Speech on Criminal Justice Inspection’s Report on Section 75, Northern Ireland Assembly, 22nd June 2009

At the outset, let me say that the SDLP supports the motion and welcomes it, and we thank the proposers for bringing it to the House. The motion is characterised by a lack of political colour; there is no partisan element whatsoever.

The motion calls for the relevant agencies to implement the recommendations of the Criminal Justice Inspection’s report. I ask Members opposite and Mr Kennedy what objections they have to any of those very moderate recommendations. The report recommends increasing monitoring and collecting more equality data; it recommends a consultative forum on criminal justice matters, which, I believe, has already been established. It also proposes a strategy for accelerating the creation of a reflective workforce across the system: not just in the prison system but across the justice system.

The report contains agency-specific recommendations that the Northern Ireland Prison Service publish the findings of its internal review in its internal monitoring figures. There is nothing terribly frightening in any of that. It recommends that the Probation Board for Northern Ireland take steps to extend appropriate section 75 monitoring across its various functions. It also proposes that the Youth Justice Agency take steps to begin to monitor across its three core areas. I cannot find anything in those recommendations to which anybody could take exception. I cannot understand the opposition of Members opposite and Mr Kennedy. Is there some prejudice or bias in the Criminal Justice Inspection? I think not. It is a highly respected body.

Furthermore, many Members have concentrated on the Prison Service, which was the body that produced the report to which I referred, not the Criminal Justice Inspection. That report was produced by the Prison Service, which examined its internal workings and stated that there were disparities in how Catholic prisoners were treated in comparison with Protestant prisoners.

That report states that we must get to the bottom of that issue. Why do those disparities exist? Why is a Catholic prisoner more likely not to enjoy benefits and privileges in the prison regime? Do any of the Members opposite have any answers to those questions? The Prison Service has no such answers. However, the Prison Service is saying that it found those problems, and it wants to establish why. That is a very sensible approach by the Prison

Service, which has been endorsed by the Criminal Justice Inspection.

The report states that Catholic prisoners are more likely than Protestant prisoners to face adjudication proceedings in prison. The Prison Service has asked why that is the case, and acknowledges that it must focus on and explore that matter, and provide an explanation. Do Members opposite object to that?

The motion does not politicise the issue. I reject that assertion. I said at the outset that the motion has no political colour whatsoever. The Member might find some political colour in it, but I cannot see it. The motion is phrased in the most neutral fashion. It is asking the Assembly to support the report’s recommendations, and asking that they be implemented. Those recommendations will be implemented in any case because the NIO Minister Mr Goggins has said that he will implement them, in the main. Indeed, some of the recommendations have been implemented.

Therefore, I again ask Members opposite to outline the recommendations to which they are opposed, and why they are opposed to them. I have one final point about the make-up of the Prison Service. For historical reasons, the Prison Service is male and largely Protestant, and there is disparity. The Prison Service is saying that it must examine that disparity because it has to have a workforce that is more generally reflective of the population of Northern Ireland.

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