Some of the other consequences of austerity are becoming visible, too. Opponents of cuts are frequently accused of alarmism: we are now seeing how prophetic they were. While our prison population doubled in the space of two decades, last week the Prison Officers’ Association warned that falling staff numbers and cuts mean a “bloodbath in prisons”, adding that “staff are absolutely on their knees, lost all morale, all motivation”. No one can say the warnings weren’t there.
Our Victorian prison system – which is more interested in locking up mentally ill poor people than rehabilitation and crime prevention – is overcrowded, under-staffed and underresourced. And on the same day, there were reports of a riot in Exeter prison. Yesterday, two prisoners escaped from Pentonville prison and are now on the run.
This weekend, up to 200 inmates rioted in Bedford prison. Over the last few days, the crisis enveloping Britain’s prison system stopped being a warning scribbled in press releases. Government cuts pursued the following strategy: to target people who were less likely to vote (such as young people) and who preferably were held in low esteem by wider society (such as benefit claimants) or where the consequences would not be felt for a long time. Yes, workers suffered the longest squeeze in their wages since the 19th century, but the fall in living standards was somehow decoupled from the issue of cuts. “ Austerity” is a term so abstract that, during the televised leaders debates at the last general election, the most commonly Googled phrase in Britain was “what is austerity?” That was after five years of it.
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