SUGGESTED CHANGES

Waikato Times, Volume 125, Issue 20911, 16 September 1939, Page 21 (Supplement)

SUGGESTED CHANGES

I TREATMENT OF PRISONERS 1 Commander F. P. Foster, Governor ' of Parkhurst Prison, speaking at the • summer school of the Howard League * for Penal Reform on the habitual ' criminal, suggested that each prisoner j should be given a fully stamped insur- ! ance card on his release to enable him to get unemployment benefit, says . The Times. That was the most desirable thing to be done, he said. Some people said that by doing that they were paying a man to keep out of prison. When they considered the . cost of keeping a man in prison, how- ! ever, and the cost of maintaining him | out of prison he thought they would j come to the conclusion it was money ! well spent. Tf they wanted a man to live a i normal life outside prison he should ! not be made to live in an abnormal life ’ inside the prison walls. Men first ( sent to penal servitude should go to a training prison, where they would •. be trained to work machines for the . production of clothing and boots for lhe Government. If they went hack for another sentence they would then go to a factory prison paid at trade union rates on condition that they became members of a trade union. The output of the factory prison would be bought by the Government, which ; was one of the largest buyers of such things in the world. Suitable Work Needed Commander D. N. Venables, Gov-

ernor of Oxford Prison, speaking on “ Borstal and the Training of the Young Offender,” said it had always been in the forefront of every scheme of reformation that the delinquent should do suitable work, and no doubt the principle was sound. The difficulty was that every generation, and almost every individual, had different ideas about what constituted suitable work. Since the inception of the Borstal system the idea had been that young offenders must be taught a trade, and by the practice of that trade after their discharge they would be able to earn an honest living. At the back of this theory was the idea that people in honest employment did not get into trouble, but that was a false assumption. Bovs sent to Borstal had only a slender chance of obtaining work in ! the trade for which they might be j trained in the institution, j The touchstone for any activity must be: Will it help to do anything ! towards the reclamation of the boy? llf not it was not worth doing. There ! were some activities which were a ' sheer waste of the time of the boys j and staff. He was doubtful after bitter experience of the value of per- : forming plays. On some of the playi c-rs the effect was bad. They were cursed with too much sense of drama and too much love of the limelight.