August 25 2003

‘ELDERLY PRISONERS NEGLECTED’

A report published today by the Prison Reform Trust provides evidence that elderly prisoners are being neglected because the Prison Service is failing to meet their specialist health, social and rehabilitation needs.

Between 1990 and 2000 the number of prisoners aged over 60 in jails in England and Wales trebled. According to the latest Home Office figures there are more than 1,200 currently in prison. 

The report,’Growing Old in Prison’, by Ken Howse which was funded by the Nuffield Foundation, recommends that the Prison Service develops a national strategy for older prisoners. This strategy should not just address the need to improve health and disability provision for older prisoners but should also focus on social care provision, the need to develop appropriate education and rehabilitation programmes and the specific resettlement needs of older prisoners.

Drawing on recent academic research, the report reveals that elderly prisoners have a range of needs:

* More than eighty per cent of older prisoners have a long standing chronic illness or disability. Of these more than a third suffer from a cardiovascular disease and more than a fifth suffer from a respiratory disease. Overall the health of older prisoners is worse than that of their peers in the community.

* More than half of elderly prisoners suffer from a mental disorder. The most common disorder is depression, which often emerges as a result of imprisonment.

* Many older prisoners have no family or community links. A third had not received a letter during the period of a three month survey

* Older prisoners are often more vulnerable because they find it difficult to cope with the physical and mental stresses and demands of prison life.

Drawing on reports by HM Chief Inspector of Prisons and a survey carried out by  the National Advisory Council of  Independent Monitoring Boards, the independent prison watchdogs appointed by the Home Secretary, the report concludes that prisons are failing to meet the needs of elderly prisoners.

* Education and offending behaviour programmes are not geared to the needs of elderly prisoners. Only a minority pursue these programmes.

* Regime concessions such as less strenuous exercise classes are granted in less than a quarter of prisons.

* The majority of prisons do not have facilities to cope with prisoners who have mobility problems. Attempts to rectify lack of provision for people with impairments are often ad hoc and inadequate.

* Overall prison health care facilities struggle to cope with prisoners with long standing illnesses.

* Only one prison, HMP Kingston, has a small specialist unit for older prisoners but four prisons have had more than fifty prisoners aged over 60.

Speaking today the Director of the Prison Reform Trust, Juliet Lyon, said:

“Given the rapidly increasing number of elderly prisoners, a national strategy is urgently required to ensure that a system designed largely for young, energetic men, can meet the older prisoners’ very different needs. With chronic overcrowding affecting the whole estate, this report also prompts the question as to whether locking up more and more prisoners into their old age is of any real benefit to society.”

Speaking today, Stuart Ware, an ex prisoner and Director of Pacer 50plus, a support network for elderly prisoners, said:

“I know from my own experience that prison life can be twice as difficult for older prisoners. Prisons and their regimes are not designed for people over 60 who have special health and social needs”

‘Growing Old in Prison’ by Ken Howse is published by the Prison Reform Trust and funded by the Nuffield Foundation.

Notes to Editors:

1. In 2001 the number of sentenced male prisoners aged over 60 was 1,206 (2.4%) and the number of females was 19 (0.7%).  In 2000 the oldest prisoner was 88.

2. Between 1990 and 2000 the number of sentenced elderly prisoners trebled increasing from 365 to 1154.

3. More than one in ten older prisoners belongs to a minority ethnic group, far higher than the proportion of the general population.

4. The majority of males in prison aged over 60 (55%) have committed sex offences. The next highest proportion of older prisoners were convicted of violence against the person (21 per cent) followed by drugs (10 per cent).

5.  The number and proportion of elderly prisoners serving long sentences has increased significantly. Between 1995 and 2001 the number serving sentences of more than 4 years more than tripled, increasing from 318 to 966. In 2001 eighty per cent of elderly prisoners were serving sentences of 4 years or more. One fifth of all sentenced older prisoners are lifers.

6. Although many older prisoners are serving long sentence for violent or sexual offences, there are also many serving short sentences for less serious offences. Some will be first time offenders, while others will have a long history of offending and previous experience of prison.

7. The number and proportion of males aged over 60 sentenced to prison by the courts has increased significantly. Between 1995 and 2000 the number of elderly males given custodial sentences increased by 55 per cent. In 1995 fines accounted for the majority of sentences (31 per cent). By 2000 imprisonment accounted for the majority of sentences (31 per cent) and fines accounted for 24 per cent

8. The significant rise in the number of male prisoners aged over 60 is not matched by a corresponding rise in the number of males convicted by the courts for indictable offences. Between 1995 and 2000 the number of convictions for this age group increased by only 8 per cent. In 2000 the number of sexual offences which accounted for 18 per cent of all convictions (the second largest proportion, after shoplifting) was 2 per cent lower than in 1995.

9.  The increase in the elderly prison population is not explained by demographic changes, nor can it be explained by a so-called 'elderly crime wave'. The increases are due to harsher sentencing policies which have resulted in the courts sending a larger proportion of criminals aged over 60 to prison to serve longer sentences. This has particularly been the case in relation to sex offenders and drug traffickers. The courts are also tending to imprison those older offenders whose crimes most challenge society's age-related stereotypes. 

10. In 2000 14 people aged over 60 died of natural causes whilst in prison.

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