FINDING FREEDOM IN JAIL (LTE 3)

Given the link between drugs (including alcohol) and crime, the Prison
Service would be failing in its duty to the public if it did not seek to
provide treatment to the addicts in its charge. It is surely appropriate,
therefore, that the service intends to increase substantially the level of
treatment provision in this area. What concerns us, however, is the quality
of that provision.

Of the 36 new programmes the service intends to put in place over the next
year, 14 will be developed and run on an entirely in-house basis, with most
of the rest involving only limited input from outside. But the Prison
Service plans to run its programmes using non-specialist custody staff and
appears to have made little provision for their training or supervision.
Furthermore, recent research commissioned by the service itself questions
its ability to deliver in this area when compared with outside agencies.

When there is so much knowledge and expertise in the wider community, is
the public really being best served by the Prison Service keeping so much
of the money set aside for drug treatment under the Comprehensive Spending
Review to itself?

Simon Shepherd Chief executive, European Association for the Treatment of
Addiction