Prison Reform and Safety — House of Commons, 2017-12-07
Topic: Law and Crime
Rebecca Faye Clark (Pow) (Conservative, Centre-right): I am delighted to follow the hon. Member for Nottingham East (Mr Leslie), who talked about his experiences of his local prison, and I am pleased to be part of today’s debate. I believe there is general consensus in the Chamber about the fact that our prison system is not perfect, but I acknowledge that the Government have an ambitious programme for reform that will benefit not only offenders, but communities across the country. In particular, I welcome the 2,500 new prison officers who will be appointed and the provision of 5,600 body cameras, not just for prison officers, but for the police—that issue has been raised with me in particular I wish to focus my speech on gardening and the environment in the prison system, and I make no excuses for that, because it has a lot of potential to be helpful. We know that imprisoning somebody does not in itself reduce reoffending rates. As a number of Members have said, to do that we must try to give these people skills to increase their employability chances and help them to reintegrate back into the community. That is where environmental and gardening schemes can really help. As I have said before in the Chamber, many prisons are old and outdated, with little green space. There is definite data to show that when people are not in contact with green space and nature, it has a real impact on their mental health. I want to talk about a couple of good schemes that can show how this is useful The Eden Project has teamed up with Dartmoor prison to transform a disused exercise yard into a gardening project within the resettlement unit, from which local residents can buy vegetables, flowers and eggs. Such schemes are starting to crop up in many prisons across the country. When I was a television reporter, I went to Leyhill prison, near Bristol, which had a fabulous gardening project. It had state-of-the-art greenhouses and its gardening projects won gold medals at Chelsea. Lots of those projects need to be either reinstated—some have dropped away—or regenerated. The Conservation Foundation is about to start a "Gardening against the odds" project in Wandsworth prison. The project will extend across three exercise yards that are currently just tarmac, and will bring together prisoners, staff, members of the community, leading horticulturists and environmentalists Such schemes can stimulate mental and physical health. As I said, they also teach skills and disciplines that can improve employability. I recently met the British Association of Landscape Industries, which represents a £6 billion industry that is crying out for people to work for it, so there are opportunities if we can skill people up in these areas before they get back into the working world. Lots of these projects are not costly—they are cost-effective and highly beneficial—so I hope that the Minister will make reference to them. Earlier in the year, he replied to one of my oral questions by mentioning a prison gardening competition and inviting me to be a judge. I hope he is going to stick to the offer, because I would very much like to do that.