Treating crime
Sir: In his response to my article on treating crime (' Prisoners and unions' — October 14) Mr. C. W. Bond makes a number of errors and unfounded assumptions.
The figures I gave in support of my arguments were not mine but official Home Office statistics and predictions. Like so many others who use statistics selectively, Mr Bond is guilty of making unjustified extrapolations from then. He should be aware that the number of indictable offences in any given period is not necessarily related to the number of offenders in that same period and that statistical comparisons over 0 period of thirty-three years (1938* 1971) are meaningless unless one also takes account of variations in the country's population, officiallY defined poverty levels and the classification of indictable offenceS which have taken place since 1938.
Finally, Mr Bond rests his case on the assumption that we actuallY do have a more ' humane ' code than we had in 1938. It is nlY contention that the ' humane ' code exists more in theory than in fact. Less than; 10 per cent of all prisoners in central training prisons actually receive any forol of educational or vocational train: ing — and the number of sue!' prisoners is falling as the prison population rises — our one psychiatric prison at Grendoti, Underwood is understaffed an underemployed, and prison condi' tions are worse in many respect! than they were in 1938. Almost all sentences are longer than the,' were and yet they have to be served by men living three to 0, cell. These cells were designee to accommodate one man and theY still have no toilet facilities ill them. Overcrowding varies be' tween 51 per cent and 73 per cent yip all but three prisons: the psychiatric orison at Grendon, central :,,training prison Wakefieldo and Dartmoor, which. new a J3 ' category training prison. The great majority of those Who are 1§Rntenced to Correctil ,Training ot:,who are recommende. ifor psychiatric treatment never gs: t. We :tan hardly judge tri', officacy of such 'humane' me sures until they art actuaiilt employed on a large scale where '
counts — in the prisons.
Doug/as Curtis
43 Malcolm Place, Cambridge
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