Tom Paine Festival Talk - Anne Owers

In 2001 Anne Owers was appointed as the HM Chief Inspector of Prisons, a post designed in 1982 to independently scrutinise the detention system in the UK. She was a surprise choice for the job: not only was she the first woman to be chosen; as director of the human rights pressure group Justice for the nine years leading to her appointment she had been a thorn in the side of successive governments, campaigning for prisoners’ rights. She was particularly critical of Jack Straw over his immigration policy.

Having been appointed Anne focused on four key criteria for prisons and immigration detention centres to fulfil: that prisoners are held safely, that they are treated with respect, that they are allowed to engage in purposeful activity and that they are prepared for release. In her time she has succeeded in improving conditions in individual prisons and highlighted the problem of overcrowding. She has drawn attention to the extent of mental illness amongst prisoners and suicides in prisons. Perhaps she is the best-qualified person in the country to answer the question she poses as the title of her talk today: ‘does prison work?’ AG