•
the correct authorisations and risk assessments are in place to support the
monitoring of prisoners’ communications;
•
all interception is carried out lawfully and in accordance with the Human Rights Act
(HRA);
•
there is consistency in the approach to interception; and
•
appropriate measures are being afforded for the retention, storage and destruction
of intercept product.
In 2016, my office conducted 76 prison inspections. The majority were conducted in a
single day. The total number of recommendations made was 418 – an average of 5.5
recommendations for each prison. These recommendations are given a ‘traffic light’
rating, in line with the standard practice across IOCCO inspections.
In 2016, 19% of the recommendations were red, 62% amber and 19% green. Prisons
received the following overall grading:
•
•
•
65% received a good grade
20% were satisfactory
15% were poor.
A full list of prisons inspected and their scores can be found in Annex C.
Prisoners’ telephone calls are controlled by a pin-phone system. Each prisoner has an
individual telephone account, which is accessed by their pin-number. Prisons discharge
their responsibility to inform prisoners that communications may be intercepted by
issuing, on arrival, a communications compact. This document informs prisoners of the
interception process, confidential calls and the statutory purposes for which a Governor
can authorise interception.
The administration and content of the communications compact were amended by the
2016 Instruction. This caused some confusion, and a number of recommendations were
made to correct problems where:
•
•
•
•
•
staff were issuing old versions of the compact;
copies were not being supplied to prisoners;
documents were unsigned;
compacts had been stored or disseminated incorrectly; and
there was poor provision for prisoners with language difficulties.
When a communications compact is served, prisoners individually request the authorisation
of their pin-phone contacts. In all of the establishments inspected, this process was in
order and completed to a good standard. However, some prisons were vulnerable to
abuse by prisoners who had made requests for numbers to be placed on the secure side
of the system in an attempt to prevent their communications being intercepted rather
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