This weekend the Liberal Democrats will be meeting in Bournemouth for their annual conference. One of the issues I will be raising with parliamentarians is the story in The Guardian newspaper about cuts to education in prisons. Prisons in England and Wales to cut spending on education courses by up to 50% | Prisons and probation | The Guardian The story says that although the cash value of spending on education in prisons remains the same, the amount of education the cash will buy has inevitably been reduced both by inflation, and the additional costs placed on employers providing the education and skills courses are a result of actions such as the employer’s national Insurance increase.

Regardless of the stupidity of cutting education and skills courses in adult prisons, it is totally unacceptable if the amount of education on offer to the under-18s or indeed the under-21s in custody is to be reduced. I shall be drawing the attention of delegates to this story in the hope that the parliamentary party will take up the issue with the government.  

The Ministry of Justice has been battered with massive cuts for the whole of this century, to a point where parts of our criminal and civil justice systems just aren’t working. Local justice has completely disappeared and, as a result, just to provide one example, shoplifting has increased dramatically. If a police unit that has arrested a shoplifter has to drive 20 miles to take the shoplifter to the nearest custody suite, just for the person to opt for trial at Crown Court when they first appear before a magistrate, there is little incentive to respond to the first call of the day, especially if it means the market town has reduced police cover for several hours while the individual is taken to be processed at the nearest custody suite.

There are times when government’s economy drives have unintended consequences, and cuts to the Ministry of Justice have already been too deep. Cutting access to education and skills for prisoners is not a sensible move.

Fortunately, we have fewer under-18s in prison than last time that Labour was in government, but those that are there probably contain a high percentage of young people for whom schooling had been a painful experience both for them and for those that tried to teach them. If they emerge from custody with both skills and the ability to hold down a job, then there is much less chance of their re-offending.