It’s not often that Russia provides lessons on prison reform but earlier this year the Federal Penitentiary Service proposed that the age at which teenage offenders must be transferred to adult penal colonies should be deferred from 19 to 25 years old. Depending on maturity and behaviour, young adults will be able to stay in juvenile correctional facilities where they will be protected from the worst risks of the adult system and can benefit from the educational regime on offer.

Contrast this with the direction of travel in England and Wales where increasingly young adults are being held alongside older inmates in establishments that combine the functions of a specialist Young Offender Institution (YOI) and adult prison. It is sometimes claimed that adults can have a positive influence on the behaviour of younger prisoners. It is certainly true that many establishments which exclusively house young offenders struggle to keep violence under control and to deliver the educational approach they are supposed to. The Prison Inspectorate’s scathing report on Feltham B earlier this year questioned the viability of it being set aside for just young adult prisoners.

But does the answer really lie in integrated establishments? Earlier this week the Independent Monitoring Board (IMB) at Portland in Dorset reported serious concerns about mixing young offenders and adult prisoners. They reported a dramatic increase in drug finds and a rise in substance trading, debt, bullying and pressure on susceptible prisoners which made the facility much less safe. The IMB suggested that a clear physical separation of young people and adults on the site would be an improvement.

A new report I’ve written for the Transition to Adulthood Alliance looks at how best to deal with this challenging age group in a prison setting. Focussing on the arrangements in England and Wales where the government is considering the future of the young adult custodial estate, the report draws on lessons from Europe.

In Germany , in each of the lander , separate youth prisons accommodate all of those from 14-21 sentenced by the courts. Under 18’s and young women live in separate house blocks but take full part in the active daily programme of education , training and employment. Unlike many British prisons, almost no young people are found on the wings during the day with evenings and weekends filled with a wide range of recreation activities. The campus at Neustrelitz north of Berlin feels more like a further education college than a prison. Staff eat their lunch in a canteen alongside the trainees. In the UK meals are almost always taken in cells , with disruptive prisoners subject to the what is sometimes disturbingly called “controlled feeding”.

The Prison Service in England and Wales acknowledges that even in a dedicated YOI, life for a young offender is not that different to prison life for adult prisoners. Staff in a YOI they admit “will not be able to give you much individual support, as there will generally be one member of staff for every ten young people.” This is a starling admission and the nub of the problem. Wherever they are held , young adults require regimes and levels of care and intervention which respond to their distinctive and developing needs.
This will be particularly true in the re-designated regional resettlement prisons which will prepare prisoners for release. As with the Transforming Rehabilitation Proposals as a whole, without a specific focus on the young adult age group, they will continue to be a neglected group.

Rob Allen is co-founder of the Justice and Prisons and a former Chair of the Transition to Adulthood Alliance. You can read his report in full online here.

Over the last weeks we have witnessed commemoration of the March on Washington, the high-point of the US civil rights movement. A timely reminder of the difference that movements can make, but also a challenge to this generation to take action to end injustice. In 2013, racism is still a problem which pervades our society. Since our inception in 1968 Runnymede has been fighting to achieve race equality in the UK. We’ve done this through research, network building, and policy engagement. But recently, we’ve been feeling as if this isn’t enough. Race equality seems to have been filed in the ‘too difficult’ box. In order for discrimination to stop, the struggle against racism needs to be part of the public consciousness. We need to change our approach; we need everybody to not just feel that racism is not good for society, but to act to eliminate it.

Although the Equalities Act 2010 protects ethnic minorities from racial discrimination, your ethnic background still significantly impacts your life chances. In education, if you are from a Black Caribbean background you are three times more likely to be excluded from school, and data revealed by the BBC shows that 87,915 racist incidents were recorded between 2007 and 2011 in British schools. After school, youth unemployment is experienced by one in five white men, but one in two young black men. When seeking work you will have to send out 78% more job applications if you have a ‘foreign sounding’ name. On the street, you will be 7 times more likely to be stopped and searched if you are black than your white counterparts, and 2 times more likely if you are Asian. In health, black and Asian people with dementia are less likely to receive a diagnosis or receive it at a later stage than their white British counterparts. Chillingly, 106 people have been killed in racist and suspected racist attacks since Stephen Lawrence’s death in 1993.

It is everybody’s responsibility to change this. Racism is a product of society and as a society we have the power to end it. It can be solved, if we work together. We believe that it everybody makes changes in their own lives, workplaces and communities, we can cause a fundamental shift where treating people equally and accepting difference will become the norm.

This September we are launching ‘End Racism This Generation’, a movement to end racism in the UK. The key to its success will be informing people about the continued existence of racism and the damage it causes to all of us, and sharing knowledge of what works in combating it.
Fighting for racial equality is everyone’s business. End Racism This Generation will create an online platform where those who want to make change can gather, learn, and create new networks for change. We will also be hosting events all around England and Wales to connect people together and spread the message.

People will be able to pledge the action they plan to take on the End Racism This Generation website. Their pledges will be mapped by area, which will allow individuals, organisations and businesses to see what is going on around them. It will present the opportunity for people to create partnerships to end racism. Crucially, these pledges will inspire others to take actions, and show what works.

We want the pledges to be non-restrictive, no action is too small, no pledge too insignificant. We want everybody to feel empowered to end racism, regardless of the resources at their disposal. A pledge could simply be to find out more about racism in the UK or to spread the word on how to tackle it through social networks. On a larger scale, organisations could pledge to show how their work already reduces racial inequality or use the momentum of the campaign to launch new activities. Businesses can pledge to work harder to ensure employees reflect the make up of the population at all levels of the business, including the boardroom. Schools and universities can pledge to take action in ensuring equality of educational experience for its minority ethnic students. And everybody can support the campaign by a donation, by giving money, time or offering the resources at their disposal.

We want this collective action to signal a shared commitment to work towards a Britain without racism; a Britain which accepts differences between people but treats them equally in all aspects of their lives. No one person, or organisation can achieve this by themselves but together we can end it.

You can find out more about the campaign on the Runnymede Trust’s website, on Twitter and on Facebook.

The Wren’s Nest is not a name that conjures up a positive image for most people living in the Black Country. Synonymous with a once notorious area of North Dudley, which many still would try and avoid. However, for over a year now, HOPE not hate have been working in both the Wren’s Nest and Priory estates to try and change the perceptions of the area from the outdated negative image and towards something of which residents can feel proud.

In 2011 HOPE not hate produced the Fear & Hope report, which among other findings, discovered that those who are most vulnerable to the messages of extremist organisations tend to have a very pessimistic outlook on life and their area, and believe that their future is in the hands of others. Consequently, HOPE not hate have been working hard in the Wren’s Nest and Priory to encourage local residents to view their community from a different perspective; to hopefully get them to see the positives of their area and celebrate everything that is good about their community – rather than turning to a hard estate image as a way to find their identity.

Our work does not just stop there. We also aim to help empower local residents to take action in the locality and create positive change, and hopefully give them the knowledge and skills to do this. Thankfully, both of these estates have one of the counties best community resources right on their doorstep – the Wren’s Nest Nature Reserve.

The Nature Reserve is one of the most important geological sites in the United Kingdom, and is highly regarded amongst geologists the world over. Fossils date back to an ancient tropical seabed alongside well-preserved evidence of the glacier which cut through Dudley during the Ice Age. As if this was not enough, lime mines dating back to the 17^th Century dominate the area and give a constant reminder of the role this region, and the locals’ ancestors, played in the Industrial Revolution. Most communities would be singing about this from their rooftops, unfortunately however, a small minority ruin it for others by leaving their beer cans, and other less savoury items, lying around. So when a group from IHG (InterContinental Hotels Group) in Brierley Hill offered their time to get involved with some community work, HOPE not hate got in contact with them to help clean up the reserve.

The motivation behind the clean-up day was to provide a cleaner and more pleasant environment for families and children who wish to use the nature reserve during the school summer holidays. On the day around 22 volunteers gave up their time to help clear, very literally, a truck load of rubbish from the reserve.

Despite it raining all day the local volunteers remained high-spirited, and the most encouraging aspect from the HOPE not hate perspective was hearing how the volunteers changed their perception of the area quite quickly during the day.

As we started quite a few were certainly aware of the reputation of the area and were, understandably, inquisitive about its realities. For the majority, this was a part of their town to which they would never consider coming. Both the Wren’s Nest and Priory offered nothing positive to the town – it was just an area that one would whizz past on the Birmingham New Road. As we walked around, they learnt about the history of the area and were given a quick lesson in how to spot fossils of the tropical plants that would have once covered the area.

Before long the volunteers were actively, and passionately, discussing amongst one another how their thoughts on the area had been transformed and would certainly be encouraging others to check out the Wren’s Nest as an interesting place to visit. Cleaning up all that rubbish and ensuring that young children passing through the reserve do not have to see the evidence of someone’s Friday night litter on the paths and bushes was of course invaluable and will help encourage more and more residents of Wren’s Nest and Priory make better use of the resource. However, what was most important was that other locals, albeit only a small group to start with, have completely changed their attitude towards the estates, opening them up to visitors, with the ultimate aim of the estates finally lifting that sense of isolation, which has had such a damaging effect on the morale of those living there.

Owen Jones is the West Midlands Community Organiser for HOPE not hate

Here at OBV we are currently in the middle of yet another of our award-winning mentoring and shadowing scheme this one covering Birmingham and Wolverhampton with the West Midlands Civic Leadership Programme, funded by the Barrow Cadbury Trust. One particular go-getting member amidst an already elite group of 40 individuals is Sundeep Dhadley who has, it would seem, a finger in every pie and has managed to garner himself a position as the newest member and Third Sector representative of the new Policing and Crime Board in Wolverhampton.

Dhadley’s new role will mean he is directly involved in how the board set their policing priorities and he hopes to be able to address the deficit of BME viewpoints in this decision making arena. He was inspired to apply whilst sitting on another strategic board, which fed into him being recommended for this newly established one.

Sunny, as he prefers to be called, has been extremely active on the Civic Leadership Programme. He, along with other members of the programme, volunteered to help with Neena Gill’s campaign for re-election as an MEP to gain an insight into campaigning. He says he feels privileged to have been present as Gill herself explained a little about her political journey and how the role of MEP directly affects people’s lives often in ways they may not realise and how laws and legislation at the European level get handed down to Britain. He expressed a desire to eventually become an MEP and contribute to bringing long-term sustainable change to the UK and it appears to be a fully realisable dream as he shows no signs of stopping.

All this is in addition to being a full time member of OBV’s Civic Leadership Programme for the West Midlands to whom Sunny attributes his achievements for the opportunities it has afforded him. He is rubbing shoulders with MPs and Councillors and acknowledges that without OBV, it would’ve been difficult to gain such exposure and would not have been as simple to open doors to initial contact opportunities. Sunny is always asking insightful questions, a quality that has been noted by his mentors and peers alike and has brought him into the recognition of people of influence. He encourages all of us to follow his example and take the initiative. He said,

Do not be afraid to put your head above the parapet and do not worry if you don’t understand at first – ask until you do.“

The last thing Sunny insisted that I do was to thank OBV for the opportunity invested in him and that he remains eager and is looking forward to continuing to soak up all knowledge as he embarks on his Councillor shadowing of the leader of the Council in Wolverhampton, Councillor Roger Lawrence. Well done Sunny, you are a model for us all.

It’s usually a lot noisier. The men were so attentive, a different atmosphere today. I think they really appreciated it.

These are the words that we hear often after a visit by the Traveller Project to a Traveller Group meeting in any one of the 138 prisons across England and Wales. The speaker, usually a prison officer or chaplain, is often surprised by the engagement of the Travellers present but for us at the Traveller Project it simply makes sense – the group meetings are about things that are relevant, interesting and helpful to them and their families.

Traveller Groups in prison are by and large a recent phenomenon but they are a vital source of support and advice for a section of society that experiences an unrelentingly negative media portrayal. However, encouraging the provision of effective custody and rehabilitation of Travellers in prison is a challenge; a challenge that means starting from scratch within prisons – encouraging groups but also encouraging the sharing of ideas and news amongst staff and prisoners.

A few years ago before many Traveller Groups in prison were launched, a Traveller prisoner would do his or her time the ‘hard way’. The high levels of illiteracy amongst Travellers affecting over 60% of the community means many Travellers are isolated in the rigid bureaucracy that is prison life. Without literacy skills, he or she, even if willing, cannot do rehab courses necessary for early release or vocational training like bricklaying to go straight or even to gain a prized prison job.

Irish Travellers and Gypsies represent approximately 5% of the prison population – a vast over-representation in relation to their numbers in the general population – but quite standard for traditional or aboriginal communities adapting poorly to modern economic and social realities.

With this population spread across so many prisons it was a great challenge for our small team to disseminate the information and news that are necessary in promoting the needs of Travellers in prison. We needed a forum that was interesting and informative, useful and enjoyable. So we started the Travellers in Prison News (TIPN), a newsletter supported by Barrow Cadbury Trust, now read in over 100 prisons by approximately 500 men and women.

TIPN is a lively mix. It provides a platform for Travellers contributing articles, poems and drawings. It covers news relevant to Travellers, from Britain and Ireland often about success stories and role models. One of the most important elements of TIPN is its work in promoting literacy, education and the use of services in prison and upon release. In short, TIPN is a tool written mainly by Travellers for Travellers with the ultimate aim of building an empowered community inside and outside.

TIPN has become an integral part of building a greater awareness of Travellers in prison in England and Wales. As well as highlighting local prison initiatives, it has been crucial in the development of some of our own national projects. For example, the increased interest and uptake amongst Travellers in the reading programme Toe By Toe undoubtedly stems in part from TIPN’s circulation and TIPN’s testimonies from Travellers on the programme.

Travellers in Prison News has proven such a successful blueprint that the National Offender Management Service, the people who run prisons and probation have just commissioned a monthly programme for Travellers on Prison Radio.

Thanks for the Newsletter. I passed it on to one of the girls a few weeks back. It was about Travellers in prison, anyway it really inspired me to step up and be heard. I’m now training to be a Toe by Toe mentor and I am the Traveller Rep at Downview – Catherine, Traveller Representative, HMP Downview

Race Review 2008, a report by the National Offender Management Service, stated a particular concern for Gypsy Traveller Roma prisoners which ‘included: difficulties accessing services, including offender behaviour programmes, as the literacy level required was too high, derogatory and racist name calling primarily by prisoners, and by some staff, in two of the prisons visited, lack of confidence in the complaints system and the lack of cultural awareness and understanding of staff.’

As each month passes more and more prisons are conscious that there is a demand and interest in the provision of services for Travellers in prison. Travellers in prison are no longer so easy to disregard as being ‘hard to reach’. All of this is in no small part thanks to Travellers in Prison News and the support of Barrow Cadbury Trust.

Many of the people we work with are entirely destitute at the time of their first contact with us and, increasingly, struggle to access even the few rights and entitlements to which they are entitled. We have seen the situation become increasingly worse since the introduction of Legal Aid cuts in April, and were not in the least surprised to read that the Government’s strategy in terms of migration policy is actually to develop a “hostile environment”, in which irregular migrants struggle to access the most basic services.

The consequences of this this strategy on the lives of vulnerable migrants can be well illustrated by the example of Carlos and his family. Carlos approached us for help to regularise his family’s status, telling us that he and his wife, Angela, had arrived from Jamaica some 12 years ago, overstaying on a visa. Their son, Anton, had been born just over 9 years on and, having been diagnosed with autism early in his childhood, Carlos and Angela had felt unable to return home, fearing that Anton’s special needs would not be met within the Jamaican education system.

The family had paid a succession of private solicitors thousands of pounds to help regularise their status, to no avail. At the time of their first contact with us, they were renting a room within private accommodation, with mother, father and Anton all sharing a double bed. Their situation was rendered yet more precarious by the fact that the rent was paid by Angela taking employment as a care worker, without permission to work.

We were able to identify legal arguments to help regularise the family’s status: case law says that the families of children resident in the UK for longer than 7 years and well integrated into the UK’s education system should be granted status. Moreover, Anton will become eligible for registration as a British citizen in just 2 months’ time when he turns 10, having spent the entirety of his life to date in the UK.

We advised Carlos that his family was eligible for support from the Local Authority under section 17 of the Children Act while the new application was under preparation and consideration by the Home Office, and went about making a referral for support to the appropriate Authority. Which is where things became complicated.

Rather than working in partnership with us in Anton’s best interests as a child in need, the Local Authority has adopted an essentially adversarial approach; the social worker responsible for conducting the assessment actually told Carlos that he had been instructed by his manager to “disregard” information we had shared about representations we were in the process of submitting to the Home Office, and both the social worker and his manager have refused to communicate with us in any way about the family’s case.

On completion of the assessment, Carlos was presented with a letter advising him that his family was not eligible for support under section 17 of the Children Act, and should take immediate steps to ‘return’ to Jamaica- a country which Anton has never so much as set foot in. We consider the decision to be illegal, and referred Carlos and his family on to Birmingham Law Centre, with whom we had a close partnership working relationship, to initiate a Judicial Review proceedings. Nightmarishly, within a fortnight of our referral, the Law Centre closed down. We have now, thankfully, identified alternative legal representation for the family, and hope that appropriate support will be put in place within a matter of days.

In the meantime, however, the family is living on food parcels we are able to provide, and experiencing harassment from the family of the landlord in whose property they are still sharing a room, not having been able to pay the rent since Angela stopped working on our advice.

Consultations are underway to make the environment in the UK even more “hostile” for families in this situation: it is proposed to give yet more power to the landlord exploiting this family’s vulnerable situation, and to restrict their access to healthcare. The reception afforded to this family by the agencies they approach for support is that they are “illegal immigrants”, who should simply leave the UK. And yet, the law actually says that this family- and particularly Anton, who knows no other life- does have a right to settlement in the UK.

Which raises a question: what use are rights if no one can help you to access them? Carlos and his family are not eligible for legal aid to help regularise their immigration status. The Local Authority responsible for the family’s basic accommodation and support needs refuses to take responsibility. Agencies which can help are so precariously funded that, like Birmingham Law Centre, they go out of business in the process of initiating legal challenges.

ASIRT, for now, is here to fight for the rights of people denied them in a “hostile environment”. But the decimation of advice and advocacy organisations across the country makes it likely that thousands of families in similar situations will be left in precarious “limbo” situations for many years to come.

Welfare reform, the ‘bedroom tax’, tougher sanctions for those receiving Jobseeker’s Allowance, reductions in council tax benefits, reductions in benefits; all happening at once with reduced funding to administer and/or advise those affected – for many the nightmare has just begun; and we haven’t even hit universal credit yet.

What seems to have been overlooked is that many people on benefits already live hand-to-mouth and change at this level is enough to upset the balance and literally send families and individuals lives into chaos; so a whole raft of changes introduced at once with more to come has been nothing short of catastrophic for many.

I’m not saying things shouldn’t change but change on this scale needs to be properly thought through and resourced; implemented at a realistic pace and most importantly, it must be fair.

The number of new food banks opening up and the caps being placed on the number of food parcels people can have shows the reality of the situation – I was on the High Street at the weekend and without moving could see four shops advertising loans or offering cash for goods – to me it’s the payday loan companies benefitting most from these changes and not the taxpayer.

Some statistics from Birmingham Settlement to demonstrate the point: last year for our biggest single advice contract we had 1200 contacts; in April and May alone this year we’ve seen 660 – that’s more than 50% of last years’ total in just two months. At the same time our funding has reduced and we have had to cut our delivery team from 12 to 8.

There has also been a significant increase in the number of people being referred from other agencies who are also struggling to cope – in the last six weeks two advice agencies near us have closed due to lack of funding.

Money advisers at Birmingham Settlement. Their time and resources are increasingly stretched.

We are advising people that they may have to wait up to three hours, sometimes more, and the fact that most people are prepared to wait says it all; some days we have to simply close the doors because we cannot see any more people.

There is also a real danger to staff struggling to maintain the service. I was in the corridor outside our offices with an adviser last week and he was stopped by an existing client seeking advice, once outside the building he was stopped again by another client – the pressure being placed on small responsive agencies (and their staff) like the Settlement is immense, and is not sustainable.

It’s interesting that Birmingham City Council recently said they had seen a 91% increase in rent arrears since the inception of welfare reform; and a couple of Housing Associations in the North East reported a 300% increase in arrears – and they have empty properties because people aren’t prepared to move into family accommodation – clearly there is a problem.

At Birmingham Settlement we see hundreds of people and it seems to me we’re penalising those who are least able to deal with the situation – it’s out of their hands.

I propose that a much fairer solution would be to send the bill to the housing provider or local authority. If this was the case, pressure would be taken off the people who literally cannot pay; whilst you could be assured the provider would work quicker to find an alternative solution or accommodation – and perhaps even plan for future needs? Obviously, there could be problems as the tenant could, in theory, be offered something totally unsuitable (think of an elderly or disabled lady with mobility needs on the top floor of a tower block), so there would need to be some safeguards. However, at least the problem would be addressed by those who have a voice or ability to influence – and it’s good to see some providers are beginning to stand up and use their position. The reality is that unfortunately our clients don’t have a voice. Who is fighting for them?

Government has said there is flexibility in the system, but the reality doesn’t seem to reflect this – and welfare changes are being applied across the board with little apparent discretion. Even if there was discretion – what allowances would be made and how would they be implemented? That’s another reason why we need to shift responsibility to the provider.

We often talk about inequality and the need to close the gap between the haves and have nots. Indeed, an independent inquiry by MPs recently concluded that the poorest and most deprived parts of the country are the worst affected by public spending cuts. Here in Birmingham we can certainly agree on that.

Securing a place at school

RMC helped Rose to complete the application for admitting her child to the local school. It is very difficult for clients with little English to discriminate between very important and less important letters from their child’s school. Rose always brought any letters from school to RMC so that she was sure she fully understood them. When she moved to another area we assisted her in appealing the decision not to allow the child to move schools. Later Rose was obliged to return to her home country for several months and we contacted Wolverhampton Council to inform them that the child would be travelling abroad for a protracted period of time.

An adviser and client at the RMC (not those featured in these case studies

Housing debt while coping with cancer

Our client was in debt with rent arrears with their housing provider, who had contracted out collection of the debt to a private company. The debt collectors demanded that he pay each month over the phone. Because the client couldn’t speak English he had to travel to RMC each time so that an adviser could assist him.

He found the journey difficult as he was suffering from cancer, and he was being harassed by the debt collectors knocking on his door continuously. An RMC adviser contacted housing provider and explained the situation. The housing provider retrieved the debt collection from the private company and allowed the client to make payments by direct debit, which was a huge relief to the client.