The prison raided by prison officers

ROBIN DENSELOW:
Out in the Kent countryside there is a very unusual and once very successful prison. There is little security and in the daytime little sign of prisoners, half the 120 inmates are out working. The results of Blantyre House have been extraordinary. Men convicted of serious crime are sent here for resettlement at the end of their sentences. In most prisons the reoffending rate is over 50%, here its been 8%.

ROSY CLARKE:
Board of Visitors
It was a prison that worked. Men were getting lives, you've heard the expression 'Get a life', career criminals who came to Blantyre were, not just a job, they were having links with their family, their communities reinstated, and they were getting interests. Really they had prospects for the future once they had left Blantyre.

DENSELOW:
Even prisoners approved, but then many were allowed mobile phones and even cars. Paul, on the right, jailed for robbery and Alan, jailed for drugs and firearms offences, are both Blantyre House old boys, now with steady jobs.

PAUL COLLINS:
Former Blantyre House Prisoner
I've been in and out of prison most of me life, you go into a system, and you get lost. Next thing you know you are kicked out of that system and you are back into society. At Blantyre, you go there, after six months you get a change to go out and do community work. It brings you back into society nice and slowly, it doesn't just kick you out of the door.

DENSELOW:
And what would you be doing if you hadn't been to Blantyre?

COLLINS:
Maybe now, planning the next job, you don't know.

DENSELOW:
And you've got a full time job now.

ALAN ROGERS:
Former Blantyre House Prisoner
The full time job I do now was one I started in Blantyre House as a volunteer in March 1996. I moved to the area to continue the work I am doing.

DENSELOW:
As a drug counsellor?

ROGERS:
As a drug counsellor. I am very content with what I do.

DENSELOW:
But on May 5th life at Blantyre changed dramatically, thanks to the Prison Service. 84 prison officers and staff from outside Blantyre headed for the prison, where the Governor and his third in command had been moved from their posts just a few hours earlier. In the words of those there at the time, the prison was raided. The outgoing Governor had not been informed that 'Operation Swinford' as it was called, was about to take place, or that the Prison Service Director General had authorised the raid after hearing emerging intelligence of possible security breaches at the prison. The Board of Visitors complained they were not fully informed of what was going on.

ROSY CLARKE:
Board of Visitors
We weren't informed about the raid until it actually took place and then two Board Members were rung up that evening and asked to come in. We were completely misinformed about what was happening at the prison.

DENSELOW:
In what way?

CLARKE:
At about half past twelve they were told things were quiet and they could go home. They had no reason not to believe that. But in fact, after they had gone, the main part of the search actually revved up quite a bit and dogs, men in riot squad kit, were brought in and doors were smashed. Needless violence took place to the fabric of Blantyre House.

DENSELOW:
The damage as doors were forced open was indeed considerable. The chapel, hospital and the gym were searched. The cost of repairs, £6100 plus VAT. These days Dave Newport is enjoying his retirement. Until May 5th he had worked at Blantyre House for nineteen years, the third in command, looking after inmate activities, work placement and the prison's lifers. He then had just four months to go before leaving the service. But a few hours before the raid he was told he was to be moved to another prison. There was no suggestion he had acted wrongly in any way. He went back to work the next day to complete a report, and was astonished by what he found.

DAVE NEWPORT:
Former Assistant Governor
I was called to the hospital to inspect the damage done there. There were a considerable number of doors broken down, which gave access to anybody who wished to inmates medical records. Further to that on the raid there were two governors present who had both worked at Blantyre House and were familiar with the key systems there and knew that the keys were available at the Gate Lodge and there wasn't a need to break any doors down.

DENSELOW:
And as a result of all this the prisoners were given drug tests and they all proved negative. After the raid the Director General of the Prison Service talked of the "¿quite frightening amount of contraband¿" found. The committee calls this an "¿attempt to mislead¿" as an internal prison inquiry concluded, there were no significant finds, just a small amount of drugs and unauthorised mobiles and credit cards.

NEWPORT:
Any governor in the country would have been proud, had 76 staff come into his establishment, turned it over, and found that amount of contraband material in a prison, they would have been very proud of it.

DENSELOW:
As for the prisoners of Blantyre House, they said the raid was appalling.

COLLINS:
In a lot of prisons you get this once a week, but not on the scale this was. They was abusive, they was, in my eyes, looking for trouble.

DENSELOW:
In what way?

COLLINS:
Provoking you, swearing at you, pulling you about. Just generally antagonising you, trying to get at you.

DENSELOW:
They were trying to wind you up then you would say?

COLLINS:
Yeah. Without a doubt.

DENSELOW:
So what was the reason for this? Those close to the prison made the extraordinary allegation to us that the aim could have been to deliberately incite the prisoners to give Blantyre a bad name.

CLARKE:
I think they were hoping to find things that they never found, or they were hoping that the men would be incited to some sort of behaviour that would give them an excuse to close Blantyre House down.

DENSELOW:
So the members of the Prison Service conducting the search were trying to incite trouble, incite a riot you say?

CLARKE:
That's all we can thing of, because otherwise why would they behave in such a way?

NEWPORT:
If you follow the premise through that people wanted to change the regime of Blantyre House, a good way to change the regime would be to have caused a bad reaction, closed the place down, you've got free gratis to open it as what you want.

DENSELOW:
Behind all this there is a history of disagreement within the Prison Service as to how Blantyre House should be run. The Select Committee report makes clear there was confusion about resettlement policy and how tight security should be at Blantyre. The now moved Governor, Eoin McLennan-Murray, believed Blantyre had been a success because of the trust placed in prisoners. Tom Murtagh, his security conscious area manager, clearly thought differently and, the committee note, their relationship had deteriorated to the extent that the Prison Service should have addressed the issue.

DAVID RODDAN:
Prison Governors Association
We are about managing risk. If governors are about managing risk, then area managers, the Deputy Director General and the Director General have to support governors in that and we think that support was lacking in Blantyre House.

DENSELOW:
While we were filming outside Blantyre we tried to talk to Mr Murtagh.

Do you regret the raid on May 5th?

MURTAGH IGNORES HIM

In view of what happened, and that nothing was found here, do you think it was the moral thing to do?

The Select Committee concluded that even if Tom Murtagh was fully committed to resettlement at Blantyre House, he gave "¿very much the opposite impression to others and to us¿". This one other area of controversy surrounding the area manager. The so-called Chaucer Group, who first met here at the Chaucer Hotel in Canterbury. The Committee note that the intelligence used to justify the Blantyre raid was first produced by this group. A Prison Service group from outside Blantyre which carries out investigations and reports to Tom Murtagh. It already caused concern to prison unions.

TOM ROBSON:
Prison Officers Association
I've never been very impressed with the Chaucer team with my knowledge. First of all the general prison officers on the ground floor in the Kent area are very wary about the team and the way they conduct investigations. What we need to have done is proper investigations taking place, and not an Inspector Clouseau outfit running around, doing their own thing.

DENSELOW:
The Select Committee recommend an immediate review of the way Chaucer's intelligence was collected and assessed and what steps might be taken to confirm the reliability of such intelligence. It was "¿completely unconvinced¿" that the raid was justified by the reasons the Prison Service gave in public or private session. What took place on May 5th was a "¿self-inflicted injury by the Prison Service¿". Blantyre House is seen by its supporters as the model resettlement prison. Preparing men, who have often spent years in jail for serious offences, for their return to society. Trust is essential to the process and its argued that that trust has now been eroded. A successful prison has been seriously damaged by the Prison Service itself, with no clear policy on resettlement.

NEWPORT:
The trust has gone out of the place, there is no trust. People are now using the place for what they can get out of it. It will take some years for the reconviction rates to go back up and I believe they will go back up and reflect the norm rather than the special place that Blantyre was.

DENSELOW:
Today's report agrees. The ethos of Blantyre House has been damaged, the problem, says the Committee, is that the Prison Service has no official policy over resettlement and that the Prison Service should promote the rehabilitation of prisoners and there should be clear guidelines.

RODDAN:
It is actually quite worrying that there are no national guidelines and as long as there are no national guidelines the governors responsible for those establishments will be vulnerable.

DENSELOW:
And if they are doing so well why aren't there more of them?

RODDAN:
It is quite extraordinary that the success of these establishments hasn't been investigated. It does warrant a proper academic exercise to look at why they are successful and once we know why, why not expand the use of resettlement prisons

DENSELOW:
The extraordinary raid of Blantyre House could lead to a shake up of the Prison Service. The Committee suggest the duties of the Inspector of Prisons should be widened to include an independent oversight of the Prison Service and meanwhile it concludes, the burden of salvaging Blantyre House and resettlement policy now rests heavily with the Prison Services Director General, Martin Narey.