Yesterday the UK voted in a general election. Not wanting to not vote, I went straight after work, in uniform.
In the line at the polling booth, the man in front saw my uniform, before saying, “Guess you’ll be voting Tory.”
Perplexed, I asked why he thought this. He told me that Boris Johnson was building 40,000 more prison cells, and extending the time served for those sentenced.
I thought this sounded terrible. The service doesn’t have enough staff now, let alone staff to support such an expansion. There’s no point telling me we’ll hire the staff for the spaces, because we can’t even hire enough staff now. I’m the only survivor of an induction class of 19. That’s like a 90% attrition rate for staff retention, if my class is typical of all. Longer sentences likely won’t produce better people upon release either, because the system is on its knees anyway.
He didn’t really comprehend the concept of prisons requiring staff to function. No different to the NHS or police really.
Tories won again though, so I expect nothing to change soon. Moan over, I promise not to mention politics again until next election.
Art and Sadness 