THE UNITED KINGDOM
G4S and Private Prisons in the UK
MP expresses concern over planned expansion of G4S-run Parc Prison
- Jail's young inmates ‘to double' November 2, 2006 BBC News
While the BBC reports that the Youth Justice Board plans to double the number of young offenders housed at Parc Prison, some leaders are questioning the need for the expansion.
Plaid Cymru's MP Elfyn Llwyd questioned whether the additional beds were necessary, given a decrease in youth crime in Wales and the fact that so many imprisoned youths have medical problems.
Since its founding in 1997, the G4S-run prison has been marked by reports of poor physical upkeep and racist behavior by both inmates and staff.
The latest report on the prison by HM Chief Inspector of Prisons Anne Owers, released in August 2006, stated that the facility had “moved significantly backwards” since the previous inspection. According to Owers, this was a “disappointing inspection,” as the G4S-run prison was “unable to meet three of our four tests of a healthy prison.”
More “disappointing” inspection results for the sole G4S-run prison in the UK
The latest report by HM Chief Inspector of Prisons Anne Owers on the Group 4 Securicor-run Parc Prison in Bridgend, Wales, shows that Parc has yet to escape its history of racism and poor management. In fact, the report, released in August 2006, stated that since the last inspection, in 2002, this Group 4 Securicor institution “moved significantly backwards.” Parc, a prison designed to house about 1,000 adult and juvenile offenders, is the only prison run by Group 4 Securicor in the UK prison system.
Owers writes that this was a “disappointing inspection,” and that the Group 4 Securicor prison was “unable to meet three of our four tests of a healthy prison.” The report cited a number of problems, including lack of activities and skills training, “weaknesses in managing the risk of self-harm or suicide,” and the lack of a visitors’ center.
G4S Managers Allow Racists to Operate Freely
Most disturbing is the fact that the G4S prison still has no action plan to address the racism that has marked the prison since its early days. “This racism appears to be quite endemic and has to be rooted out,” said Juliet Lyon of Prison Reform Trust. Both Lyon and Owers highlighted the prison’s failure to respond to a 2003 report by the British government’s Commission for Racial Equality. At least five government reports and assessments have noted racism in the prison over the years, in one instance referring to it as “shocking and disturbing.” The Deputy Director General wrote following a 1999 visit to Parc that “there was genuinely racist behaviour by staff and for many supervisors and managers little recognition that racism was a problem.”
The 2003 report showed that G4S had not remedied the dire situation. The report documented racist graffiti , a lack of support and protection for staff suffering racist abuse, failure to protect prisoners from verbal and physical race-driven abuse, a failure to punish prisoners accused of violent racist assaults , and retaliation against prisoners who reported racist behavior. Racist epithets and neo-Nazi calls like “Zieg Heil” were reported, as were the use of the initials KKK, for Ku Klux Klan, and RVS, for a racist prison group called the Rhondda Valley Skins, in graffiti and letters, including one intimidating letter slipped under a prisoner’s door. The report noted that, “the management at Parc did not have an effective programme of action to challenge the racism of an influential group of inmates who were able to continue racist abuse and intimidation over a long period of time. ”
This racism is the most severe of a pattern of serious problems that place both inmates (particularly ethnic minorities) and the public at risk. Read more about the history of ugly incidents and poor management since Group 4 Securicor first opened the prison...
Graphic: This threatening material, reproduced in a Commission for Racial Equality report, was slipped under a prisoner’s door at the G4S-run Parc Prison, along with photographs of Hitler. The words “Nigga your next” had been written on an article describing racist assault on West Indian prisoners, along with the initials “RVS” for Rhondda Valley Skins, an organized racist group operating in the prison.