Letter to the Clerk of the Committee from
the Director General of the Northern Ireland Prison Service
KEY PERFORMANCE
INDICATORS FOR
ASSAULTS ON
STAFF AND
PRISONERS
That you for your letter of 21 December about
the above.
As you state, the Stage Two Report of the Quinquennial
Review commented that the targets chosen in Northern Ireland of
five per hundred prisoners for assaults on staff and 9.5 per hundred
prisoners for assault on other prisoners appear to compare unfavourably
with the corresponding targets in Scotland, ie 2.8 and 26 per
thousand prisoners.
The definition below is used by the Scottish
Prison Service (SPS):
"When the victim has sustained an injury
resulting in detention in hospital as an inpatient, or any of
the following injuries whether or not detained in hospital: fractures,
concussion, internal injuries, crushing, severe cuts or lacerations,
severe bruising, burns or scalds, or severe general shock requiring
medical treatment."
At our Prison Service Seminar held on 26 October
2000 senior managers in the Service and representatives from each
of the three trade unions considered the application of the SPS
definition and targets to measure good order and control in establishments.
It was concluded that the SPS definition would exclude the vast
majority of assaults in our establishments which are not serious
enough to be captured by it and thus would provide too restricted
an indicator of the level of order and control.
However, it was recognised that the existing
Key Performance Indicator did not provide a complete picture as
it merely reflected the number of incidents of assault rather
than the number of staff and prisoners assaulted—sometimes
an incident involves more than one victim. Therefore from April
2001 we will be measuring:
(a) number of staff assaulted by prisoners;
and
(b) number of prisoners assaulted by prisoners.
I trust the above clarifies our position but
should the Committee require any further information please do
not hesitate to contact me.
3 January 2001
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