UNLOCK e-newsletter – September 2010

Welcome to September 2010’s e-newsletter. UNLOCK have over 5,000 members, and this email is sent to every UNLOCK member who has provided us with an email address. If you have any suggestions for content, would like to make any submissions, or would like to make a comment on the UNLOCK e-newsletter, contact chris.stacey@unlock.org.uk. Any submissions must be received by the 25th of the month. You are more than welcome to pass this email on to others who you think may find it useful. We’ve added a pdf version of the e-newsletter, so that you can print it and share it if you wish. If you have received the e-newsletter indirectly and find it useful, please sign up to receive directly by joining UNLOCK as a member, free of charge. This will guarantee that you receive it and will allow us to know who the e-newsletter is reaching.

In this month’s e-newsletter A round-up of September

Barclays expand banking service to cover the whole East of England region

Focus group at HMP East Sutton Park

Old/Minor Convictions Expert Panel – We need your views Barred from Voting: UK Prisoners must be allowed to vote next year, says Europe

Member response to Offender Learning Review

A roundup of UNLOCK’s work in the Media Useful information & advice

Appealing against decisions of the Independent Safeguarding Authority

Prisons and their MP What’s happening on the Forum Other news (selected from UNLOCK’s delicious page)

A round-up of September Back to top

DON’T FORGET – You can keep up to date with developments at UNLOCK by following our Twitter page, become a fan of UNLOCK’s Facebook page or sign up to our delicious updates (via RSS feed)

Barclays expand banking service to cover the whole East of England region Back

to top The UNLOCK/Barclays banking programme for people in prison is in the of being expanded across all 14 prisons in the East of England region after securing Barclays agreement, in addition to 4 other prisons with which the bank had developed positive relationships. Support with financial capability, application forms and providing ID will be delivered by expert local resettlement staff, under a contract with the National Offender Management Service in the East of England. For more information, read the media below, our press release, or our UNLOCKing Banking campaign page.

Focus group at HMP East Sutton Park Back to top This month we facilitated a focus group at HMP East Sutton Park as part of updating the Financial Freedom Newsletter, which was produced by the Financial Mail on Sunday’s Financial Mails Women’s Forum earlier this year. A copy of the previous version is available here.

Old/Minor Convictions Expert Panel – We need your views Back to top

Background As a result of Sunita Mason’s report, which was published in March 2010 (which UNLOCK made a number of recommendation to when it was being conducted), Sunita is chairing an Independent Advisory Panel (An “Expert Panel”) which has been established to look at devising filtering rules for old/minor convictions. The panel will work towards producing recommendations which will then be passed to Ministers, although it is important to note that the recommendations of the panel will not bind Ministers to having to adopt them. We are pleased to announce that UNLOCK have been invited to take part in this panel, the first meeting of which was held earlier this week. There are be a series of meetings held in the coming months. A link to our page on Retention and Disclosure of Old/Minor convictions, including links to the relevant documents involved, including Sunita’s paper published in March, is http://www.unlock.org.uk/staticpage.aspx?pid=76. We hope to be able to contribute constructively to this panel in a way that helps move towards recommending a system of disclosing old and minor convictions in a fair and proportionate manner. However, one element we are keen to focus on is the practical impact that the Court of Appeal decision has had on people with old/minor convictions which were previously stepped down, as well as the practical issues that individuals faced when met with the step-down process in the past. To

do this, we are reliant on getting the views of you, our members, and those that have been, or will be in the future, affected by the disclosure of old/minor convictions. Since June/July of last year, when we first began to get to grips with this subject (whilst the case was going through the courts), we have been inundated with individuals coming to us with their thoughts, experiences, problems and recommendations. Since the decision in October, we have had contact from those who are feeling the effects of step-down being removed. Broadly speaking, there is an agreement that there is a problem with disclosing old/minor convictions on CRB checks. This is not what the panel has been formed to discuss. What is being looked at is trying to agree a solution which is fair and proportionate. You will see from the above link that, prior to October 2009, there was a ‘step-down’ process. However, this was far from perfect. What we are now trying to do is get the experiences of individuals, and combine this with what we know about the current situation, to allow us to put forward a credible and suitable system for the future. It is worth pointing out a couple of points at this stage:

1. The panel is looking at only old/minor conviction and cautions – it is not looking at other non-conviction information (such as allegations and findings of innocence) – this is something that is being looked at separately.

2. The panels work is not to be confused with proposed changes to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act. This panel is looking at the disclosure of convictions for jobs which are exempt from the ROA (i.e. those that will undertake a CRB check). Whilst there are considerations to be had around minor changes to the ROA that are needed to make the non-disclosure of old/minor convictions which have been filtered possible, changes to the ROA disclosure periods in particular are a separate issue altogether. CRB checks which disclose old/minor convictions are disclosing convictions which are spent under the ROA, as the ROA doesn’t apply to positions which can undertake CRB checks. Reform of the ROA is an area which sits with the Ministry of Justice (rather than the Home Office, which is who set up this Independent Advisory Panel), and which UNLOCK will be pushing forward with separately.

We need your help! We want your views on this subject, so that we can make sure that the arguments which we make, and the proposals we put forward, are those which try to cover the broadest range possible. We therefore would like your views, particularly covering the following areas:

1. Have you had any experience of the old step-down process? If so, did it solve the problem? What was the problem in the first place?

2. How would you feel about step-down being re-instated? Would this solve the problem? 3. What changes would you make to the step-down process if it were to be re-instated?

We have started a specific discussion thread on the UNLOCK forum (click here) so that you can post your thoughts anonymously as well as discuss the work of this Expert Panel. However, you can also send your views/comments by email to chris.stacey@unlock.org.uk. If you wish for your personal details to remain anonymous, please state this clearly. Thank you in advance for your support.

Barred from Voting: UK Prisoners must be allowed to vote next year, says Europe Back to top

The UK coalition government failed to inform the Committee of Ministers at the Council of Europe how it intended to abide by the 2005 European Court of Human Rights ruling (Hirst No. 2) to allow sentenced prisoners to vote in time for next year’s Scottish, Welsh, Northern Ireland and local elections. At its meeting on 15 September 2010, the Committee said it “regretted” that “no tangible and concrete information was presented to the Committee on how the United Kingdom now intends to abide by the judgment”. Click here to read the decision. Justice minister Lord McNally had promised during a debate in the House of Lords on 10 June that the government was “considering afresh the best way forward on the issue of prisoner voting rights” and to “fully update” the Committee on the government’s intentions in time for the meeting in September. As part our shared campaign, “Barred from Voting”, UNLOCK and the Prison Reform Trust made submissions to the Committee ahead of its meeting, asking the Committee to consider serving the UK government with formal notice of its intention under Protocol No. 14 to the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, to refer to the Court the question of whether the UK government had failed to fulfil its obligation. You can download UNLOCK’s letter here. The Committee didn’t do this but did instruct the Secretariat, in the absence of any concrete developments, to prepare a draft second interim resolution, and would resume consideration of the issue at its 1100th meeting in November – December 2010. It called upon the United Kingdom to “prioritise implementation of this judgment without any further delay and to inform the Committee of Ministers on the substantive steps taken in this respect”. Also this month, Elkan Abrahamson wrote in insidetime to inform readers that he had heard from the European Court that there were processing 3 lead cases which they hope to have heard next year and are meanwhile logging all other applications and 'staying' them until the lead cases are heard. He also stated that he had received contact from over 2,000 prisoners, but as he is doing this work for free he cannot go on working on this case indefinitely and so has asked prisoners to stop writing to him on this for the time being.

Member response to Offender Learning Review Back to top

In response to the announced review into offender learning, we submitted a response that was made to us by an UNLOCK member with a personal interest in the subject for a number of reasons. You can download the response here.

A roundup of UNLOCK’s work in the Media Back to top

Banking coverage

Barclays opens up to prisoners reaching the end of their sentence – Mail on Sunday (Financial Mail section), 26th September

UNLOCK Press Release - UNLOCK and Barclays in partnership to open bank accounts for people leaving prison – 27th September

As a result of the two pieces, this was covered in 180 media outlets, including the Financial Mail Womens Forum, the Evening Standard, the Press Association, Reuters and the Guardian

UNLOCK/Barclays banking programme - 1hr 46 min in – BBC Radio Manchester, 27th September

Call for more prison bank accounts – 11th September, BBC Radio 4 Money Box (text summary of piece here)

Other coverage

UNLOCK Press Release - Reformed offenders say people with past criminal convictions are being ‘forced onto benefits’ – 1st September

Employing people with previous convictions (Part 1 and Part 2) – BBC Radio Wales, 2nd September 2010

Seeking employment with a criminal record – BBC Radio Kent, 2nd September 2010

Employing people with convictions – BBC Radio Newcastle, 2nd September 2010

Reforming the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 – BBC Radio Tees, 2nd September 2010

Useful information & advice Back to top

Appealing against decisions of the Independent Safeguarding Authority Back to

top There is a useful document available on the Tribunals Service website about appealing against decisions of the Independent Safeguarding Authority, setting out what you need to do and how the process works. You can download this here, and find out more general information about the ISA here.

Prisons and their MP Back to top The House of Commons Information Office have produced a list of prisons and the relevant MP. You can download this here. The Member of Parliament responsible for representing the interests of a serving prisoner is the Member who represents the area where the prison is located. If a member of the public wanted to contact an MP on a prisoner’s behalf, he/she should again contact the Member representing the prison. Thank you to Cos Michael at the Prisoners Education Trust for forwarding the details of this on to us.

What’s happening on the Forum Back to top We’re trying a new section in the e-newsletter this month by picking out a selection of key themes being discussed on the forum this month. We’ve sought to give quite a good coverage to the topics discussed this month, but the list below isn’t exhaustive of the contributions made to the forum this month. You can contribute to each of the discussions by clicking the relevant links or visit forum.unlock.org.uk for a full list of topics previously discussed.

“CRBs – what is exactly the law?” – a discussion about what jobs can do CRB checks, at what point, how else employers can find out, what they can do when the do, and questions about how to stop it.

“General Help – Should I Disclose?” – Blues finds himself in a difficult situation when deciding whether to disclose or not.

“Illegal Enhanced CRB Checks” – Jimbob kicks off a discussion over concerns about employers potentially conducting illegal CRB checks.

“Son suspended after CRB check – please help” – Matarij updates the forum with the good news that their son has managed to keep his job having been temporarily suspended after a CRB check disclosed his convictions.

“SIS Insurance” – a very interesting post by art about their experience in getting motor insurance.

“Coping strategies” – IanC talks about ways in which to planning for, and cope after, release from prison.

“Prisoners families” – an interesting discussion initiated by karen_mellor but contributed to by AndyH and Newton about prisoners families and visits.

“travel” - A continuously interesting discussion about travel abroad.

“China visa” – A specific example of the confusions around travelling abroad and how to decide what to do for the best.

“fresh start / new identity” – some interesting posts on ways to avoid continuous discrimination.

You can view the forum at forum.unlock.org.uk. If you are receiving this e-newsletter direct then you are already a member of UNLOCK. You can login to the forum here, where there is an option if you have forgotten your login information. However, if you are a member but are not yet registered with the forum, you can do so here, entering your membership number. If you cannot remember your membership number, email chris.stacey@unlock.org.uk. If you are not yet a member of UNLOCK, you can join at www.unlock.org.uk.

Other news (selected from UNLOCK’s delicious page) Back to top

29th September - Can an institution demand a CRB check from tutors visiting to train staff? – Guardian Liberty Clinic

20th September – Nick Clegg to reconsider prisoner voting ban – BBC News

9th September - The Law Commission wants to move from criminal to civil penalties – Law Society Gazette

Sent to you by Christopher Stacey LLB LLM | Information & Advice Manager Back to top

Notes

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© UNLOCK, the National Association of Reformed Offenders, 2010 35a High Street | Snodland | Kent | ME6 5AG T: 01634 2473500 E: chris.stacey@unlock.org.uk W: www.unlock.org.uk