Sir, Prisoner contracts to reduce reoffending, as announced by Jack Straw, are a welcome step forward (report, Jan 30 ). Training people for jobs after release and dealing with drug addictions are useful in themselves, but people go to prison because they commit offences and it is this behaviour that needs to be addressed directly as well as via other problems.

According to the Ministry of Justice’s own statistics, individuals who complete general offending behaviour programmes in the community are 26 per cent less likely to be reconvicted. But 80 per cent of all the people on community orders do not complete such programmes. For a Government keen to protect the public and to continue reducing the rate of reoffending, it must be a matter of the highest priority to substantially increase the proportion of cases engaged in offending behaviour programmes.

Successfully applied to more people, these programmes could effectively reduce the pressure on prison places and put on hold the need to build the so-called “titan” prisons.

Philip Priestley

Community Justice Campaign

Wells, Somerset

Sir, Jack Straw’s response to Anne Owers’ report into Britain’s failing prisons was woefully predictable. When plans for “titan prisons” were announced the Government omitted £1.2 billion from their budget — money which isn’t going spare in the public purse. Plans were rushed out at a time when the prison populations were headline news and the Tories were making political capital on the issue.

Jack Straw now says that “We are not definitely going ahead with them.” Were they ever?

Britain’s prisoners do need more space and, crucially, better rehabilitative care. But they also need a government which won’t sell them short with knee-jerk decision making.

george leigh

London SW5

Sir, The Chief Inspector of Prisons has claimed that giant, titan prisons do not work. She particularly highlighted their failure in France. Yet the Government presses ahead with giant secondary schools, where numbers of pupils dwarf schools in the private sector. Record high levels of inmates or pupils bring disastrous problems of scale despite the superficial economies. America, especially New York state, has already decided that smaller schools work best.

But the UK Government presses on with a failed formula. When will it learn?

john johnston

Eye Green, Cambs

Explore Letters

• Feedback