Policy and culture change Sentencing trends and impact of the prison population It feels like an offence just to be a foreign national.5 The numbers of foreign national prisoners is increasing and nearly doubled between 2000 and 2012, going up by 93 per cent. This compares to a 24 per cent increase in British nationals. This is due to changes in sentencing and remand practices. As well as the larger numbers of people being sentenced, the numbers of foreign national prisoners held on remand has also increased massively, by 107 per cent since 2000. Remand is supposed to be used only where an offence someone has been charged with is very serious but the majority of people on remand are not being held for violent or other serious offences. Women are also disproportionately impacted by sentencing practices. The statistics for sentenced foreign national women prisoners show that 25 per cent are in prison for any kind of violent offence, robbery or burglary. This compares with 49 per cent of women prisoners from the UK. There is a presumption in favour of deportation for any non EEA national sentenced to a year or more. However, sentences have got longer and harsher. Therefore, it is not reasonable to assume that anyone with a sentence of a year or more is dangerous or that it is in the public interest to deport them. Alongside the increase in sentence lengths generally, sentences for immigration matters and using false documents have been enacted in an unsuccessful attempt to curb immigration. This has further impacted on the numbers of people going to prison, and now 7 per cent of foreign national male prisoners and 16 per cent of foreign national women prisoners are in custody for fraud and forgery offences 4. This is an offence of deception and although it is appropriate for the government to act, it cannot realistically be argued that all these people are dangerous. The argument for bringing in longer and longer sentences is that it acts as a deterrent to people abroad. However, there is no evidence that people travelling here from other countries have a clear understanding of the UK’s laws and policies. Ten years ago, the prison service’s policy was that all foreign national prisoners should be treated as individuals in terms of allocation and services. There was a reluctance to consider allocating them to specific prisons or developing specialist centres. It was believed that all prisons could and should respond to the needs of whomever their population happened to be. There were concerns that having particular establishments holding foreign national prisoners might lead to a twotier system, build discrimination into the system or lead to tensions between prisoners. However, this changed as the numbers increased and prisons found that the needs of this population were not being met. Individual prisons began to allocate prisoners they were transferring to prisons they believed had the resources and expertise to support them. Therefore, by 2004 there was an informal policy of grouping female foreign national prisoners in four prisons. In addition, male foreign national prisoners were accumulating at prisons such as The Mount and The Verne. In 2006, after media reports that 1,013 people who did not hold UK passports had been released from prison without being assessed for deportation, the political interest in this area increased. The subsequent media attention led to the sacking of Charles Clarke as Home Secretary. Following this, the government’s response was to focus on deportation as the ‘solution’ to a perceived high number of foreign national prisoners. Over time the stated aim of the government to increase the numbers of people deported has trickled down to impact on the attitudes and practices of officers on prison wings. There is often significant confusion — among both prison staff and prisoners — about the rights and entitlements of this group. The perception of a foreign national prisoner as a deportee, or potential deportee, influences decisions about sentence progression and other opportunities in the prison. Officers have a large amount of discretion over which prisoners can access activities and privileges in prison. In addition, resource- The perception of a foreign national prisoner as a deportee, or potential deportee, influences decisions about sentence progression and other opportunities in the prison. 4. 5. 46 Table A1.19 Ministry of Justice (2011) Offender Management Caseload Statistics 2012, London: Ministry of Justice. No Way Out, Prison Reform Trust 2012:9. Prison Service Journal Issue 205