Minority Ethnic Prisoners’ Experiences of Rehabilitation and Release Planning

London: Black and minority ethnic (BME) groups are greatly overrepresented in the prison population: as of March 2020, 27% of prisoners were from a BME background, compared with only 13% of the general population. People who identify as ‘black’ are imprisoned at an even more disproportionate rate: they comprise only 3% of the general population but 13% of adult prisoners (UK Prison Population Statistics, 2020). HM Inspectorate of Prisons (HMI Prisons) inspection reports consistently show that BME prisoners report worse experiences and outcomes than white prisoners across a wide range of indicators covering most areas of prison life.

There is considerable gap between black and minority ethnic (BME) prisoners and prison staff in their understanding of how ethnicity influences rehabilitation and resettlement, a review by HM Inspectorate of Prisons (HMI Prisons) has found. About a third of BME prisoners interviewed for the review felt that their ethnicity had a significant impact on their experience but almost no staff felt the same. BME prisoners referred to a lack of understanding about their cultural backgrounds and differences, the lack of diversity of prison staff, previous experiences of discrimination in prison and unfair access to jobs.

Developing a greater understanding of the perceptions of prisoners and disproportionalities in the prison system, and finding ways to address them, is an important task for those working in prisons. This thematic review is a small but original contribution to that effort. We will consider carefully how the findings might be built upon in future work. Little has been written on BME prisoners’ experiences of offender management and resettlement services, and there is very limited work on the increasingly influential concept of ‘rehabilitative culture’ and the degree to which efforts to achieve it have taken account of the specific experiences of BME prisoners. Rehabilitation and release planning is not a well-understood area for any prisoners, in part because systems for supporting rehabilitation have been in flux for several years.

Throughout this project, we have been acutely aware that there are considerable problems with using collective terms such as ‘black and minority ethnic’. Such descriptions imply a false homogeneity of experience between culturally different minority groups, and will always understate the uniqueness of each of them.

Read the full report, https://is.gd/CGrx99