22/04/2012 Sunday Politics Scotland

Afternoon, folks! Welcome to the Sunday Politics.

There's a new word circulating the Westminster village these days.

It's not in the Oxford English Dictionary, it begins with O and it

means "a bit of a mess". The word is omnishambles and it was used

just the other day by Labour leader Ed Milliband to describe the

coalition government. It's not the best backdrop for the

Coalition parties as they head for elections on May 3rd. And it's a

particular headache for the Liberal Democrats, who were already

suffering in the polls. We'll be talking to Deputy Prime Minister

Nick Clegg in our Sunday Interview. His latest mission, to reform the

House of Lords, will be making the headlines tomorrow. But there won't

be Coalition consensus. We'll have the latest from the Tory

backbenches. And on Sunday Politics Scotland...

Our only women's prison is not working and should be demolished -

that's the finding of a commission set up by the Scottish Government.

I've been to Cornton Vale to speak to staff and prisoners about what

Apology for the loss of subtitles for 1526 seconds

It is getting that balance right. Why are you putting up so few

candidates in the local elections? We lost a lot of councillors last

year. We took a real thumping. What we are doing is normal. We are

focusing our resources and candidates on those areas where we

are strong and can campaign well. Michael Brown, your party's biggest

ever donor, is now being extradited from the Caribbean back to this

country. He gave your party �2.4 million. He is a convicted

fraudster. You have no legal obligation to give the money back

but don't you have a moral obligation? I am very pleased he is

coming back to serve his sentence. I should stress this is something

that happened before I was even an MP. What I have been told is that

the Electoral Commission in 2009 looked at this exhaustively as far

as the receipt of the money by the Liberal Democrats from one of his

companies and they categorically concluded that the money was

received in good faith and all the controls and checks her that should

have been made were reasonably made by the Liberal Democrats at the

time. If we had been shown wanting on those counts, of course, we

should pay the money back. whether you knew or not and I

accept you did not know but you work in effect in receipt of stolen

goods. Don't you have a moral majority to hand the money back?

The money was received from a particular company... I am just

talking about the principle. If you receive money from someone and you

did so on false pretences knowingly and you did not conduct the right

checks, of course you should pay the money back. Electoral

Commission showed that it was not the case and the Liberal Democrats

were fully exonerated. They are all sorts of stories doing the rounds

in Westminster that he will stand down either before or after the

next election. Can I give you the opportunity to scotch it does today

and confirm that you will fight the 2015 election. You bet. Assuming

you hold on to your seat, if Parliament results in another hung

parliament, are you up for being Deputy Prime Minister again in a

different coalition? I will say to you now what I said for months and

months no doubt in into these with you before the last election was

that I do not think how coalitions are formed should ever be the

plaything of individual politicians. You should be driven by

instructions from the British people. At the last election, there

was only one possible combination that could have led to its stable

government. We should always do that in the future. Thank you for

being with us today. It is approaching 2:30pm.

Good afternoon and welcome to Sunday Politics Scotland. Coming up

on the programme: How can we improve the way women are treated

by the criminal justice system and stop the revolving door of

offenders going in and out of Cornton Vale? I have been here 12

years and I am still seeing some goals who are so when I first

arrived there who have still never had an adequate opportunity to

intervene effectively. And with less than two weeks until

voting in the council elections, have you made your decision? I am

here in East Renfrewshire looking at the day in a life of a local

council to find out wide your vote counts.

Cornton Vale women's prison is not fit for purpose and we are locking

up too many women who should not be there, undermining efforts to

reform those who are a risk to the public. These are the core findings

of a commission investigating women in the criminal justice system. We

will be talking to the commission chair, the former Lord Advocate

Dame Eilish Angiolini in a few minutes, but first I went to

Cornton Vale prison earlier this week to meet a group of women who

were all serving sentences of more than three years for violent crimes.

I asked them for their impressions of how the prison system works and

how a jail sentence has affected them and their families. You have

not just lost your liberation, you have lost contact with your kids,

your secure attachment to your kids has been severed. You have

committed a crime and gone to prison and they think, that set,

but it's not. It is not until you get a big sentence and a Desiree

lot of time to think -- it gives you a lot of time to think. You

take a lot of things for granted. It is getting a wake-up call.

miss your family and kids and your freedom. It is upsetting when you

see them going away. I have got nine brothers and two sisters.

would you feel if any of them ended up here? I would be very sad. It is

the loneliest place to be. They come in and go back out and

reoffend. There are no programmes. Some of the lasses are not strong

enough and commit suicide do stupid things to themselves. With the

short-term prisoners they are just in and out. People so they should

just lock them up and throw away the key. When you get out as you

expect to do shortly... I am going out to nothing. I will be homeless

when I get out of prison. No money. The rest of my family are broad and

so I have not got much support. Basically, I am on my own -- my

family are broad. Are you frightened? I am. I am going to

struggle with what has happened through my life. I am being

punished in here but I am going to punish myself for the rest of my

life for what has happened. Do you think you will be back? No chance.

Definitely not. My family is too precious to me. It has taken me to

come here to realise that. There are a lot of nice people in here.

Obviously, everybody makes mistakes in their life so you would not

think they were in for what they are in for. Sometimes you do need

to give people second chances. The commission findings released

this week are the latest in a very long line of reports and

investigations which have all recommended radical change at

Cornton Vale, much of it informed by the opinions and experiences of

the front line staff. In Cornton Vale, I sat down with the governor

of the prison, Theresa Medhurst, lead doctor Craig Sayers, chaplain

Bill Taylor and Diane Cairns, a mother and child development worker.

I began by asking about what they thought were the most common

misconceptions about women in prison. I think people are

genuinely taken aback at the kinds of lives that folk are living. I

think that is because they are preconceptions which may be are

fuelled by the media that there are goodies and baddies we are divided

along those kinds of access. From a medical point of view, do you think

the women should be here? I believe not. The ones who have short

sentences do not really achieve anything within the establishment.

We do not have time to achieve things. Potentially, it is

dangerous, to open up some of their medical issues. When you are

dealing with mothers and children, what do you think of some of the

key public misconceptions about prison life? That they get

everything handed to them on a plate and that things are easy for

them. They have now got someone else looking after their children.

A lot of these women want to look after the children. What we do like

to do that you cannot do at the moment and why can you not direct?

Probably the biggest thing is to have more of a focus on those women

in here who present the greatest risk to the public, those who are

here long term and those whose behaviour is high-risk. At the

moment, we have to spend significant periods of time

managing women in and out of custody. That is because of the

short-term nature of the population. There is very little we can do so

it is very difficult for us and if it is difficult for us, how

difficult must it be for those women? What indication does that

have won a medical basis if what you are saying is that with a lot

of these women who have severe problems you do not have time to do

anything with them? It has a significant impact. When they

arrive, we need to be consistent so we cannot treat gulls to friendly

for different postcodes in terms of medication. We have longer term

plans to help address addictions, physical health issues, mental

health issues, but week require a significant period of time to

address those to any satisfactory standard. Lots used drugs not for

enjoyment but to plant have dramatic -- traumatic past issues.

To open those can of worms and then release them to we Slater is a

dangerous thing to do. What kind of work do you do with the women and

children? We have women who have never experienced parenting

themselves so they do not know what to do with their child. That is

difficult. We have women who have had good parenting skills but have

gone off the rails for whatever reason. Things have become chaotic.

The women who have had nothing, it is about starting from the ground,

the very basics. What sort of things? They do not know basics

stuff on making up bottles, they cannot follow the instructions

because there are literary issues may be. And Parenting is such a

difficult job. No one ever actually shows us what to do. The only thing

that works is intense parenting work that we can do with families

and mothers. Given all we know about early years and their

importance, how valuable do you think this particular line of work

is in prison? Many a lot of our patients will state their

motivation to get a better life, to avoid crime, to avoid drug use, is

because of their children. They wish to regain custody of their

children. So it goes hand in hand. Confidence is a big thing? I think

very often we will find women saying things about themselves that

betrays their own self-perception which is invariably very low.

People think badly of themselves, their behaviour very often is

turned in upon themselves through self-harm and very negative

thoughts about their lives. Let alone their behaviour. People do

not have a sense of a life worth living. I think in many ways that

is what we are seeking to restore, to offer people a different self

image. If your objective is to make communities better and safer, does

this prison work? This present works in respect of -- this prison

works in respect of providing support and input and services to

those prisoners who was serving longer sentences. Because most of

them are statutory cases, they do have the support on release that

means that they are more likely to succeed. In that respect, I would

say it back Cornton Vale does work. But it does not work with the short

term and high remand population because we can offer very little to

women who are coming in here for a short period of time. If that were

taken away, where the number of prisoners on remand was reduced, if

the number of people coming in on short-term sentences was reduced,

we would be able to concentrate our efforts far more effectively to get

the women to the stage where they are confident about going back out

through those gates and have got a realistic chance of turning their

lives around when they are released. What should be the alternatives

then, do you think? alternatives should be alternatives

within the community because essentially we up -- a lot of the

problems come from the communities. We are dealing with their behaviour

is within the confines of a present but you are not dealing with the

community based problems. You can hear people saying, this is about

punishment, these people have to serve time. But in your opinion, is

it working in a punishment cents, a medical sense, in any sense at all,

for these short-term prisoners? the short-term prisoners, no. It

destabilises some of the environments that are stable. For

some it is vague brief time-out from extremely chaotic environments

outside but not enough time to change their environments. I have

been here 12 years and I am still seeing some girls who I saw when I

first arrived who on short sentences and has still never had

an adequate opportunity to intervene effectively. What do you

think about this idea that people are just swirling around the system

and not being dealt with and therefore communities are not safe

for? That is definitely what I find as well. These are the women that

will not engage with services and activities. They tend to opt out a

lot of the time because they know it is a short sentence and they

will be back out doing whatever it is they want to do. Who are the

women in here? The women in here are just women, normal women like

you and died. How many judges, sheriffs, come to Cornton Vale to

say, let me have a look at the programmes and where women are

being held and how effective your programs are? In almost three years,

I have not had any asked to come and look around. None. The effect

of that? I do not think there is an understanding of what we can do

here. I do not think there is an appreciation of the damage that can

be done by some of the short-term sentences and how that impacts on

our ability to be able to address those with the more complex needs.

Thank you. I am joined now by the QC and

former Lord Advocate, Dame Ailish Angolini who chaired the Commission

on Women Offenders. Thank you for coming in. If we start with the

premise that the objective is to cut reoffending and make

communities safer, who should be in prison and he shouldn't? Every case

differs and the individual factors are important. Human beings... One-

size-fits-all will inevitably be crude. Essentially, the interviews

which she carried out of their summarise it very neatly. It is

those who are a danger to the community, those who have committed

very serious crimes and who cannot be left safely in the community.

The difficulty is that they are a very small number of the population

currently in Cornton Vale. The very large numbers are those committing

offences which are serious and the sense that they do disturb the

community but require effective management and to be tackled in an

effective way and the sentences do not do that. They are not working.

What do you think would be more constructive? The commission report

outlines what we believe would be a radical reworking of the current

system. They are very good alternatives to custody in the

community which provide a punishment, paying back to the

community. So very often, the community can then benefit from the

work of offenders. Also, allowing people to tackle the underlying

causes of their behaviour. Many of the women in Cornton Vale have

significant mental health problems. Many of them self-harm because they

have such self-loathing and low self-esteem. Many also have

suffered sexual and physical abuse through their lives. They have had

very ghastly child puts, many of them. Many of them are victims of

crime. The idea that there's a dichotomy of those who are accused

of crime and the victims is artificial. They overlap very

We had a statement yesterday from victim Support Scotland. They say a

huge percentage of women, there is nowhere else to put them. They

support community-based programmes were those sentences of six months

or less. When we see the examples of their ligature cell in Cornton

Vale, where women and bought her who are a very high risk to

themselves are held, one would almost think that the mental health

problems of these women justify sectioning them. What sort of

people are going in there and can they be effectively treated? Where

there are very serious mental health problems, they are dealt

with effectively. But there are many women who have what would be

conditions that would be treated by primary care, through GPs or

psychologists or psychiatrists, but because of their personalities or

the chaotic nature of their lifestyles, they tend to self-

medicate with drugs and alcohol and do not go to the doctor. They

simply sometimes allow a mental health conditions to deteriorate.

There needs to be a different nature of programme towards these

women. We need to take them out of the officers and into the streets

to become Street doctors. That style of thinking also includes the

courts. How would a just as harbour or work and would it be a lot more

expensive? -- Justice hob. Over 150 different services are provided in

Cornton Vale. It is chaos for the prison trying to deal with all

these different programmes. There are different types of funding and

sometimes there are there for different times. We need a decent,

strong courts led by criminal- justice social workers who are

working collaboratively. That is not rocket science. It takes

imagination and innovation. It should not take a huge amount of

money. There are plenty of people working in silos who need to get it

together and work collectively. Thank you.

There are other options available for dealing with female offenders

who currently receive short term sentences. One such project is the

218 service in Glasgow. It works to rehabilitate prisoners and stop

them re-offending. We agreed not to fully identify the women who told

their stories to Kathy Long. For some women who have been inside

Cornton Vale, prison has never prevented them from returning to

crime. It's never did me any good or I would not be still be going in

and out. I just got a five day detox in prison. That was really

hard. 218 is an alternative to jail for those who have committed minor

offences - shoplifting, breach of the peace or failing to pay a fine.

The women here will treat their addictions. They will also attend

workshops and classes to give them skills and education. Being sent to

a place like this, you are dealing with a drug problems, defending,

dealing with everything. This is more appropriate. There is always

somebody there to talk to you. If you're having a bad day, there's

always someone there. So what is at the soft option? At 218 is a much

harder option then prison. When you explore that with a woman that is

about to come to 218, they have to do the work and do the programme. A

lot of that programmes about looking at themselves. 218 can cost

half as much as a prison sentence for the same crime. The rate of

reoffending is significantly reduced. I would not offend after

coming out of 218. There is no reason. It actually works. You feel

like a failure, but this place makes you feel like you have a

chance to get right again. Joining me in the studio is the

Conservative MSP, Margaret Mitchell. You also the convenor of the

Hollywood equal-opportunities committee when it looked as this.

You'll be basing your opinions on evidence and expert witness opinion.

All the evidence suggests that sentences of six months or less did

not work and all the expert opinion seems to say the same thing. So why

have the Tories and the Labour Party set their face against

getting good of prison sentences of six months or less.

It is very much horses-for-courses. What we discovered in the report we

did and the equal opportunities committee was that in Cornton Vale,

there were far too many people on remand, 70% of which were never

going to get a prison sentence. But time and effort, the warders, the

people who would be doing Rehabilitation, all their effort

was going on looking after these people. We heard about people who

had mental health issues. They were not being dealt with. 1% should

have been hospitalised. They're still there. Call one reason or

other, people do end up on short- term sentences in Cornton Vale. You

might look at alternatives, but when you run right of every single

alternative you can go to, then there will be, for one reason or

another, prisoners there on short- term sentences. Quite frankly,

they're getting no support, no help and no resources were given to them.

That is where we are fundamentally criticising that nothing is done

with these people. Even having someone for one month or two months,

think of the things you can do it in terms of the dressing literacy,

numeracy and sometimes, from the 218 report as well, speech and a

lack of confidence to communicate. All of these things have been known

since 2009, when be completed a report. Nothing has been done. The

political will has not been there. But the expert opinion is that you

can deal with those things, but you better to deal with them not in a

prison environment for a few months, or even in a situation where it

could be medically dangerous to try to teats -- treat them in that time

scale, but to take them into the community and a structured, long-

term programmes their. The concern would be but this is just political

posturing and lazy thinking to say that you can put these women in

prison for six months or less. How did you respond to that? We are not

saying put people in prison for less than six months. We are more

than happy to look at the alternatives. If you go back to

that 2009 report, we praise to the high heavens the work being done in

the 218 Centre in Glasgow. We pointed out that the Scottish

Government in Edinburgh would love another 218 centre. We said we

needed to redress romance. -- address a wee man. There's nothing

substantially different in that report but was known in 2009.

you create -- agree that it should increase the six months? There

should not be a presumption. We should look at each case on its own

merits. If there is any element of a potential problem to public

safety, then public safety must come first. There is no question

there. Beyond that, there is a whole list of interventions that

should be put in place and the political will has not been there

to do that. If we come back to the point about

the prison governor, where we were talking about the judges and how

they and the sheriffs had not been to Cornton Vale. What you think

about that?'s do report mentions the judiciary specifically.

It is important that the judges have confident the alternatives of

custody and that the community have that confidence as well. It is very

important that this new service that we are recommending measures

the impact and can actually demonstrate that reoffending is

reduced. Then, the community and the judges will have more

confidence. So far as the Conford - - judges are concerned, their

training requires to be supported and that the sea and visit prisons

regularly. They should be out there. They should be understanding of

what they're sending people to. They should be visiting the

community alternatives as part of their training to understand what

is available. Then, they can actually influence what is working.

These are just two of the reports - there are seven substantial ones.

You could argue that nothing has changed. What will change because

of your report? Like any report, it could gather

dust and the words on a shelf. I recommend a Cabinet Secretary to

report in six months of what he is going to do. There is a political

will and a recognition of it. This gives the politician and the

Government the tools to restructure the way this is all done.

Thank you. We did ask for the Justice

Secretary to be here, he says it is vital that we find a more effective

way to deal with women offenders and 21st century Scotland. I will

consider this report in detail before making a formal response and

summertime. And now here's the news, with

Andrew Kerr. The American tycoon Donald Trump is

due to fly in to Aberdeen Airport this afternoon. The entrepreneur is

giving evidence to a Holyrood committee on Wednesday about

renewable energy. He's objecting to a planned offshore wind development

near the site of his �1 billion golf resort in Aberdeenshire. Mr

Trump claims Scotland is committing financial suicide by creating a

windfarm landscape. Officials in the Dominican Republic

say the convicted Glasgow-born fraudster, Michael Brown, who was

once a major donor to the Liberal Democrats, is being extradited to

Britain. He's understood to be on a flight to Madrid, where he's

expected to be handed over to the British authorities.

Having enough money is not a high priority for Scots, according to

Oxfam. A poll carried out for the charity found housing and health

were more important to people. Oxfam says this suggests most Scots

want enough to provide for their families and that economic measures

like GDP are part of a failed economic model.

And now here's the weather with Another afternoon of sunshine and

showers. The best of the driest conditions will be across the Outer

Hebrides. Nearly everywhere is at risk of brain. There are cloudier

conditions across the East with lighter showers. Not feeling too

Babbs with a rise of 12 Celsius. That's the news and weather, our

next update is just after 6.30pm this evening. I'll now hand you

With the local election campaign underway, the major parties have

been voicing their concerns about low turnout. We sent Gilly

Mathieson to East Renfrewshire, one of the most politically engaged

electorates in Scotland to find out why your votes count.

I am one of a team of 34 or who looks after 475 kilometres.

I am looking out for a glittering offences.

We collect glass and waste paper for recycling.

Rhodes, community safety, waste and education are some of the policies

set at Hollywood but delivered by a local council. These final-year

students believe many voters are confused about who is responsible

for providing them. People can often get confused about

who is running for what and who is standing for what.

People don't vote in council elections because they do not

understand their own counsel's play in their area. They still think

there are decisions come from Government.

Part of their remit is to promote health. People think that is the

job of the NHS. Scotland's councils spend �18.7

billion of our money. In East Renfrewshire, almost 20% of its

budget goes on social care services like this, with 11% on the

environment and half of its budget With polling day less than two

weeks away, there are no visible signs of an election campaign in

this suburb. There is only one campaign going on and that is the

national campaign. I have not seen any campaigning and the local

elections. It is almost as if they're not here.

People are being bombarded with the media, papers, radio, television

and it is either UK or Scotland. They're missing the issues

altogether. With the independence referendum

expected in 2014, the Paul is an important test of political

strength. You have this big national campaign

with the parties trying to get on top and then small local campaigns

about small local issues. A two- speed campaign.

Whatever your reasons for voting on third May, there is a lot at stake

for the parties and for the delivery of you are local services.