwood Scrubs prison to take charge of Woodhill. Luke Serjeant was moved at just a few days’ notice after serving only 17 months at Wormwood Scrubs, where he was leading on resettlement for all the London prisons.
This will inevitably lead to a series of moves by pivotal governors and forms part of a pattern in which many senior managers are not enabled to stay for a sufficient time to develop a decent regime in any one establishment.
With overcrowded jails badly in need of continuity and leadership across the country, this kneejerk reaction is crisis management at its worst.
In 2004 the average tenure for governing governors in an establishment was one year and nine months. Prisons are our least visible, most neglected, public service. It is salutary to think what the public reaction would be if headteachers were moved from school to school in this way.
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The Prison Service must improve recruitment, retention and succession planning if it is ever to have enough people to do the essential, and often under-regarded, job of running our prisons.
JULIET LYON
Director
Prison Reform Trust
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Sir, Far from there being a “deep institutional reluctance” to accept that tough measures deter crime (Comment, Feb 2), the reality is that our courts give out some of the toughest and longest prison sentences in the Western world.
So why does the view persist that this is weak? When you consider that only some 2 per cent of all known crime results in a conviction (most of it never reaches a court), then the view that weak sentencing is a contribution to an ineffective justice system does not seem so convincing.
The latest statistics show that reoffending after a prison sentence has risen to 67 per cent within two years of release, while for community sentencing the comparable figure is 14 per cent lower. Neither figure is satisfactory but the difference is significant.
Being tough on crime is a policy direction that has to some extent been addressed. Being tough on the causes needs more thought and investment.
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MARTIN WARGENT
Chief Executive
Probation Boards’ Association