Rattling the Bars; The Prison Crisis

As of 07:00 this morning (Wednesday 29th August 2007) members of the Prison Officers' Association in England and Wales stopped working as part of a 24 hour strike over pay and working conditions. This action follows the decision to pull out of a 'no-strike agreement' with the government. The Ministry of Justice has since been granted a High Court injunction against the strike.

Mr Justice Ramsey said the effect of any strike would have "particularly difficult consequences" to prisons already filled to capacity. The affected prisons have been locked-down, that is, the prisoners confined to their cells. The Prison Governors are doing their best to control the situation, but using Wormwood Scrubs prison in west London as an example, the 1,300 prisoners are being looked after by eight governors.

This strike is beginning to highlight several cracks that are perhaps beginning to show in Gordon Brown's rule. Under New Labour the Prison Service has been neglected. The money directed towards it has been miss-spent, and with overcrowding, and no signs of the rise of inmates abating the situation is far worse now than it was when Labour came to power over a decade ago. This strike has served to bring this situation into the attention of the media, and hence the general public. Gordon Brown has so far enjoyed an extended honeymoon period and has handled the first three tests he has had well (attempted bombings, floods and foot-and-mouth). This action by the POA (Prison Officers' Association) is however, entirely of his own making. It was him, as Chancellor who refused to meet the independent review's recommendation, but instead decided to stagger it in two stages.

The strike by the Prison Officers' will no doubt be of interest to other public sector workers, such as Nurses, who have been given similar unsatisfactory pay rises. They are to decide in a couple of weeks time whether to go on strike. Unless Gordon Brown makes his mark here there could be no stopping this discontent, and while I am sure it won't be as bad as 1979 and the fall of Jim Callaghan's Labour government it certainly won't be in the best interests of the British public.