Supplementary evidence from the National Offender Management Service following the evidence session on 2 December 2014 (PPP 58)
I am writing to follow up the requests made for further information by members of the Justice Select Committee at its oral evidence hearing on 2 December in the inquiry into Prisons: Planning and Policies, and to comment on one specific point relating to the laundry at Wormwood Scrubs.
Following your letter on 17 December, the Minister for Prisons, Probation and Rehabilitation, Andrew Selous MP, will respond shortly on the additional information requested by the Committee.
1. Q 385 to 387. The survey to which I referred was the National Offender Management Service 2014 Staff Engagement Survey. It was open online for the whole of October 2014 and paper copies were also provided to prison staff at an earlier stage. It is part of the Civil Service-wide People Survey which is carried out each year by ORC International who are an independent market research company. It is our way (and the cross Civil Service) of measuring the engagement levels of our staff and provides a confidential opportunity for staff to express their views on the organisation they work for. The survey results give a critical insight into the things we can do to improve staff members’ experience of work and to provide a working environment conducive to success. They enable us to identify areas where changes are working, and where there are improvements still to be made.
The survey results are published online at this address:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/civil-service-people-survey-results
As you will see, the results are broken down into the distinct business areas of the Ministry of Justice and the National Offender Management Service, and so include a specific report on the Prison Service. As I said during the oral hearing, 44% of Prison Service staff responded (14,886 staff in total) and of course it is important that we take note of the POA well-being survey of its own members, but it represents a much smaller sample than our own survey generated.
As the results show the overall engagement score for prison staff was 46% and this is 1% lower than it was in 2013. The reduction no doubt reflects the extent of change across the service and the pressures staff have been under in the last year but still demonstrates a strong level of engagement overall. It is significant, for example, that 57% of respondents said they wished to stay working for the Prison Service for the next three years which was higher than the Civil Service-wide score of 46% for 2014. We are committed to responding to the survey outcomes and doing everything possible to improve engagement over the next 12 months.
2. Q 394 and 396. Jeremy Corbyn MP asked for a short note on the progress of prisoners working, and the conditions under which they work.
The number of prisoners working in industrial activity reported by public sector prisons increased from around 8,600 in 2010-11 to around 9,900 in 2013-14, an increase of 15%.
Over the same period the total number of hours worked increased by 33%, from 10.6 million to 14.2 million in public sector prisons.
This excludes activity such as cooking, serving meals, maintenance and cleaning, and work placements undertaken by offenders on release on temporary licence.
Private sector prisons have also been supporting this agenda and have reported that they delivered over 1½ million prisoner working hours in commercial and industrial workshops in 2012-13 which provided work for over 1,200 prisoners.
Prisoners also take part in a large number of other activities including education, training and offending behaviour programmes. Under the revised Incentives and Earned Privileges scheme, prisoners are required to engage in work activity where this is available in order to earn privileges. This reinforces our policy objective.
Our programmes are supporting the introduction of additional activity. One of the main drivers of benchmarking and the new core day is to increase the time that prisoners can undertake appropriate and meaningful work, training and education to enable employment on release to their home areas. The new operating benchmarks being rolled out across the estate will provide a new ‘core day’ designed to optimise the time available to provide good regimes and to staff them efficiently. For example this has led to additional time being found for prisoners to spend on activities instead of being locked up and then unlocked at lunchtime. Benchmark reports incorporate staffing resources for escorting to and patrolling activity areas.
The Benchmark for Phase 1 prisons (Local prisons and Category C prisons) will provide enhanced regimes with additional Activity Places. Work and training is being shaped in each prison to match the employment market opportunities in the areas where the prisoners are to resettle on release. In Category C prisons, prisoners will be unlocked for 10¼ hours from Monday to Friday and for 8 hours at weekends, Many sites are already delivering (or are close to delivering) this provision. Following the last inspection of HM Prison Featherstone the Chief Inspector said “Most prisoners had more than 10 hours out of their cell each week day.” “Most men at Featherstone could expect to make good progress in a decent environment and the excellent activity on offer would prepare them well for future employment.” In Local prisons, prisoners will be unlocked for 91/4 midweek and for 8 hours at weekends, In the last inspection of HM Prison Liverpool the Chief Inspector said “Time out of cell was reasonable for most prisoners and the daily routine was now more predictable with little evident slippage”. “A greater range of opportunities was offered compared with the previous inspection”. “Most prisoners had access to a sufficient range of opportunities to develop vocational skills and achieve qualifications that could help them gain employment on release.”
We are currently recruiting additional instructional officers to enhance the work provision. This is proving more problematic in certain trades and locations than others. Where necessary, pay is being boosted by a recruitment and retention premium and we have commissioned our recruitment supplier, Havas, to use headhunting processes to fill remaining posts.
Prisons vary in the numbers of prisoners engaged in industrial activity for a number of reasons, mainly the category and role of the prison and the types of prisoner available to work. For example the transient nature of the prisoner population in local establishments, as well as the requirements of commercial customers, mean that this is a more challenging, and often less suitable environment into which to introduce work. The physical capacity of prisons – primarily available space and operating environment – is an additional limiting factor. Many prisons were built without large workshops. Some prisons are additionally constrained by not taking work away from the local population.
Prison workshops provide a range of work and ensure that the obligations such as health and safety are met as part of the working arrangements. A number of establishments are now ISO accredited to the same levels as those expected in the community.
The Employers Forum for Reducing Reoffending (EFFRR) is co-financed by NOMS and the European Social Fund to bring together a wide range of employers and stakeholders who are interested in working with offenders to get them into sustainable employment. The Forum is chaired by James Timpson.
At the heart of EFFRR is the Leadership Group which involves major employers such as Timpsons, Greggs, and DHL, who are already committed to providing opportunities for prisoner both in and out of custody and who offer support and mentoring to new members to the Forum.
This level of business to business support is an effective method of getting across our message that employing offenders is more than a social good but can provide a committed and competent workforce. Employers on the forum have reported to have employed over 1500 offenders in the past 3 years.
Laundry at Wormwood Scrubs
I wanted to follow up one specific point that the Committee raised in relation to the laundry at Wormwood Scrubs. At Q395, Jeremy Corbyn MP said that the laundry was unable to operate properly because prisoners could not get out to work it. A new industrial washing machine was installed in the Wormwood Scrubs laundry in 2012, providing increased operational capacity. Consequently the laundry now delivers a full washing service not only to Wormwood Scrubs but also to Wandsworth and Feltham prisons.
There was a temporary shortage of prisoner workers in November and there are normal interruptions on occasion due to operational issues but the laundry has continued to operate throughout and is currently meeting its service delivery requirements. There is scope to further increase work in the laundry if we can source external commercial contracts to supplement the prison laundry work. This has been a significant challenge given the competitive external market but we will continue to seek such opportunities to expand work where we can.
For completeness I should add that as part of the benchmarking process, the Officer Instructors in the laundry are being replaced by non-operational instructors. That recruitment has started but is not yet complete so at present some Officers remain there. The core staffing at the moment is one Officer Instructor and two non-operational instructors. A further Officer Instructor provides cover when required.
3. Q399. Nick de Bois MP asked for data on the number of prisoners who had been downgraded under the Incentives and Earned Privileges scheme.
Based on data provided by prisons, in November 2014 the average percentage of prisoners on the different levels of the Incentives and Earned Privileges (IEP) national policy framework were as follows:
In October 2013, the last month before the revised IEP policy framework came into effect, and so before Entry level was introduced, the figures were as follows:
As I indicated in my oral evidence to the Committee on 2 December, the aim is that prisoners on Basic level will not remain there for long periods of time; prisoners on Basic are reviewed within seven days and, if they have not demonstrated that they are suitable for progression, reviews take place every 28 days thereafter. As I also explained in my evidence, it is to be expected that the proportion of prisoners on Enhanced level will have fallen since the revised IEP policy came into effect, since more is now expected from prisoners before they can reach that level.
January 2015