Lessons from Swedish prisons

The outlier

 Regardless of these preconceptions, at first look essentially the most urgent challenges dealing with the Swedish jail service look extra much like ours right here in England and Wales than we’d think about. Like us, their prisons are full, with the inhabitants predicted to triple within the subsequent ten years. Like us, there’s a big undertaking underway to develop present prisons and construct new ones. Like us, there may be sturdy public help for a more durable strategy to crime, pushed by the notion that immigration is essentially guilty for a rise within the crime price (particularly, gang, gun and terrorism offences). Like us, their incarceration price per capita will quickly change into one of many highest in Europe. All of this, plus the identical challenges within the recruitment and retention of jail officers, new generational tensions as Gen Z comes hurtling into the workforce, and a crumbling jail property, and all of it begins to really feel very acquainted.

With this in thoughts, you’d subsequently anticipate locations like Österåker – a medium safety jail on the outskirts of Stockholm – to really feel rather a lot like a busy native Cat B jail in England or Wales. Regardless of being constructed greater than 50 years, it’s because of greater than double in dimension within the subsequent decade. There’s stress to suit extra prisoners in cells, any with sufficient flooring house have gotten double occupancy, and the cells we noticed didn’t even have loos in them. Stereotypical Scandinavian utopia this isn’t.

However there’s a essential distinction: two-thirds of the prisoners launched from Österåker within the final three years haven’t reoffended. Why?

A tradition of “higher out”

Firstly, there’s a clear imaginative and prescient centered on the idea of “higher out”. This philosophy underpins the whole lot. It offers a framework for selections to be made, for tradition to be set and to relentlessly deal with addressing what they name “prison id”. Relatively than doing that by taking a look at trauma or partaking in deep remedy, they use extra CBT and utilized social studying principle. In apply, this appears to be like like programmes and training for prisoners. Programmes to show new habits and behaviours when responding to acquainted issues, with the sturdy narrative that if you happen to hold performing like you’ve gotten all the time acted, you’ll solely find yourself again in jail once more.

Prisoners are anticipated to work one-on-one and in teams to replicate on previous triggering experiences, with a view to perceive their prison motivations, discover new instruments, after which apply utilizing them via scripting and situations. These programmes are delivered by specifically skilled jail officers. Schooling is as a lot about creating a brand new id and studying “the best way” to do issues, as it’s about studying content material. Private training plans are typical, and a tradition of self-motivation and self-development is embedded as prisoners observe their very own instructional journey linked to their very own pursuits and motivations.

Secondly, the times are closely structured and busy. Prisoners by and huge don’t have time to trigger bother or be bored. They order and put together their very own meals with a kitchen on every unit (sure, there are knives, however they’re chained to benches). Affiliation time is spent surrounded by potential actions: males bake muffins, play monopoly, do jigsaw puzzles, battle at desk tennis, hearken to audio books. All recreation actions are structured, modelled and actively contain workers. None of it’s random or unplanned. It’s wonderful dynamic safety at its finest, which in the end makes the jail safer for everyone.

Thirdly, segregation is seen as important first step for a small proportion of prisoners who aren’t prepared to completely interact but, reasonably than a punishment of final resort. Within the youth custody setting I visited, the boys had two rooms – a bed room for sleeping at evening, and a room with a settee, tv, and desk and chairs for the daytime. Officers interacted with them in a lot the identical manner they’d in the event that they have been on a wing; they ate meals with them, performed console video games, and did work to help them to get able to reintegrate with the regime. They might additionally select to combine with different prisoners for components of the day.

Lastly, and maybe most significantly for me given our focus at Unlocked, was the precedence positioned on efficient workers tradition. It appears self-evident, however frontline workers can solely have the affect they should if they’re prioritised by management. All workers put on the identical uniform (even governors) and there are not any formal ranks, which creates a tradition of openness round suggestions and admitting errors. Shift patterns are fully constant (you both do morning shifts, day shifts or evening shifts), knowledgeable by the sturdy proof across the harm to bodily and psychological well being that fixed unpredictability can have.

A novel strategy to recruitment

One trickle-down impact of this tradition is borne out within the uncommon (to us, not less than) manner most be a part of the service. Nearly all of the everlasting workers I met have been launched to the function via a “summer time officer” programme whereas they’re nonetheless finding out at college! They full every week or two of coaching and are by no means left fully alone on a unit, however they’re anticipated to finish most of the jobs of a jail officer, particularly relationship constructing with prisoners. Many of the officers we met did this as a brief summer time job, fell in love with the function, and returned to it as a everlasting profession afterward.

Not solely is it a intelligent manner of protecting the inevitable enhance in go away taken by officers over the lengthy European summer time holidays, it additionally introduces the potential new recruits to the structured help mannequin (a bit just like the Mentoring Jail Officer mannequin that Unlocked gives to our individuals) and specialist coaching programs they’ll anticipate in the event that they be a part of.

Takeaways

So, what have been my huge take aways from this journey? Firstly, there may be heaps we are able to be taught from the Swedish jail system round making a tradition of desistance and decency, even when the buildings are previous and at capability. Like Norway, Sweden went on a journey away from punitive officers to rehabilitative cultures from the late 80s and 90s onwards, and it implies that their prisons make society safer. These prisoners are actually “higher out”.

Secondly, busy prisoners are secure prisoners. We should discover a approach to get ourselves out of the “happiness-is-door-shaped” tradition which has permeated our prisons since Covid. That is partly about prioritising jail coaching and improvement, partly about how we resolve what is definitely purposeful a couple of prisoner exercise, and partly about the best way we take into consideration management and workers tradition.

Lastly, it reaffirmed to me {that a} good jail is in the end not concerning the buildings, it’s about what occurs inside them and, in fact, the workers that work there.