Prisons - new material (67)
01 July 2007
Recent developments in prison law - part 2, Hamish Arnott, Nancy Collins & Simon Creighton. Legal Action February 2007, pp 17-21. This article continues the updates in the law relating to prisoners and their rights. It covers lifer parole, the Parole Board, minimum terms, determinate parole and compassionate release.
Zahid Mubarek: a legacy for change, Various authors. The Monitoring Group, The Zahid Mubarek Trust and Garden Court Chambers, November 2006, pp 20. On 21 March 2000 Zahid Mubarek was beaten to death by Robert Stewart in his cell at Feltham Young Offenders' Institution. This pamphlet brings together a series of articles by Zahid's family, supporters and legal practitioners that explore the lost lives and squandered opportunities that characterise the case as well as the legal obstacles that the Mubarek family had to overcome. For more information contact Garden Court Chambers, 57-60 Lincoln's Inn Fields, London WC2A 3LS (tel. 0207 993 7600) or The Monitoring Group, 14 Featherstone Road, Southall, Middlesex UB2 5AA (tel. 0208 843 2333).
Prison Factfile. Bromley Briefing May 2007, pp 40. This report contains the most recent facts and figures about the state of the UKs prisons. It acknowledges the 1997 Labour manifesto pledges on prisons and prisoners as "brave words" but concludes that: "the government has gradually ossified into talking tough and tinkering with sentencing policy." Available from the Prison Reform Trust, 15 Northburgh Street, London EC1V 0JR
Barred from Voting: the right to vote for sentenced prisoners. Prison Reform Trust and Unlock, March 2005, pp 4. This briefing is calling for sentenced prisoners to be given the right vote in response to the Department of Constitutional Affairs consultation paper Voting Rights of Convicted Prisoners Detained within the United Kingdom. It concludes: "The UK ban on prisoners voting is a relic from the nineteenth century, which is neither a deterrent nor an effective punishment. The right to vote poses no risk to public safety...There is widespread support for the removal of the ban, which the European Court has ruled violates human rights law. The Government should act to restore the right to vote to sentenced prisoners without delay." PRT: info@prisonreformtrust.org.uk, Unlock - The National Association of Ex-Offenders: unlock@tinyworld.co.uk