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12 Feb 2003 : Column 305WH—continued
Ex-offenders (Post-release Support)
3.30 pm
Mr. Steve Webb (Northavon): I should like to raise the issue of provision for people who leave custody and who have a history of drug problems. My raising it is prompted by the tragic case of a 20-year-old young man, Sean Wildman, who sadly and almost certainly unnecessarily died on the streets of Bristol shortly before Christmas 2002. It is worth putting my remarks into a national context because, although Sean's case is tragic, I do not believe that it is isolated, and there is clearly a national problem, that needs to be addressed. I was talking to a representative of the Prison Service in my area yesterday, who told me that more than four in five of the new inmates who entered Horfield prison in Bristol in December 2002 had some sort of drug addiction problem. There is clearly a widespread problem of people entering prisons, especially young offenders, with some drug problem.
What happens in prisons can be very good, but what happens when people leave prison often lets them down. In last Sunday's edition of The Observer, an officer standing in the gym at Pentonville prison is quoted as saying:
- "These guys look pretty well, don't they? They come in here like skeletons—the crack diet, we call it. Here we give them exercise and decent food. It's like a health farm. The problem starts again at the prison gate. I hate to say it, but most of them will be back a few months later, looking like skeletons again."
In other words, there is provision inside prisons. I shall come to Sean's case in a moment. What went badly wrong in his case seems to concern the link between what happened inside prison and what happened when he left. I do not doubt that there are often good intentions and that things are meant to work well. I have a board of visitors handbook in my hand, which says:
- "Preparation for release should begin in the early stages of any prison sentence."
In other words, and especially in the case of someone who receives a short sentence, one needs to be thinking right at the beginning about what will happen when they are released. That is obviously good practice. I also have a document produced by the Prison Service called "Male Prisoners and Young Offenders" which says to a young offender:
- "Your personal officer (if you have one) will be able to help you to prepare for release through your sentence plan."
- "Re-integration planning was poor and there was little in place to prepare children and young people for release. Training plan conferences had become merely a form filling process."
I am sure that the intentions are good. There is no desire to let people down, yet what happens when people are released often seems to do so.
Earlier this week, the Home Office announced new initiatives that might begin to address some of the concerns that I am raising. I am grateful for the fact that the Minister took the time to brief me and other hon. Members about those welcome pilot schemes, which I
wish well. My only observation is that they are pilots, due to start in 2004, and will be evaluated over a three-year period. Although I fully accept that a pilot must be properly evaluated, which cannot be done overnight, the process will not be concluded before 2007. Today, I want to ask not only what happened to Sean Wildman, and how we can avoid that happening again, but more generally how we can be sure before the pilots are evaluated that there will not be more cases such as his in the immediate future. It might be helpful if I tell Sean's story. I advised the Minister that I intended to do so.Sean's family home was in Charlfield, in my constituency, where his father, Peter, still lives—I spoke to him this morning. I have also met Sally, his mother, who now lives in Taunton, and have spoken to her about their son's death. Sean was 20 years old when he went into Exeter prison in September 2002 with a relatively short sentence, having been convicted on burglary and other charges. I am not convinced that the prison is being very forthcoming about what happened, as even family members have had problems in obtaining documents and finding out what happened to their son, but so far as can be told, he acknowledged his drug problem on entering the prison, and a programme of treatment was arranged. I see the Minister nodding to that.
Sean's history of drug problems had put a great strain on his relationship with his parents at various times. He appears to have received help at Exeter prison from what is known as the CARAT—counselling, assessment, referral advice and through-care—team. I am told by my local drugs action team that, originally, funding for CARAT teams was made available with the intention of providing services for people not only while they were in prison, but for eight weeks after their release. Will the Minister clarify whether that was the original intention, whether it is still the intention and why that appears not to be happening?
Sean left prison on 19 November and, tragically, by 4 December he was dead. He died homeless, on the streets of Bristol, of a heroin overdose. Almost double the lethal dose was in his body. The question that we should all ask ourselves is how that could happen. Many institutions and public authorities are involved. I should like to examine the role of each.
My strong impression is that the authorities at Exeter prison failed effectively to liaise with the agencies that were to be responsible for taking on Sean's care after his release. First, they failed to put him in touch with the right bodies; they gave him details of a reintegration service—which is a good thing—but it was in Gloucestershire. Sean's family home is not in the county of Gloucestershire; it is in the South Gloucestershire unitary authority, which is nothing to do with Gloucestershire and has no contact with it. Apparently, he said that he would be living at an address in Bristol, so why did Exeter tell the Gloucestershire reintegration service about him? Even if it had been the right service, why was the fax sent only a few days before his release? Gloucestershire reintegration service, which I am sure provides a good service, prefers a month's notice so as to get to know the person in order to support him. Why was only a few days' notice given? Similarly, why did
Exeter prison give Sean the details of a project called the Emmaeus project in Bristol, which is not even open yet? Why did the prison not know what was going on?The Big Issue South West, which supported Sean by helping him to keep body and soul together after his release, has suggested that prisons such as Exeter might have online access to up-to-date information about which services are available for which client groups in which parts of the region. Although some information is available, the people in Exeter did not put Sean in touch with the right agencies.
At one stage, Sean lived in Stoke Gifford in South Gloucestershire. The drugs action team for the area is based in Stoke Gifford and runs just the sorts of services that could have helped him, but it did not know that he existed. It found out about him only after his death. Why did Exeter prison not put him in touch with the right authorities instead of giving him duff information?
When Sean was released on licence, why did the prison governor at Exeter not refer in the licence to the drug problems? The probation service has told me that it was not aware of Sean's drug problem—nor did it know about his homelessness until he turned up and said, "I have nowhere to live." I understand that Sean did not want it to know about his drug problem. The question that I ask about the system, therefore, is why are people not told when inmates consent or volunteer to begin a drug-treatment process in prison? Why is it not a condition that support services will be notified post-release—in other words, that ex-prisoners will be required to consent to ongoing support after release? Had that happened, the probation service would have known that Sean had a drug problem. Someone in the South Gloucestershire drugs action team should have known. The probation service told me this morning that it did not know that he had a drug problem.
I shall deal with the role of the probation service in a moment, but between his leaving prison and his death, Sean saw a probation officer three times in less than three weeks. It did not become apparent to the probation service until too late that he had a drug problem, but it could not do anything about it because nothing in the terms of his licence required him to have any drug treatment. I query why the prison sent Sean to the wrong places; I query why the licence did not refer to his drug problem; and I query how much care the prison showed him.
I have with me a letter to Sean's mother from Devon prison partnership, dated 21 January 2003, which says:
- "In answer to your query, I can confirm your son was released . . . on 3rd December".
Sean was released well over two weeks before that, so either Exeter prison had the wrong person or that was just another cock-up. I appreciate that prisons have to deal with huge numbers of young people and that there is a huge turnover—that is the subject of another debate—but it would help if the Minister would clarify whether the medical information that the prison gave to Mrs. Wildman was about Sean and not about someone else. The family deserve an apology for the fact that the prison could not get correct even basic information about Sean.
The other thing that the prison failed to act on was the fact that Sean had been homeless before he went into prison. It appears to have done little to check his address. He gave an address in the middle of Bristol, but none of the family or anyone else seem to know where it was, and he seems not to have intended to live there. He had not lived there before, and he had a record of being homeless before going to prison. Nevertheless, with negligible support, Exeter prison pushed him out of the door—a crude way of putting it—to an address about which it knew nothing. Despite such a lack of evidence and his record of homelessness, the prison did not tell the probation service that homelessness might be a problem. I query the prison's role, and I hope that the Minister will ensure that it cannot wash its hands of Sean Wildman by saying that he was not the prison's problem. There should be a thorough investigation of what went wrong.
The probation service saw Sean three times in three weeks. It did not know that he was homeless until he turned up and told them. It then referred him to Bristol council, but single, homeless, ex-offenders with drug records do not do very well in the housing stakes. The probation service tells me that it has a limited number of hostels, that—guess what—it needs to be told that someone is coming, and that no one told it about Sean. The probation service was not told about Sean's drug problem at his request, but I think that it should be a condition of entering the prison drug programme that offenders should consent to follow-up services after release.
Sean turned to The Big Issue South West. I pay tribute to that organisation and those who work there for what they did to support Sean. He was determined to make a success of his life. A support worker said:
- "When Sean first came in he was really confident. He had lots of plans because he was going to have lots of money because he was not using. When I found out he had died I was really angry. It shouldn't have happened."
With the best will in the world, it should not fall to charities to pick up such people. I stress that Sean wanted to stand on his own two feet. He was in a relatively good condition when he left the prison.
After seeing Sean's body, his father said:
- "What really haunted me was when I saw his body lying there and thought: 'This is the Sean that I remember two or three years ago, not the Sean I'd seen ten months earlier . . . he looked something like his old self and why do you die when you are like that?'"
Sean did not want access to drug support services; perhaps he wanted to stand on his own two feet, but tragically he could not. My question is whether the authorities did enough to make sure that someone who may not have wanted to co-operate fully with official programmes none the less received the support that he needed.
Is Exeter prison looking into what happened to Sean Wildman, and learning from it? Is the probation service looking into what happened, and learning from it? Can we ensure that there is more of a follow-through when people come out of prison and enter a community? Can we ensure that the public authorities involved—the prisons, the police, the probation service, the health and local authorities, and the support services are talking to one another and taking responsibility? Despite all the good people working in those agencies, I have been
unable to find anybody who will take responsibility. I hope that the Minister will assure me that steps are being taken to learn the lessons of Sean Wildman's death, and that notwithstanding the very good pilot schemes, which I fully support, steps will be taken immediately to ensure that fewer people meet Sean Wildman's tragic fate.3.45 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Hilary Benn) : I am genuinely grateful to the hon. Member for Northavon (Mr. Webb) for raising the issue and I wish to respond to some of the points that he raised. First, I wish to express my sorrow to Mr. and Mrs. Wildman on the loss of their son; it must be extremely difficult for them. Those of us who have not been through that experience find it almost impossible to imagine what it must be like. I know that the family will be particularly anxious to find out exactly what happened to Sean and the lessons that we can all learn from what happened.
If the hon. Gentleman feels that it may be helpful, I offer to meet him and Mr. and Mrs. Wildman. The most useful thing that we could do to get answers to some of his questions would be to speak to those who were responsible for the care of Sean and who tried to assist him. That would be the most effective way of dealing with the points that were raised.
As the hon. Gentleman acknowledged, the probation service did not have information about Sean's drug problem because Sean himself did not want it passed on, and that is very important. The hon. Gentleman raised the matter of whether we should change the system; that perhaps such considerations should not apply and that when someone goes to prison, information on the treatment and support that they receive should be passed on automatically. I realise that that poses difficult questions about confidentiality, and I see my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw (John Mann) shaking his head. We are where we are because we respect people's right to decide what information about them, their circumstances, and their treatment should be passed on and to whom. However, I recognise that one could take a different approach.
Sean was given a short sentence, so he would normally have received no supervision from the probation service. However, because of his age he was subject to a section 65 supervision notice, as a result of which he saw a probation officer three times. In such difficult situations, the individual, the family, society, the prison and outside services are responsible for providing support. It is a uniquely challenging task because of the life led by some of those who find themselves in the grip of drug addiction. They are not always amenable to doing what is suggested to them; they do not, for example, always keep appointments. That is a difficult process. I say that, by way of preface, to acknowledge the scale of the challenge. It is not as simple as saying, "If only all of those bits had been in place, the outcome may have been very different."
I am anxious, as is the hon. Gentleman, to learn lessons from all individual cases so that we can do better in future. I acknowledge completely that we, as a society, must do better. The case of Sean Wildman raises a big issue for society, because now we know much more
than we used to about the extent of drug addiction and drug-related offending. However, as I said a moment ago, it is hard for us to understand fully the effect that addiction has on individuals. Individuals are imprisoned—literally—by their drug habit. It impacts on their lives and those of their families, yet we see more clearly the impact that addiction has on society because of the effect of drug-related offending.Therefore it is important for us to put time, effort, resources, understanding and learning into trying to tackle the problem. The Government recognise that more must be done, especially to provide post-release support for ex-offenders with drug problems. I learned that early on in my ministerial post when I visited Leeds prison and was told how one day there was a knock on the prison gate, and when it was opened the man standing there said, "Can I come back in?" When he was asked why, the man replied, "I need help, and I know that I can get help quickly in prison. I have been told that I would have to wait for some time on the outside." That is not the usual conversation that one would expect to have at a prison gate.
That story highlights the nature of the challenge that we face. I hope that in the meeting that I have granted the hon. Gentleman, he will come to understand the work that Exeter prison did with Sean Wildman, because, if I may say so, some of the hon. Gentleman's criticisms were unfair, and such a meeting would be a more appropriate way to get to the bottom of the matter than the forum of this debate.
I say that because there has been a transformation in the work that prisons do with offenders with a drug problem. "Transformation" is not a word that I use casually, but if one takes a historical view and goes back 20 years, there has been a transformation. Twenty years ago nothing was done, so it is important that we acknowledge the work that is done today. We are all anxious to make further progress, but at the same time, we must recognise the progress that has been made.
Real progress has been made in prisons, simply because prison officers were the first people to recognise that there was a problem that needed to be dealt with. We do not often pay enough tribute to what I describe as the pioneers within the Prison Service. They saw the problem that confronted them. They saw offenders with drug problems arrive in prison at a time when very little or no support was available. The pioneer programmes developed from there, and, together with Government funding, much better services and support are now available in prisons, including detoxification. From memory, around 32,000 or 33,000 prisoners went through that in the most recent year for which statistics are available—I do not recall whether that was 2002 or 2001. That is a very large figure.
The CARAT system, which did not exist 20 years ago, is now available in all prisons. It is intended to meet the non-clinical needs of the great majority of prisoners and forms the foundation of the prison drug treatment framework. As the hon. Gentleman has told us, Sean received support from the CARAT team at Exeter prison. There are 60 rehabilitation treatment programmes available in the Prison Service, yet because of their duration they are available only to prisoners
who are serving longer sentences. The quality of those treatment programmes is at least equal to anything that is provided in the community.
Mr. Webb : The Minister touches on a point that Mrs. Wildman raised with me. She said that people who receive long sentences because they have done something seriously wrong can get treatment whereas people such as Sean who have done something fairly minor often cannot. Does the Minister think that that is fair? Can anything be done about it?
Hilary Benn : That is a fair question to ask. That is the case because such prison programmes need to run for a certain length of time. With regard to short-sentence prisoners who stay for a very brief period, it is difficult to start something that they might not finish. However, that makes the need for more effective through-care all the greater: I accept that argument without question.
One aspect of CARAT's work is to help to prepare offenders for when they leave prison. An important part of that is to prevent death by overdose. The Prison Service is acutely aware of the risk of such deaths for those who have been off drugs for a long time.
John Mann (Bassetlaw): Will the Minister look at detoxification, and especially at the medical evidence that certain forms of detoxification have a higher propensity than others to lead to death by overdose after they have been undertaken? Will he also examine whether the Prison Service is aware—nationally and in Exeter—of the various research evidence on different forms of detoxification?
Hilary Benn : I will be happy to look into that, and to reply to my hon. Friend and the hon. Member for Northavon, if that would be helpful. The support that is currently available includes one-to-one counselling on the dangers, a video that highlights the risks, and guidance material. That is made available before release because the Prison Service is very conscious of that risk, but we recognise that improvements must be made in linking ex-offenders with community providers.
The CARAT service is able to provide long-stop support for those who have left prison, but it would be the first to acknowledge that it cannot provide the form of through-care that others must pick up, although CARAT will do its best in the circumstances—for example, by making appointments. The Prison Service is conscious of the need to continue to improve communications with external agencies so that information is passed on more effectively.
The hon. Gentleman referred to the Prospects programme, and Bristol is one of the areas where it will be piloted. A number of schemes are already in existence across the country: voluntary organisations have been heavily involved in that work, and there is an issue for local authorities as housing providers.
As the hon. Gentleman knows because he attended my briefing earlier this week, the prospects scheme is specifically aimed at those who have come off drugs in prison. As a result of the mandatory drug testing system that now operates in prisons, the percentage of positive drug tests has halved in the past five or six years. When somebody who has come off drugs in prison—prison
having given them the space, opportunity and support to enable that to happen—the prospects programme directly addresses the issue that has been raised in general by this case, which is the need to provide continuity of support and accommodation.The prospects project will be based in a number of hostels that we will seek to establish in the pilot areas. We aim to have two hostels in Bristol—one for men and the other for women. A crucial factor in determining whether the programme succeeds will be the support of communities because, to be frank, one of the key issues will be obtaining planning permission and community consent for the establishment of hostels.
Another reason why the debate is so important is because it helps to raise awareness of the importance of this issue. Ultimately, the problem comes from society. We pass it on to the Prison Service, the courts, the probation service and the health service to sort it out for us, but we have a role to play too. We all have to take responsibility for being part of the solution to help those who want to change and live their lives differently in the future. The prospects model is genuinely interesting and exciting because, by providing that support and continuity of drug testing to make sure that people continue to keep away from drugs, it will help us to know what will work successfully in providing support to individuals.
I shall finish where I began. We are anxious to learn from experience, especially from such a tragic case. We have made much progress, but we need to do more in the future.
4 pm
Sitting suspended for a Division in the House.
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