Committee for Justice

OFFICIAL REPORT

(Hansard)

Prison Issues: Prison Governors Association

14 January 2016

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NORTHERN IRELAND ASSEMBLY

Committee for Justice

Prison Issues: Prison Governors Association

14 January 2016

Members present for all or part of the proceedings: Mr Alastair Ross (Chairperson) Mr Raymond McCartney (Deputy Chairperson) Mr Stewart Dickson Mr Sammy Douglas Mr Paul Frew Mr Danny Kennedy Mr Seán Lynch Mr Alban Maginness Ms Bronwyn McGahan Mr Patsy McGlone Mr Edwin Poots Witnesses: Mr Gary Alcock Prison Governors Association Mr John Attard Prison Governors Association Mr Colin Ward Prison Governors Association

The Chairperson (Mr Ross): I welcome John Attard, Gary Alcock and Colin Ward from the Prison Governors Association (PGA). Before we begin, have you all read the CJINI report? Mr Gary Alcock (Prison Governors Association): We made sure we had — long before then. The Chairperson (Mr Ross): You probably have the time to read it. Mr Alcock: I have read it that many times I think I have lived it. Mr Kennedy: Do any of you read 'The Sun'? Mr Alcock: No, I do not read 'The Sun'. The Chairperson (Mr Ross): You may take five or 10 minutes for any comments, and then we will open up to questions. Mr Alcock: I thank the Chair, Deputy Chair and Committee members for the invitation to the PGA. I am the chairman of the Prison Governors Association for Northern Ireland, which represents almost 100% of governors in the Northern Ireland Prison Service. Thank you for the offer to make the opening statement. Mr friend and colleague, John, will read out a prepared statement.

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Mr John Attard (Prison Governors Association): Good afternoon. The PGA welcomes the report, if for no other reason than that it highlights some of the critical issues that the prison was facing and has resulted in the commencement of recruitment and provision of additional resources, something that the previous governor petitioned for on numerous occasions during his 11-month tenure. You have heard from a number of individuals, many of whom are seen as experts in their field, and all have expressed their opinion on what the problems at the prison were. However, up until today, you had not heard from the most compelling witnesses: those who actually worked in the prison and those who currently work there. The previous governor and deputy governor, as you will be aware, have been publicly singled out and criticised, and local management has also been criticised. What the Committee may not be aware of was that the whole Maghaberry senior management team was transferred out, except for one. That includes the governor, who was responsible for the resettlement function, which scored well in the report. The headlines that I would like to open with are these: the then governor and deputy took up post in June 2014, when the prisons budget had been reduced by approximately £4 million from the year before. Staffing levels were already approximately 100 short and, at the time of the inspection, around 200 short. The PGA also gave early warning signs at the Justice Committee in March 2014 that cutting resources might damage regimes and staffing levels, leading to issues down the line. The Committee may well be of the opinion that, as a trade union, our aim will be to divert the finger of responsibility away from our members. That is not an unreasonable assumption, but the PGA is also a professional body, and we can present evidence from contemporaneous records and notes made prior to the inspections that highlight many of the issues referred to in the inspection report. These records are made up of staff appraisals, letters, emails and personal journals and are compelling in their content. The sheer breadth of evidence that can be produced is staggering. There is, paradoxically, evidence not of a failing management team but of a decent, experienced and committed team whose pleas for support and warnings of things to come went unanswered. What we will present today is not opinion but fact based on evidence. I am mindful of the limited time available, and I will keep this as short as necessary, focusing on one key element of the criticism of Maghaberry and the performance of the governor and deputy governor. I do not wish to delay the Committee's asking any questions, but ask for just a little indulgence in addressing this particular point. This is imperative, as the criticisms and observations about other key areas of the prison, beyond that of local management's performance, will take on a new perspective when a light is shone on this issue. With regards to the inspection report, the chief inspector described conditions at Maghaberry as Dickensian. Why did he do this when other prisons that had fared worse were not described using such emotive terms? Was it because those other inspections have not been quite as bad? The evidence, sadly, suggests not. The reason, I suggest, for the sudden use of such terminology is that it is more likely to attract media coverage than simply repeating that there is another failing prison. The more sensational a report, the more likely it is to receive attention, and the more attention a report gets, the more likely something will be done about it. That is indeed what happened at Maghaberry. Now this tactic, some might say, is not necessarily a bad thing if it results in the achievement of our joint aims: a safe, decent and secure prison. However, it becomes a bad thing if it results in those unable to defend themselves being condemned for failures outside of their control and, more importantly, in a missed opportunity for lessons to be learned. I will read out some reported headlines now: "most prisoners feeling unsafe"; "inmates said drugs were easily available"; "levels of violence were high"; "increased use of force and adjudications"; "acute staff shortages due to levels of sickness and recruitment problems"; “prisoners dissatisfied with healthcare provision"; and "a failure of management and leadership." No, I am not referring to the Maghaberry report, but the headlines of a report on a prison in England in February 2014, just a few months before Maghaberry's inspection and whose overall assessment was lower than Maghaberry's. Maghaberry, as you know, scored three 1s and a 3 for resettlement, with 4 being the highest mark. The prison that I have referred to scored three 1s and only a 2 for resettlement. The similarity between the reports is uncanny. However, the way the respective heads of each organisation responded to them could not be more different. The National Offender Management Service (NOMS) response was that the prison was going through a difficult time when the prison was inspected because it was short of staff, and standards of cleanliness were unacceptable. However, since the inspection, a robust recovery plan is being put into place. The prison has an able governor — the same governor — the management team has

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been strengthened, and staffing numbers have increased. There has been a crackdown on illicit drug use, and cleanliness has markedly improved. NIPS senior officials, on the other hand, responded in a rather different way. They blamed local management and stated that the Prison Service had taken steps to challenge the performance of the governor and the deputy governor, and criticised them for not robustly tackling sick absence. Those are very serious allegations to make against two senior governors who have a combined commitment to the Prison Service of over 60 years. It would not be unreasonable, therefore, to expect the allegations made against them to be backed up with evidence. There is no evidence. Let us deal now with the claim around performance and how that was challenged. We will start with the governor. The governor of the prison in April 2015, just weeks before the inspection, had his end-of-year appraisal carried out by his line manager, the then director of operations. He stated:

"Tradition dictates that my assessment of the governing governor's performance should be informed by the establishment's key performance measures. In this case, that would be unjust on a senior leader who has not had the opportunity to shape or change an inherited management team and whose prison has been handicapped by acute staff shortages, much of which are beyond his sphere of control."

The director of operations also wrote of the governor in his monthly report. For example, in November 2014, he states:

"You are the right man to lead Maghaberry, and we will work collectively to ensure you have the right support around you."

In March 2015, he writes:

"I do not underestimate the challenge of governing Maghaberry and commend you for the resilience you show. That represents a considerable management challenge, and you have applied yourself to that task by showing you care for your workforce, by forging a collegiate approach and in which you seek to bring all quarters of the prison with you."

The last quote I will read is from April 2015:

"At this time I am greatly concerned by the impact that staffing shortages are having at Maghaberry, but that is not a reflection on a governor who engenders loyalty with his team and works hard to bring his workforce with him to provide lasting solutions and who is now being robust on sickness."

I will go on to the deputy governor. On 11 December 2014, the director of operations met the deputy governor and stated in that meeting that he had no issues with his performance. The deputy governor's end-of-year appraisal comments, after the inspection, were:

"The deputy governor is probably the governor with the greatest personal drive that I have ever worked with. I found him to be a totally loyal, honest and effective manager and leader."

Lastly in this area, the deputy governor and I met the director general to discuss his transfer out of Maghaberry. That was on 6 July 2015, after the inspection. In the minuted meeting, I suggested to her that, if there were any issues with the deputy governor's performance, he should be told. The director general agreed with me but did not suggest that there were any issues with his performance, and he has never been told that there is a problem with his performance. In conclusion, the assertion, therefore, made by the Minister that Prison Service management were taking steps to challenge their performance does not stand up to closer scrutiny. That now leads me on to the issue of why improvements are being made in the prison — if, indeed, they are, and you have alluded to that already. The Chief Inspector of Prisons described the conditions in the prison as Dickensian. To continue with the Dickens comparison, the governor, like Oliver Twist, went bowl in hand and said to the most senior managers in NIPS, "Please, sir, I want some more." He was clearly referring to staff and resources and, like Oliver Twist, he got more than he bargained for: he was criticised and transferred out. The question is this: was he being unreasonable or excessive in his request? The answer to that is no. How do we know this? We know this because a replacement governor has now been given what the previous governor had been asking for — and more. Staff

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have been detailed detached duty to work at the prison. Staff have been transferred into the prison from other stations, and recruitment has finally started. Furthermore, the governor management team has been increased from 12 to 16. This is something that the PGA had requested numerous times. What has changed between the previous governor leaving and a new governor arriving? Nothing, except for a highly critical report on a prison that hit the headlines. Going to some substantive points, was Maghaberry in as poor a state as described? This is obviously a complex question. However, only two months before the inspection, a highly respected criminal justice consultant visited Maghaberry. His report suggests that it was not as bad as reported. This is an excerpt from what he wrote:

"The governor discussed with him, among other things, problems regarding shortage of staff, high sickness levels, high bed-watch numbers and unpredictable willingness of staff to work overtime. He attended a good and businesslike morning operational meeting, which was used to monitor performance on key targets like keeping square houses at a safe population level, and bed watches were creating substantial problems for raising delivery. At the start of the day, there were four bed watches out, but, when you left at 4.00 pm, there were six. We observed good engagement between prisoners and staff, which were respectful and friendly in tone without compromising staff authority. The report was not without its objective observation on areas for improvement but, overall, it was balanced and a positive report."

Who was this criminal justice consultant? It was Phil Wheatley CB, a former director general of the England and Wales Prison Service and a current a non-executive director of the Northern Ireland Prison Service. When did his visit take place? Just two months before the inspection. Is there independent evidence to demonstrate that there were issues beyond the governor's control that impacted on delivery? The answer to that is yes. On 1 August 2014, the then chair of the Independent Monitoring Board (IMB) wrote to the director of operations with regard to serious staff concerns. This included commenting on sickness levels, a lack of recruitment and stress, and warning that the situation was becoming critical. The chair was so concerned that she concluded by stating that she would raise the issue at ministerial level. There was then a series of correspondence and exchanges between the IMB, the director general, the director of operations and the Justice Minister. However, since the PGA understands that the IMB is attending the Committee in several weeks, we will leave it to the IMB to expand on this further. We have touched on safety, but I have another short paragraph on that. The fact was highlighted that there had been six deaths in custody since the last inspection. This is very sad, but it is also important to point out that none of those occurred during the tenure of the governor and the deputy governor. I will conclude on this last point: on 6 November 2014, the Chief Inspector stated in a BBC radio interview that the staff at Maghaberry faced the same threats as at many other jails in England. He also said, when asked about ongoing paramilitary threats, that Maghaberry was not a special case. He said:

"I think people should stop making excuses."

The fact that the interview was aired on the same day as a Northern Ireland Prison Service memorial service was unfortunate. It was particularly difficult for the family and friends of those most recently affected to hear. It is clear that the level of threat to colleagues in the Northern Ireland Prison Service is greater. Referring to it with regard to an inspection report was insensitive and caused huge hurt across the Prison Service family and wider. Thank you for listening. The PGA is happy to answer any questions that you have.

The Chairperson (Mr Ross): I will be brief, because I expect that a lot of members will want in and my voice is starting to go. We have had the director general in front of the Committee virtually every six months. In my first session as Chair when she was here, she kept talking about collective leadership within the Prison Service in Northern Ireland, how they act in a collegiate way and everything else. The day the report from CJINI was published, she went on 'Newsline' and, to use an American term, threw the governor under the bus. She said, "It is nothing to do with me. This is a local management issue." Leaving aside that leadership style, how does it impact on not just the governor in Maghaberry but governors across Northern Ireland and even right across the UK to see a director general taking that approach?

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Mr Alcock: Without wishing to get into throwing stones — that can go back and forth, and that is not the way that the PGA will operate — I will answer that by saying that leadership is not just about being the leader in sunny weather. Sometimes leadership means standing up in the mouth of the storm, in freezing snow and sleet, and saying that you are the leader. If Barack Obama, as the President of America, can say that the buck stops at his desk, I would suggest that every leader should. I certainly have exemplified that in the past — to my own cost, as many members are probably aware. All that I would suggest is that, sometimes, being the leader and throwing bodies in front of the oncoming train does not win you the most kudos, confidence or respect, across the service and wider. The Chairperson (Mr Ross): One of the frustrations for the Committee was that it took about 10 or 15 minutes of questioning before the director general accepted that responsibility stopped with her. It was remarkable that it took quite so long before we got to that point. I want to mention one specific area before I open it up to other members. That came out of the previous evidence session, and it was about the fire at Erne House. I was on public record at the time as saying that I thought that both the Minister of Justice and the director general were trying to underplay that fire, both with what happened and with the cost of the damage. We have heard from the Prison Officers' Association (POA) that there were enough officers on duty that day who were ready to go in and tackle the fire and ensure that everybody was safe, but they were not able to do that. The POA representatives said that the governor was willing to let them go in, but they had to refer that decision to gold command, which I presume was the director general that day. Is that correct?

Mr Alcock: That is my understanding; correct. The Chairperson (Mr Ross): Can you talk me through how that happens? I asked the question about decision-making, and part of the CJINI report was about people having a lack of confidence in making decisions. That is bad in any organisation. If you trust your staff and your local leadership, you have to allow them to take decisions. When something like that happens, you need to act quickly, because, ultimately, you are talking about saving people's lives or trying to minimise damage. Talk me through the process from the moment that a prison officer spots a fire. What process do they have to go through before action can be taken within the prison? Mr Alcock: I can talk to you in general terms, Chair. I would rather stay clear of the Erne House incident specifically. As you are aware, it is still under investigation, and due process should be allowed to take place in as much as, whilst the investigation is ongoing, I have a sense that it coming very close to a conclusion and the report being released. I am not being evasive — The Chairperson (Mr Ross): I understand. Mr Alcock: — I am being honest. I would prefer, as when speaking about any ongoing investigation in a public forum, to let due process take its place. The Chairperson (Mr Ross): I am happy for you to speak in generalities. Whatever the incident may be, what process has to be gone through before action can be taken? Mr Alcock: In general, there are three levels of incidents — levels 1, 2 and 3. A level 1 incident is a member of staff being assaulted on a wing. Level 3 is a larger one where you need a larger body of staff to deal with it. When you click into command mode, as the Maghaberry member of staff said, you then fall into the bronze, silver and gold command system. Initially, there is the incident, whether it is six prisoners — sadly, I have had too much experience of these incidents, so I will keep it short. Say you had 12 or 20 prisoners who refuse to come in from the yard, the football pitch or the gym — it does not matter. What you do, in simple language, is you hold, plan and act. If they are in the gym, you seal it off, providing that there is no threat to life. You then do a quick on-the-ground assessment. If you know that it is a larger than normal incident, you alert the emergency control room or nerve centre of the prison through the alarm system. They then fall into the command mode, which is bronze, silver and gold. In short, bronze command is those staff on the ground who you will have seen on TV and in the newspapers kitted up in protective gear. Commanders are assigned, briefings go on and they try to assess exactly what is involved in the incident. In Maghaberry's case, silver command happens in the

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boardroom. Governors and other senior staff are pulled in, and a very detailed process happens there. I will give you the scene. The silver command suite is set up. Normally, the silver commander will be the most senior governor in charge. On a perfect day that will be the governor, but, if he is on leave or at meetings etc, it will be the deputy governor. If it is deemed at that stage that it is serious and likely to be prolonged, a gold command is then formed at headquarters. Sometimes it is formed in a shadowing role; sometimes, if it is very clear that it is going to be a serious incident, it forms into an actual gold command in headquarters. If it happens out of hours, we have an on-call system. For example, the three most senior governors in Maghaberry are one week apiece on call if it happens during the night etc, and we also have a duty governor. So that, in a couple of minutes — I am sorry for having taken so long —

The Chairperson (Mr Ross): No, it is useful. Mr Kennedy: Welcome, and thank you for your evidence. I listened carefully to your assessment of the report. You seem to be indicating that it was sensationalised or sexed up, potentially for more prominent media coverage. You have been present to hear the evidence of the Prison Officers' Association and particularly that of Mr Ivor Dunne, who works at Maghaberry. What is your take on that evidence from the POA? How accurate and relevant is it, in terms of what you have heard and how it applies to this report? Presumably you believe that your members have been scapegoated. Who do you believe they have been scapegoated by, or for whom? Mr Alcock: As you are aware, the Minister gave a statement to the Assembly, Mr McGuigan gave one to the Justice Committee and Sue McAllister and her team gave one subsequently. I have read all three Hansard reports. All I suggest is that the governor and deputy governor were the only two I heard singled out. In fact, the Minister was particularly scathing. He gave a performance critique on the then previous governor and deputy governor and said he would not go into personal details, but then went into personal details. I have not heard anyone else being blamed for the report at Maghaberry. I listened to radio and TV interviews. I am not suggesting that it was simply heaped on the governor and deputy governors. As you heard today, Maghaberry is a very complex prison with many issues. However, those were the only two individuals singled out. I do not know whether John or Colin has anything further to add to that. Mr Attard: With regard to your interpretation of us saying that the report was sexed up, the report itself was not sexed up but, in a way, the report on the report was. The content of the report was probably right. Mr Kennedy: The reporting of the report was sexed up? Mr Attard: Yes. I think — Mr Kennedy: Sorry, by whom? Mr Attard: The Chief Inspector of Prisons said that it would not have been out of place for Dickens to write about Maghaberry prison. Those were his words. Because of that media sound bite, the media was interested in it. I am not suggesting for one second that the report is not a critical report; it is. However, there are many other critical reports about prisons in the UK that have not got anywhere near the same degree of attention as Maghaberry. Mr Kennedy: Let me just come back to what Mr Alcock said. I want to try to be fair and clear as to where you apportion your view. You believe that your members have been scapegoated. You appear to be indicating that they were scapegoated, at least, by a politician for political reasons? Mr Alcock: No, I have never suggested that. It is felt that those two individuals were singled out because, first, they were the only two staff in the positions mentioned in the statement. We think that it is unfair to use the word "scapegoated" in light of their line managers' assessments and their annual report assessments, which were done in April and May — the very time when the Minister stated that those two individuals had been challenged about their performance. The two annual report assessments that you heard are verbatim. Then, you heard the chief inspector, I think, mention monthly reports — I may be wrong; it may have been another individual. You have heard an excerpt of the assessment of the then governor's performance:

"He was the right man to lead the prison".

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Mr Kennedy: The commentary in the aftermath of the report, provided by the Minister and Sue McAllister, clearly laid blame at the door of your members. Mr Alcock: That is our opinion, yes. Mr Kennedy: In your view, unfairly so and unjustly so. Mr Alcock: It is not just a view or an opinion — that is evidentially the case. That is why we were very clear that we were not coming today to give views or opinions: if there are 20 people in a room, there will be 20 opinions. Mr Kennedy: Why do you think that they apportioned blame to those individuals? Mr Alcock: Officially, the director general is the operational head of the Prison Service. Mr Kennedy: That is where the buck should stop. Mr Alcock: I have not said that. Mr Kennedy: You have implied it. Mr Alcock: I am saying that the governor and the deputy governor were the ones who were removed from the Prison Service and publicly embarrassed. Mr A Maginness: Do you believe that Maghaberry is Dickensian? Mr Attard: I have visited Maghaberry on a number of occasions, and I remember my first visit very well. Maghaberry, like another prison that I have worked in, is a high-profile prison. I did not know what to expect when I got there, but I was pleasantly surprised by a lot of the good things that I found. I witnessed prisoners moving freely and excellent interactions between staff and prisoners. I visited a fantastic unit in Quoile House and was absolutely blown away by that. I saw innovation, such as cameras at the doors. I saw lots of things that were really pleasantly surprising. I also saw some things that were less than good. The square units felt oppressive and not nice to be on, and anyone who suggested otherwise would not be telling the truth. It did not feel Dickensian to me. Dickensian relates not only to a building but to the people who are in it, and it did not feel that way to me. That is not just my opinion. Phil Wheatley went into the prison two months earlier, and he did not describe it in such terms. I have been in the Prison Service for 29 years, but Phil Wheatley is significantly more senior and significantly more experienced than me. He is in a stronger position, and he never made such references.

Mr A Maginness: Was Mr Wheatley on the panel with Anne Owers? Mr Alcock: Yes. Mr A Maginness: As a trade union, you accept the general direction, general thrust and substance of the Anne Owers report that that is the right way to proceed. Mr Alcock: Yes. Mr A Maginness: In the context of Maghaberry and leaving the other prison establishments aside, do you think that progress has been made on the recommendations of the Anne Owers report? Mr Alcock: I believe that we are moving forward. We cut too deep, too quickly. The PGA is certainly not against change. We all know that change is constant and does not stop for anyone. We support the general direction of the normalisation, modernisation and professionalisation of the Northern Ireland Prison Service generally and Maghaberry specifically. However, you have to do it with the people, and I include prisoners, staff and the local management of prisoners in that.

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Mr A Maginness: Can you reconcile the report by the Chief Inspector of Prisons and CJINI with the views and assessment of Mr Wheatley when he visited the prison two months before they did? Mr Alcock: I have read both reports in detail. No, they cannot be reconciled, but, more importantly, if you read the monthly visit reports by the then director of operations, you will find that they do not mirror that report. The PGA is not saying that Maghaberry is perfect, that there are no faults and that there cannot be improvement. We are saying that, factually and evidentially — it is not an opinion — the monthly report by the then director of operations, references to other senior officials who visited and said that Maghaberry was doing well, and I know that some of you around the table have visited numerous times — none of that can be reconciled with the report. In fairness to the director general — again, I might be selecting the wrong individual — the view put forward was that it was a snapshot. I am not saying that it was a snapshot; I am saying that it is not as bad, in our members' view, as it was portrayed. The Chairperson (Mr Ross): Sorry to interrupt, but were the monthly reviews provided to the inspector or did he get them as part of his work leading up to the inspection? Mr Alcock: I believe that the inspector received them. We have lived and slept this for a number of months now, and, if I recall the Hansard report correctly, he referred — I may be wrong; it might have been the director general — to the monthly reports. I know that the inspection team had access to them. The Chairperson (Mr Ross): Sorry, Alban. Mr A Maginness: Not at all, Chair. I am obliged for that intervention. Do you believe that Maghaberry is the most dangerous prison in western Europe? Mr Alcock: Any prison can be the most dangerous prison if the conditions are wrong. The Deputy Chair said it: prisons should be conflict-free zones. Everyone within those prison walls is a human being. When you treat prisoners decently and with respect and try to deliver a reasonable regime, you prevent the temperature in the prison rising. The reverse of that is, as you will be aware, Mr Maginness, also true: if the regime is crumbling — prisoners are not getting the basics and feel unfairly dealt with; the staff have retreated into bunkers and offices; and governors are not walking the site — you could have the most dangerous prison in any country. Mr A Maginness: Do you think that it was hyperbole on the part of the inspector general? Mr Alcock: I defer to my more learned colleague. There is public access to the last six or so inspection reports across the National Offender Management Service (NOMS). I do not wish to name the prisons, but you will find very similar statements in those reports. Mr Hardwick's most recent annual report across NOMS includes the very same issues as the Maghaberry report: staff shortages, critical underfunding and drugs. I am not saying that Maghaberry is any better or any worse; I am saying that I do not recognise it as the most dangerous prison in Europe. Mr A Maginness: I have one last question. Thank you for your indulgence, Chair. I know that you disagree with parts of the report and some of its findings. The report highlights a failure of leadership, and that seems to be a principal criticism. If we assume that there was a failure of leadership — I know that you do not accept it as precisely as that — was that not a failure on the part of the top people in the prison? Mr Attard: As you heard in my opening statement, Maghaberry is not the only prison where chief inspectors criticise management and leadership. It is how those who are able to respond do so. The response from the senior managers in NIPS was to focus the criticism on one area, which was local management. The night before, at a meeting between the inspectors and the management team at Maghaberry, it was suggested that the leadership issue was not just local; it was also within NIPS headquarters, but that never found its way to the report. Mr A Maginness: If you are assessing a situation in which the leadership of a prison is going wrong, is it not reasonable to say that it is the head — possibly the deputy, too — who is at fault because, operationally, they are responsible?

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Mr Alcock: In some sense, Mr Maginness, that is correct. However, if any governor or deputy — let us depersonalise this; it does not matter which prison — was in any way underperforming or lacking leadership, there is a process, and it should apply to all of us. Their line manager should bring them in and, first, verbally make them aware, informally, that they are not performing and that they have failed on this and fallen short on that. There are different ways of doing that: for example, a line manager can put them on special report, comment on their leadership every three months and review them at the end of the year. It should not come as a shock — out of the blue — but none of that happened to those individuals. The Chairperson (Mr Ross): I raised that point with the director general when she was here. I said that it took a report such as this one for her to make the changes that she said were necessary to improve things. I asked her what she had been doing for the last three years and why, if things were not going well, she did not make the changes in the previous three years. You are saying that, at no point between the 2012 report and the 2015 report, when the director general was in post, were warnings given to the local management at Maghaberry that she did not think that things were going well. Mr Alcock: With due respect, I can account only for the period when the now-removed governor and deputy governor took over. That is why we have been factual today. We are content to be challenged by anyone. We have the evidence for everything that we are saying. You have heard the governor's annual report and excerpts from the monthly report from his line manager, the then director of operations, and the quotation that sticks in my mind is that he was:

"the right man to lead Maghaberry." I am not totally sure, but that was, I think, in November. It just does not seem logical. Do not get me wrong: if a governor or any member of staff is underperforming, hold them to account. Make them aware of it and put processes in place, but that should not have happened out of the blue to those individuals, given the evidence that we presented today. Mr Frew: On that subject, you referred to the Minister's statement to the House on Monday 9 November — do not worry, Chair, I will not read it all out — which mentioned the achievements and improvements made, and the progress being made by the senior leadership:

"In 2014, however, due to planned departures from the Prison Service, a new leadership team was appointed in Maghaberry. ... Unfortunately, in the case of the team appointed at Maghaberry in June 2014 that was not the case."

That related to rising to the challenge and showing real ability. The statement continued:

"Increasingly concerned about the weakness of that leadership, in the spring of this year, Prison Service management took steps to challenge their performance. Last week’s report references the difficult relationship that evolved between the local leadership at Maghaberry and Prison Service headquarters at that time."

Later in the statement:

"Prison Service management, with support from me and the DOJ permanent secretary, took steps to remove the governor and deputy governor from their posts, and to replace them with a new senior team. ... I will say that neither of the two personnel removed from their positions in Maghaberry were redeployed within the Prison Service. These actions are a reflection of the seriousness with which the Prison Service and I took the findings of the inspection".

I have been on the Committee for a long time, and never, ever has Sue McAllister or the Minister raised the increasing concern about weaknesses in leadership or told us about the steps that they took to challenge that. At no time when they were before us did they talk about a difficult relationship between the local leadership and headquarters. You talked about the leaders at that time, post-2014, pleading for resources, and about the toing and froing of correspondence. Can we access that correspondence?

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Mr Alcock: The correspondence referred to is from the Independent Monitoring Board (IMB). I believe that when the board first wrote to the then director of operations, pleading for additional resources, it used a phrase that was something like, "The prison is heading towards" — Mr Attard: The IMB sent an email on 1 August 2014 about the shortage of staff, and that email is here. Mr Alcock: In response to your exact question, a raft of correspondence flows thereafter from the chair and the IMB, which is independent. Naturally, you will think, "The head of the Prison Service says that; the PGA says that. Who is right and who is wrong?" That is why, as an association, we are clearly saying that, in two weeks' time, the IMB — the Independent Monitoring Board — which is nothing to do with the Prison Service per se and especially not local management, will come and give you its independent view. Yes, we have seen some of its correspondence, but it is not for us to give you someone else's correspondence. Mr Frew: When did that correspondence start? Mr Attard: The first email that we have here is dated 1 August 2014. Mr Frew: The inspection was in May 2015, so it is not as though the Minister could argue that someone said, "Crikey, the inspection is taking place — let's start covering up here and write asking for more resources". That would not have been the case. Mr Alcock: I apologise that we cannot give you other people's correspondence, but maybe what I can say will suffice in providing some clarity. When the governor and deputy governor took over Maghaberry in June 2014, the prison was almost 100 staff short because of a combination of vacancies and sick leave. In July, it was getting no better. On 28 July 2014 — that date is critical because these two individuals took over only in June — the then deputy governor, who had significant operational experience, seeing how things were starting to get slightly uncomfortable, said in discussion with the then governor, "We need to start to document this because there is bad feeling". The deputy governor asked the senior manager in Maghaberry to write to the head of HR in headquarters:

"Hi. The deputy governor has asked me to contact you regarding the number of CPOs who have resigned, 38 to date, and anecdotally we have heard that there are another 19 in the pipeline. Do you know if there are any plans in place to replace any of these CPOs?"

The response from the head of HR at headquarters was:

"Hi. I regularly raise the issue with the director of HR and have obtained an extension to our most recent recruitment competition in order to bring staff in, if I am instructed to do so. At this point in time, I have been instructed not to bring any additional staff in".

Mr Frew: Who makes that instruction? Mr Alcock: The claim here from the head of HR is that it was the director of HR. Mr Frew: Who instructs — Mr Alcock: Who instructed the — Mr Frew: He pushes that button. Mr Alcock: Yes. We are not here for opinions; we are here to give hard evidence of what has gone on. Mr Frew: When Sue McAllister was here, I was loath to say to her, "Look, we're here to help you as a Committee. Please tell us these things. Why do you hide these things from us? Why do you rose-tint these issues?". To be fair, she had no answer; she just took it on board. We cannot continue to run our prison service like this. In your view, what is the real problem with Maghaberry?

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Mr Alcock: If only it were that easy that I could put it into one sentence. I will talk more generally. A prison needs vision and leadership. It needs to be resourced appropriately — it needs appropriate funding. I know that we are in strict economic times, and that is why we are not using the lack of funding as an excuse. We all hear what is happening to hospitals and schools. We are not here pleading for more money. It takes a decent relationship with prisoners and for staff to have confidence when dealing with them. You provide the basics of a healthy prison. We fully support the four tenets of a healthy prison. However, you cannot do that when you are lurching from crisis to crisis. Each time you hit another crisis, staff lose their confidence. If nothing else, the removal of the deputy and the governor has sent a very clear message to local managers: "If you get anything wrong, you're finished, and we'll publicly destroy you". What would that do to any management team? It makes people fearful of taking decisions. To use the inspector's words, it will not encourage "innovation". It is not going to encourage "taking risks". Taking risks in a maximum security prison? That quote rings often with me. Mr Frew: I understand that you may not be able to give us someone else's correspondence, but it cannot surely all be about staffing levels. Mr Alcock: No. Mr Frew: Would it be possible for you to glean the main points that were being pleaded for and send us a letter about the main topics, whether it be the apparatus of command-and-control structures, staffing — Mr Alcock: We can certainly put that in correspondence. Mr Frew: — types of staffing or core days. Was it the actual working day — Mr Alcock: I take it that you mean a bullet-point strategic overview of what, in the PGA's opinion, the main issues were. Mr Frew: What were the main issues and what was being requested? I do not know how personal you will be able to make it without breaking confidences. It is to give us as much of a steer as possible. Something has to change. To be fair, heads can roll all the time and the underlying problem would still be there. There needs to be more than that. Mr Alcock: The PGA is very clear: we want to be part of the solution. It is not rocket science. If you have happy prisoners, you have happy staff. If you have happy staff, you have happy membership, and so it goes on. The Chairperson (Mr Ross): The Clerk has helpfully found the excerpt of Hansard in which I asked the director general about how she managed performance. It would be useful to read it into the record. I said:

"It strikes me that you only acted swiftly or took the appropriate action once the report had been conducted. If the report had not been conducted in May, what reassurance do we have that you would have taken the action that you ultimately took? It seems to us that it took Mr McGuigan to tell you about the state of the prison before you took any action."

The director general said:

"Brendan and I have discussed this, and I am sure that he would agree that it was not just as a result of his concerns and the concerns raised by the inspection. Obviously, I cannot tell you what would have happened; what I can tell you is that we were managing performance. This is not about individuals, and I really do not want to go into detail about my colleagues, but we were managing performance in relation to people in Maghaberry."

I said:

"But if performance was so bad, surely you were not managing it very effectively, were you?" She said:

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"We were managing performance in accordance with —". I said:

"Were you managing performance well or poorly?". She said that she did not want to go into details about individuals and that:

"We are a small service and we have a small number of senior people in those key posts, and we absolutely have to do what we can with the people we have to encourage them and develop them to do the very best that they can. Only when we felt that we had no other option did we take the action that we did."

The clear implication is that there had been an issue for some time and that she was dealing one-on-one with the governor or senior management in the prison. You would imagine, then, that there would be warnings about performance that led up to the removal of those members of staff. You told us that the previous report said that he was the right man for the job, and then we read this. It suggests to me that, at best, Ms McAllister was misleading us by suggesting that she had been "managing performance" over a period. Mr Attard: I probably need to answer that because Gary Alcock is very close to this. All I can do is repeat what I have already said, which is that we have the best evidence that shows — Mr Frew: Surely, you should be able to give us a report. Mr Attard: Without doubt, we can give you the stuff that we own. As you can see, I have everybody's reports. Mr Alcock: Including the inspection report, by the way. Mr Attard: I have here a photocopy of the end-of-year report. It is not a made-up document; it is the actual end-of-year report that was delivered by the director of operations to the governor of Maghaberry. The dates are important, and this is from April 2014:

"Tradition dictates that my assessment of the governing governor's performance should be informed by the establishment's key performance measures and qualitative reports. In this case, that would be unjust on the senior leader, who has not had the opportunity to shape or change an inherited management team and whose prison has been handicapped by acute staffing shortages, much of which are beyond Alan's sphere of control."

Let us look at this from a common-sense point of view. On the other hand, this is from the Minister's statement:

"In early spring, performance was being addressed". Something is not right, and it is not for us to form an opinion on why that might be the case. All we can do is read out what we know. Mr Frew: I think that we need those reports, Chairperson. Mr McCartney: I will take up that point about the reports as well. In fairness, John, you set the context well in your opening remarks: you are here on behalf of the Prison Governors' Association, and this matter affects your members. You laid that out very well and very clearly. I think that there was a degree of misfortune in the media commentary. In fairness, there is no reference in the report to Maghaberry being Dickensian or the most dangerous prison anywhere, never mind in western Europe. However, those were the headlines, and people almost believe that they were in the report, and that is one of the unfortunate things about it. Gary spoke about the buck stopping with President Obama. That is fine, but the converse of that is that you cannot create a situation in which people further down the command chain make a mistake but believe that they will be let off and that heads will always roll at the top. It would be a bad system;

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the easy way to bring down the system would be for the people below not to do their jobs and allow the top person to fall. We have to be very mindful of that, and Alban led into that. We talked about the independence of the independent monitoring board. Its report will make an important contribution. For us, the inspection is also an independent body, and you accept that its report was very critical. It makes the point:

"This was a concerning inspection of a prison which was as bad as any we have seen in recent years."

It goes on:

"a significant failure in leadership was compounded by an ineffective relationship between Prison Service headquarters and local management which needed to be urgently addressed. A general malaise was evident at Maghaberry, which sought to attribute blame rather than find solutions to problems."

That is the independent assessment. I think that the reports will help to inform how we take this forward. Brendan McGuigan was of the very clear opinion, in the public presentation and at the Committee, that this was not a snapshot: had he gone into the prison one, two or three months before or even further back, he would have come up with exactly the same report. I think it is a fair assumption and, although I have not seen it in Hansard, obviously Gary picked it up that he possibly had sight of the reports. The reports would be informative. I do not doubt that you have read out parts, and that the parts you have read out are on the record. It would be good for the Committee, if possible, to see all the reports. Brendan McGuigan went on to say that there was a collective failure of leadership, that there was unacceptable risk, that there was no evidence of flexibility, innovation, creativity, problem solving, and no evidence of cultural change. That is a big mix for people to deal with. Alban was right that Phil Wheatley was one of those on the prison review team who was very critical of Maghaberry as far back as the interim report. One of the things he cautioned people about at that time was that this could be a wasted opportunity if they did not act quickly. I have said to the director general directly in other meetings that Maghaberry lagged behind the rest of prison reform. The recent reports into the moves at Hydebank and the recent reports into Magilligan have been favourable because, in my opinion, they have followed the pathway set out by the Owers report. Even in relation to this report, rehabilitation and resettlement get a favourable response because, in my opinion, they followed the Owers report. I have said this at Committee and to senior managers at Maghaberry that when I go there and talk to the senior management team I have always found resistance to the Owers report. It was reflected: "People telling us how to do a job that we have done for 30 or 40 years". We have seen some translation of that today: old hands, and new people coming in with new-fangled ideas. I am on record for a long number of years as saying, particularly since the Justice Committee was set up, that Maghaberry is a very difficult prison to manage; there is no doubt about that. However, the solution put forward by the Owers report was for three mini-prisons. I have found, and I have said this to the director general, that when you talk to senior managers you find total and absolute resistance to that idea. That is the context in which all this comes about. What we have to do now is fix it. It is difficult, because people's livelihoods are involved. In fairness to Gary, and he is sitting in front of us today, there might be aspects that he finds uncomfortable. How we fix this is our problem. That is the critical part of it.

Mr Alcock: Can I respond to the key points? Speaking for the membership of the PGA, I can say that we want to be part of the solution; we want to help; we want to change. You are right; no matter how you put it, Maghaberry is not where it should be. We know it, prisoners know it, staff know it, management knows it; everybody knows it. You will be mindful that we have not criticised the report. Mr McCartney: Absolutely.

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Mr Alcock: We want to be part of the solution and help change Maghaberry for the reasons that I pointed out earlier. However, to do that, you support people; you empower people; you resource people. You do not revert to a blame culture. In relation to the three-part prison model — being a master of minutiae, I noted your comments in Hansard — the PGA and its members fully support it. To give a bit of personal detail, the month before the deputy governor arrived in Maghaberry, he met the then director of operations. The deputy governor was just finishing secondment in the English Prison Service. One of the first key questions he asked was this: what about the three-prison model for Maghaberry? How soon? The PGA fully realise that Maghaberry is too vast and that the site is spread too widely; we realise the complexities of different prisoners' needs and classifications, blah, blah, blah. A three-site prison is fully supported by the PGA. I have questioned members of our association on it, asking them whether they were against it and where the idea that we opposed the three-prison model came from. I have yet to meet anyone who opposed that model. Why would we not support it? As well as being a recommendation, we are fully behind it. The resistance is not coming from the PGA.

Mr McCartney: The evidence on the ground is that there have been no steps towards that. From Maghaberry, that has been consistent for a long number of years, as far back as the last inspection report in 2012. I think that there were 65 recommendations, but I do not want to get into numbers. Then there was the observation from the inspector that there was a culture of resistance to change. I asked him about leadership, and he had no doubt that this went right the way down to the bottom: all levels of leadership in the prison were resistant to change. When you have a report like this, it is difficult to say that he has not hit the nail on the head. Mr Alcock: I do not know everyone he spoke to, and I think we have said between us that the PGA does not absolve itself of all sins. We are not perfect governors. We are not people who never make mistakes: sometimes with hindsight we say, "Well, we could have dealt better with that". On the point of the three prisons: tomorrow, please. I know that the common response is, "When the 360 block is built, that will enable —". That will be in 2018 or 2019. I am not saying that we can introduce a perfect solution tomorrow, but we could introduce an interim solution. What I am saying on behalf of the PGA to the senior management, who will be listening very closely to this today, is this: "Engage with us: let us look for an interim solution pending the full building and opening of a 360 block".

Mr McCartney: I know that you have read the report very well. The director general, when she was here with her senior team, stated on the record that they believed that there was an ineffective relationship between the management of Maghaberry and headquarters. How would you describe the relationship? Mr Alcock: It was not the type of relationship that the then governor, deputy governor, and senior management team were used to. The management team had never experienced that uncomfortable relationship before, and that is why we are not challenging the inspector on that quotation. What I cannot do, for reasons that may become evident through time, is to go into the details here in a public forum. But, what I am saying is this: that is correct. Mr McCartney: There was an ineffective relationship. That translated — in a direct quotation from the director general — into "instructions being ignored". Mr Alcock: I disagree, to a level, with that. To exemplify, if you do not mind indulging me for a minute; when the high number of bed watches were, as previously mentioned, basically sucking staff away, meaning that wings were being locked down, the then director of operations told the then governor — and I was present — "We will stop sending them out to hospital". The governor tried to reason by saying, "But the hospital says that these are urgent blue lights; they have to go out". The reply was this: "We cannot afford them. Once you have reached what you can afford, just do not send them out any more". Now, I was sitting there. I kept silent — unusually for me, as you can tell. All I could see was the image of corporate manslaughter on the governor had he followed that. I will give you another example, and then I will finish. As referred to earlier, there were numerous assaults. Staff who were off duty and in hospital were then reporting to their local police station: for reasons of claims, and blah blah, you have to do that. The governor was instructed to put a notice out

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to staff that they would not report this to the police station; they would report it to the governor. It was not even a legal instruction. The governor quite rightly said, "I cannot do that. It is not legal". I am just giving you some examples. I will also say that no one is blameless either.

Mr McCartney: It was described as "tension" in the session with the senior team when it was up here. Did the tension in any way contribute to the type of report? Was there a sense of, "We will show them who is in charge here"? Mr Alcock: Absolutely not. I can say that quite clearly. The governor, deputy governor and senior management were very clear about who the losers would be. You are right. I read about that: "We will show them". Absolutely not. We are a hierarchical organisation. During my entire service, I have taken instructions on occasion that I have not liked or agreed with, but I have carried them out, as do all governors. It was not a case of, "We will show them", because the management team was very aware who the losers would be, and, sadly, were subsequently proven to be entirely correct. Mr McCartney: I can see the point you are making. I asked the director general about how long this would have continued before it would have been resolved had Criminal Justice Inspection not gone into Maghaberry. You have talked about everybody sharing the blame — maybe those are not your exact words. Who was going to put their hands up and say, while this was all going on — the breakdown of relationships, the tension and, from your point of view, people giving out illegal instructions — that, "We need to go to the Minister". The Prison Officers' Association was saying that there was a danger of people being killed in prison; but this was all being played out and nobody stepped in to say, "Are you listening? While this is all going on, the jail is not being run properly". Mr Attard: First of all, it is important to understand where the power sits. The governor is a person in a chain, and he has a line manager who also has a line manager. There is a tier; there is a gap between the governor and the director general. This makes it very difficult for the governor to do anything other than try their best. The governor kept a journal throughout the entire period. He was there only 11 months. We sometimes think that the governor has been there since the last inspection report; he has not. It was an 11-month tenure. In that 11 months, there was clear evidence of a difficult relationship. It strikes me that all the governor can do in that position is, first of all, confide in the one person he can confide in — his deputy governor — and try to deal with it that way. However, he can also go to the Prison Governors' Association and say, "Look, these are the problems that we are facing". But, how does the governor deal with it, when the difficulties in the relationship are with his line manager and his manager's manager? It is a very small service. Mr McCartney: The picture painted for us is that the relationship between the governor and his line manager was OK. He said, "You are the man for the job". So, the governor could have gone to him. Mr Attard: It was not OK. The relationship between the governor and his line manager was not OK. Mr McCartney: The person put in writing that he was the person for the job. Mr Attard: That is what the line manager wrote. Mr McCartney: But, he could have said, "I want this on the record" as well. You have told me that, "You have the man for the job" — Mr Attard: You are quite right, and it is on record. Mr McCartney: We have not seen that, so it is difficult for us. Even from our conversation with Brendan McGuigan, governors, particularly in an establishment the size of Maghaberry, have a certain amount of autonomy. They can run the prison relatively freely — I am not saying that they are untouched by senior management. Whatever the failings here, how do we address them to ensure that moving forward there is not a bad report into Maghaberry the next time round? That is what we have to amend. Mr Attard: The inspection report said that inspectors met a number of good, motivated managers as well, and I think that is important, because the whole management team was moved out, including, I assume, the good, motivated managers, which is a bit of a shame because of the message that sent out.

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Mr Alcock: I would like to look forward on relationships, because no public sector organisation is going to work well if there is isolation in existence or a tension in relationships. We have not withdrawn the offer, the hope and the professional view to our members that relationships can be repaired, and only when they are repaired, effective and healthy, will it contribute. It will not solve the ills of Maghaberry, but it is a beginning. Let us not forget that, at the end of this chain, there are human beings — prisoners — who deserve better. Mr Poots: I think that you just crystallised what has been discussed thus far. We accept that there is a very negative report about HMP Maghaberry, but it is not the report but how it was played out that is perhaps what is in the public domain. In the public's mind, Maghaberry is the most dangerous prison in Europe — and we do not have the evidence base to sustain that, which is regrettable; and that it is a Dickensian prison, which, again, is not a sustainable element. That is one element. You have come here today and quite usefully given line manager reports over a period of time from the director of operations on the governor and from the governor on the deputy governor. Previously, the governor had been in Magilligan Prison, which had an excellent report or, certainly, a good report. If I recall rightly, he was headhunted to come to Maghaberry and do the job there. So, we have gone from a situation where someone was doing a good job and where the reports we have heard would indicate that, "Despite very difficult circumstances, you are the man for the job, and we need you to dig in there", to there being an independent inspection carried out, with the two individuals heading Maghaberry Prison being, all of a sudden, not fit for purpose and publicly scapegoated and humiliated by the Minister and director general. That is as I read it. In essence, what I think is wrong there is that we have identified two individuals as being the problem. We have had a discussion with the POA and it would appear that, in spite of resources being there, an awful lot of problems still exist. In essence, we have individuals taking the blame when it would appear that other underlying problems made it close to impossible to manage the prison in the way it should have been managed. Is there an evidence base to show that the governors who were in place required more staff? What was done about actually getting more staff? I think that a fair number of promises were made over the period that staff would be made available to the prison. What is the timeline between requesting staff to come forward and staff actually manifesting themselves on the ground?

Mr Alcock: I prepared this earlier, anticipating a question on resources, because that was one of the key themes. I have done bullet points here. You asked for evidence, Mr Poots, so I will give you that. I have not heard it mentioned before, so forgive me if I am repeating certain areas; I heard no one else mention it. From 2012 to the inspection, Maghaberry management team — the management team being not just the governor — had been reduced by 49% in the preceding two years. Mr Poots: Just explain that. The management team is the governor down to — Mr Alcock: That was the governors, and the PO rank was totally removed. The National Offender Management Service (NOMS) did that, but discovered it was a mistake and so reintroduced a custodial manager. Mr Poots: So, on that 49%, what was the figure? Mr Alcock: I do not have the exact figures here, but the bulk of it was something like 24 POs, maybe a couple of SOs and about five governor grades. The PGA, seeing the direction, or scenting the wind, actually came to the Committee on 27 March 2014, which I again emphasise was three months before the then deputy governor arrived. This is what the PGA said to the Committee:

"However, we do not want the budgetary cuts to impact too much on a lot of the progress that has been and continues to be made, because that may do damage to regimes and staffing levels, which will lead to issues down the line."

We have already referred to the previous year, when £4 million was cut off the budget. The new deputy governor arrived, and we were almost 100 staff short at that stage. I referred you to July 2014 —

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Mr Poots: And that was raised? The staff shortage of 100 was raised? Was that highlighted by the governors? Mr Alcock: Yes. At that stage, it was put in a five-page letter by the previous governor who was outgoing. He had received his early release date and he presented a five-page minute of his concerns. He was leaving, but he referred these things to the then director of operations. No reply was received. I have already referred to the email, which clearly evidences that there was an instruction given at the end of July 2014, two months after the new management team had come in.

"At this time, I have been instructed not to bring any staff in."

Bear with me; this is what the PGA was watching on the ground. In March 2015, the director general and her management team appeared in front of this Committee. You, Mr Ross, asked the question:

"How understaffed do you feel you are in the Prison Service at present?"

The director general answered: "I will ask Mark", who was the then director of HR:

"to talk about the detail of the numbers. However, I will just reassure you that we are about to start a recruitment exercise that will allow us to replace the posts that are ... vacant. We are committed to recruiting"

— this is March 2015 —

"and are now in agreement that we need to recruit. That exercise has started. We have pressed the button, and we will bring in new staff very soon. I will ask Mark to answer your question about specific numbers."

This is what the director of HR said:

"I am happy to. We are about 80 below our target staffing levels ... There is a reprofiling exercise that will adjust that slightly as the year goes on. We are starting to recruit now and will bring in officers in two or three intakes throughout the year."

That was in 2015.

"That will bring us up to whatever is the agreed target staffing level. Recruitment goes out the week after next, so we will have people coming in in the early part of the summer and then again in the autumn."

They are interviewing staff as we speak, in January 2016. The PGA — Mr Poots: When did that recruitment start? Did it start in those two weeks after the team appeared before the Committee? Mr Alcock: Not unless it has taken almost a year to go through the process. I can only tell you what we, on the ground, were hearing because — Mr Poots: When did the advertisements go out? Mr Alcock: In October/November. The membership expressed its concerns and anxiety and feared the picture that was eventually portrayed. The PGA, myself and the secretary, met the director of HR. This is an extrapolation of the minutes of the meeting on 11 August 2014:

"Gary raised the issue of staff recruitment by highlighting the shortfalls in the TSLs and the need to fill these posts. He stated this placed governor grades in the invidious position of being performance-measured while not being properly resourced to achieve the results required. He went on to state that the majority of the vacant posts were as a direct result of staff leaving the service. Gary did however mention that sick absence played a part and that robust management was necessary."

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The point is that we do not try to act as if we share no responsibility. We took an extrapolation here. This is factually correct, because we checked each figure about six times before presenting. We took a snapshot of 29 May 2015. That was in the week after inspection. There was a total of 93 staff below the target staffing level; 102 were sick and 21 had limited fitness. When you aggregate them and forget the specific reasons, that is 217 staff the governor did not have available. I will not bore you with percentages; I will do it in old money. That was a third of the staff who were absent or unavailable for detailing. I hope that, in evidence terms, answers the question about what the PGA and the governors did about it.

Mr Poots: You mentioned sickness. We have been told that one of the reasons why resources that have been made available to the new governor, who is also the director of operators, were not made available to the regime under the previous governor and deputy governor was that they were not doing enough about sickness. Is that the case? Was not enough being done about sickness? Is it the responsibility of the governor? Mr Alcock: Colin, will you answer the question about the sickness issue? Mr Colin Ward (Prison Governors Association): First, I would like to clarify the issue. The HR function was taken over and centralised by HQ in March 2014. That was nearly two years ago and approximately three months before the governor and deputy governor in question came into post. Naturally, that function also includes the management of sickness. Human resource business partners were appointed at each establishment and those partners replaced the personnel governors. Hence, you can see that the responsibility shifted to headquarters. A number of weeks ago, the sickness level in HMP Maghaberry was in the 70s. Presently, it sits close to 60. However, I would offer the following caveats. Due to a reprofiling of staff, staffing levels have been reduced by approximately 30. That was reflected in the figures that were provided by your learned colleague. Most of the staff who were awaiting medical retirement have gone — the figures are in the 20s — and approximately 22 staff are on restricted duties or have limited fitness. Those people are not recorded as sick; they are not operational but carry out admin work or escort duties. That reduces the number of staff on landings, where they are needed to provide a regime for prisoners and give them a worthwhile core day. Staffing levels are still unpredictable and lockdowns are commonplace. Staffing is so tight that, if a prisoner has to go to an outside hospital, a landing or landings are likely to be locked down to facilitate that. That equates to approximately 80 staff who cannot carry out operational duties due to health reasons.

Mr Alcock: To give that some context, I was in Maghaberry on Tuesday. I think that the Deputy Chair raised the issue of what engagement there had been with inspectors with the previous union, and I was in Maghaberry on Tuesday to meet the inspectors and to give them the PGA view of the world. I underline that that is not always right, but I will espouse the PGA view. At the conclusion of that meeting and exchange of views, a prisoner, very regrettably, cut his throat and wrists. We are glad to say that he is fine now, but that necessitated four staff having to go to hospital. Without over-egging it, some of them were significantly covered in blood from saving the prisoner's life — those are the good things that happen day and daily but that never make the news. As those four staff had to leave the prison for medical attention, and probably treatment for anxiety and stress, two or three landings had to be locked down. Should any prison be running that tightly? Mr Poots: Looking at the entirety of the thing, in March 2014, the previous governor said that he needed staff. In March the following year, the Committee was told that, in two weeks' time, the recruitment process would be in full flow. It would appear that, as a result of that, there are still no boots on the floors. Mr Alcock: Panels were run last week. Mr Ward: Yes. Panels were run last week. I know because I was on one of the panels. Mr Poots: So 22 months after a prison governor saying, "We badly need staff", those staff are still not on the ground. As opposed to blaming the individuals, it should have been identified that austerity has a lot to do with this. I do not understand why Minister Ford, instead of seeking to scapegoat

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individuals, did not identify that the cuts made to the Prison Service, as a result of the cuts made to the Justice budget, had a major role to play in this. It was wholly unprofessional of him to do that, and that is deeply regrettable. I say that not as someone who has any great despising of David Ford, because I have worked with him over many years, but I have to say that I am hugely disappointed that he went about it in the way that he did because, essentially, he was wrong. When Brendan McGuigan came to this Committee, Mr McGlone questioned him for 10 to 15 minutes before he admitted that the buck stopped with the director general. Brendan did not cover himself in glory during that questioning. We are here to look for solutions. Having people in the corridors is absolutely fundamental to that, and I hope that that recruitment process concludes quite soon. Did you have an end-of-report session with Mr McGuigan before —

Mr Alcock: Yes, that was with the governor and the deputy governor. What normally happens at the end of a report is that, on the Friday morning, the lead inspectors meet with the governor, the deputy governor, the senior management team, the director general and other senior officials. The full hot debrief, for want of a better term, was on 22 May. However, as has been alluded to, the night before, the team leader of the inspectorate phoned the governor and said, "I want to come up to see you so that there are no shocks tomorrow." Much of that was as is in the report. The deputy governor asked me to remain behind to listen to what was said. The two knew at that stage that it was going to be a poor report. As part of that exchange — it was at about 7.30 pm or 7.35 pm the evening prior to the full debrief on the Friday morning — the lead inspector broke the news, gave the scoring and said, "However, there is a leadership problem at headquarters because, governor, you cannot recruit staff." That narrative got lost somewhere. I have not heard it repeated in any other correspondence, and that is painful for our members. Mr Poots: So you are saying that it was indicated to you that the staffing issue would form part of the report but it was not actually in the report. Mr Alcock: In fairness, I am giving more or less an exact account of what was said between him and the governor and the deputy, who was listening. He never said or implied that it would appear in the report. However, if I recall correctly, part of the wider discussion was that, as they were inspecting, everything was leading back to staff shortages. One would have thought that, if it were critical, it might have appeared. Mr Poots: So he identified to you that there were staff shortages but, ultimately, it did not end up in the report. Mr McCartney: Was it in the hot debrief, as you described it, the next morning? Mr Alcock: No. Mr Poots: Did what happened at the press conference coincide with what happened at the end-of-report session? Mr Alcock: Again, I read that. The PGA read it in fine detail. I would choose slightly different language about the press conference. To PGA members, staff, and independent bodies, that appeared to be an opportunity to sensationalise the situation, for whatever reasons. Inspections regularly happen; reports regularly happen. It is almost unheard of to have press conferences at the end of them. I am a long time in this job, and I may be wrong, but I cannot recall another occasion when there has been a press conference. Mr Poots: When I was a young lad at school, I remember that a lot of the other kids talked about their dads being civil servants when they were actually police officers. Are prison governors civil servants? Mr Alcock: According to the Minister, the governor and deputy governor were "senior civil servants". I think that that was his exact quote when he was asked directly. I am going to answer this, hopefully succinctly. All prison staff, which governors are, are public servants employed under the Prisons Act 1953. Under section 8 of that Act, they have the powers of a constable. The deputy governor and governor, who Mr Ford individualised and publicly referred to, have published terms and conditions in their hands that clearly state that they will serve in prisons. If I recall the Hansard report correctly, he referred one of your learned gentlemen to seek legal advice if he was not happy. That legal advice has been borne out in numerous judicial reviews; however — almost as if I had prepared earlier —

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there was a judicial review on the Prison Service on 26 November last year. The Minister's statement was on 9 November, and I can assure you that I did not bribe the judge to say this. The legal argument was about the standing of a governor versus a senior official in the DOJ. This is from the judge's statement:

"A governor rank in the prison is not in legal terms an official of the Department and the Carltona principle would not apply to him/her."

Without insulting anyone, I will give a summary of what the Carltona principle is. Civil servants may exercise authority on behalf of a Minister — I could go on and on. I have the recruitment code for the Civil Service, including senior civil servants. The PGA also got some of our members to apply for civil servant jobs. You will be surprised to know that the response was, "You are prison governors. We do not give prison governors civil servant jobs". I could go on and on, but those are the key points. Mr McGlone: I will be fairly brief and, hopefully, the answers will be succinct. Going back to the report of last November, do you accept the professionalism of the inspectors from CJI, HMIP, RQIA and ETI? Mr Alcock: I do indeed. I have known many of them very well over many years, and the association has placed no slur on their professionalism. Mr McGlone: That is OK. I am getting mixed messages about the conclusions of the report. Do you accept the conclusions of the report? Mr Alcock: Well, that is a wide-ranging question. I have answered previously — Mr McGlone: It is not that wide-ranging. Do you accept the conclusions? Mr Alcock: I cannot, in absolute, say that the PGA and our members support every single thing said in the report, but, as you will have noted, the opening of our introduction was that we welcome the report. We do accept, in the round, the report. Mr McGlone: You welcome it in the round. What about the one three years before it? Tell me, because I am intrigued by how these things work. This one has generated a whole lot of light and a whole lot of energy, and we hope that it points the direction forward on how to do things. However, you do not forget about what has happened previously and, if you have read the Hansard report, you will have read the comments that I made. What happened to the one in 2012? Did it just lie on a shelf and gather dust? If you accept the professionalism of the people who conducted that report and brought their conclusions forward subsequent to the visit to the prison, who is responsible for initiating measures to meet the shortcomings as identified in the report? I just want to get that clear. It is clearly a person or a structure. That is all that I want to know. Mr Alcock: It is a combination of both. I am sorry that I cannot be as succinct as you would perhaps like. Mr McGlone: Right, let us say that it is a combination. It should not take too long to explain it. Mr Alcock: I will try for succinctness and brevity. I think that this was referred to by the director general or the Minister. When an inspection occurs, the action plan is formulated and should be monitored at local level and linked to headquarters. That is how it should move forward. Mr McGlone: OK. You have defined the structure for me. Let us hear about the process. Who is responsible for moving it on? Mr Alcock: Some of the recommendations are local and some are strategic — Mr McGlone: We have all seen action plans. If an action plan sits there and nobody's name — say, "Gary Alcock" or "Patsy McGlone" — is tagged alongside it, it could be passed over and not acted on. Who is responsible for the oversight of that action plan and for making sure that it is actioned and not forgotten about?

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Mr Alcock: It sits with the establishment in combination with headquarters. Any local actions are for the governor, the team and staff to implement. Any strategic actions that are not within the governor's authority or gift are actioned through headquarters and are monitored locally and strategically. Mr McGlone: What happened to the 2012 one then? Mr Alcock: I cannot answer for that. Mr McGlone: Why? Mr Alcock: I am not going to make excuses for myself personally. In 2012, I was otherwise engaged. I was not in Maghaberry. Mr McGlone: If you were not there and do not know, that is grand. Who should we ascertain that from? Mr Alcock: Again, I refer you to local contacts and headquarters. The action plan will have had elements of strategic recommendations. Indeed, flowing from this one will be an action plan, in which some actions are local and some are strategic. Mr McGlone: I am getting it. There is a plan. Who is the person or persons responsible for making sure that it is done? Mr Alcock: The operational head of the Prison Service through the chain of command. Mr McGlone: That is grand. That is all I wanted to establish. Mr Alcock: Sorry for being slow. I apologise. Mr McGlone: You are all right. I am a wee bit slow at times myself, but I get there. Mr Dickson: Thank you for coming to us this afternoon. It is not the POA's fault; Finlay is definitely saying that on that news. He says that prison bosses have made a Horlicks of the system. He also said that prisoners suffered as a result of what he called cowboys brought in from England and that senior service management needs to wise up. Are you part of that senior service management that needs to wise up? Mr Alcock: No, I am removed from the Prison Service. Mr Dickson: So, it is not the POA's fault. It is not your fault. Mr Alcock: No, that is incorrect. You will recall a phrase that I used in answer to Mr McCartney. I said that the PGA does not absolve itself of sins. The PGA and its members have never said an absolute, "It is not our fault". We are part of the problem, but we are part of the solution. I suggest that we can rapidly enhance a very poor situation if we are involved as part of that solution and if confidence is given to our members again. Mr Dickson: It seemed to me that the POA did not particularly want to be part of the solution, not having read the report. You have read the report, interacted with the report team and will be working towards all of that. Mr Alcock: Sorry, for preciseness, I should say that the chair of the PGA has not interacted with the report team. I have not been there to do that. Mr Dickson: Right, but the Prison Governors Association presumably will do that at some stage. Mr Alcock: That is why I took up the invitation. Or, to answer another way, at the May inspection, the PGA was not asked by the inspectors to meet them. They asked the POA and NIPSA, I think. The PGA was not invited. I and the secretary made a point of seeking out the team leader to say, "Hang on; do you not want to talk to us?" I think the team leader will confirm that we spent two hours with

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him with facts, figures and issues. Moving on to this inspection, just to answer the question, we received an invitation several weeks ago, first informally asking if the PGA would meet them. I got back to them saying that of course we would and of course we want to. We want to fully engage. We want to be part of the solution. We want to be consulted. We have a lot to add. Mr McCartney: You said "the inspectorate". The CJI? Mr Alcock: I thought you meant the inspectors on the ground. Mr Dickson: I meant Brendan McGuigan. Mr Alcock: The individual? No, I have met the team leader of the inspectorate. I will say for the record that I am quite happy to meet Brendan McGuigan. The association — Mr McCartney: It is just that the POA indicated that it was not asked to engage at all. That is why I am asking — Mr Alcock: To summarise, at the first inspection, the PGA was not invited; we knocked the door. In this inspection, we were asked, and we took up that invitation. Mr Dickson: Maybe you will recommend that to Finlay the next time. Mr Alcock: I could not possibly comment. Mr Dickson: The POA is saying that it is not its fault. You are certainly giving a more positive indication that you accept areas of responsibility because you are part of all of this. Mr Alcock: Absolutely. Mr Dickson: So, is it the director general's fault? Mr Alcock: Again, speaking on behalf of the membership — we have had long debates in committee and local branches — no one is solely responsible and no one is innocent. We should all be together. There is no one individual or group of people. You cannot have such a significant poor report and point the finger — on this occasion at two individuals — at any individuals. We are a Prison Service. We are a structure. We are a public body. We all have to accept degrees of responsibility and accountability. Mr Dickson: In accepting those, there are times when people have to face appropriate disciplinary action, and that results in change. Mr Alcock: Well, there was no disciplinary action. Mr Dickson: No, but, ultimately, that is what can happen, even in the public service. Mr Alcock: If we are talking in general terms, absolutely. Mr Dickson: People being moved inside the public service is quite often an alternative to other disciplinary action. Mr Alcock: Again, I do not want to focus on two individuals, but I have clearly set out to the Chair and the Committee the difference between prison governors, prison officers and a civil servant admin colleague. Mr Dickson: I appreciate that we do not want to particularly personalise it, but prison staff — prison officers, officer grade, governor grade, or whatever — have the same rights of appeal if they think they have a grievance or have been unfairly or unreasonably treated. They do have rights of appeal. Mr Alcock: Absolutely.

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Mr Dickson: Are there any appeals ongoing at the moment? Mr Alcock: Are you now referring to two individuals? Mr Dickson: Yes. Mr Alcock: I prefer that the PGA does not get down into the weeds of two individuals. Mr Dickson: OK, that is fair enough. Where do we go from here? Mr Alcock: I tried to answer that earlier, but I do not want to appear evasive. The PGA wants recovery. It wants to be brought into the tent. It wants to be part of consultation. The Prison Service generally and Maghaberry specifically will not succeed without governors. We want to re-engage and have a healthy working relationship in which our members feel valued and are not fearful. The common thread, some of which you are alluding to, is that, if they have done that to the two most senior prison governors in the system, what chance have we? Mr Dickson: Do you believe that that relationship has now changed with a new governor? Mr Alcock: You have seen the evidence of that for yourself. Mr Dickson: You would accept that the new governor has made change. Mr Alcock: Absolutely. The Chairperson (Mr Ross): I thank the PGA. It is a wonder that you have any time to run golf tournaments when you have all of that on your hands. [Laughter.] Thank you very much. It was a lengthy session but very useful.