Last Monday on BBC1 (in Scotland) I watched “Disclosure: Prisoners on the Brink”. I’m sure it’s available on iPlayer if you’d like to see it. Today, I’d like to write about how it made me feel.

Firstly, it’s worth noting that it was billed as a serious piece of journalism and, indeed, it covered topics such as drug use, self harm and suicide. The second thing I need to remember is that it was aimed at the general public as opposed to anyone with any experience of being in prison.

The lasting reaction I have is how underwhelmed I was.There were no surprised for me, I was initially really disappointed with what I saw as the lack of depth in the investigation. I felt that there was a degree of meekness about challenging the official line and statistics like the number of self-harm incidents were cast out without application of the plausibility filter.

When I saw the CCTV of the prisoner dying while being restrained by 17 officers, I was not surprised at the way the officers behaved. Now please STOP and read that last sentence again. To clarify – a man died at the hands of the state and yet I was not surprised.

I think it is disgraceful that in order for a fatal accident investigation to be carved out, 10 of those officers were granted life-long immunity from prosecution in relation to that incident. Presumable, this was some sort of mury deal brokered by the POA and the state and sine the programme aired, Police Scotland have said that they did not carry out a proper investigation into the death.

So I am appalled but not surprised and the fact that since I came into prison, I’ve seen so much shocking conduct that it doesn’t surprise me is telling in itself.

The issue of drugs in prison has received much interest but I have to report that I have not seen any drug misuse here. I’m happy to accept reports of drug misuse in jail but, from my own observations, I can’t say it’s as big an issue as reported.

What is, from my own experience, a far greater problem is the result of mental ill-health. Disclosure reported that the number of incidents of self harm was in the hundreds (I’m afraid I forget the figure they gave. I am happy to accept that they accurately reported the statistic that they were given by the Scottish Prison Service but, please, can we not think about that? We have a population of the most distressed men and women, adults and children that exist in Scotland. We are among the most vulnerable human beings and there are approaching 8,500 of us. To suggest that the annual number of self-arm incidents is in the hundreds is obscene.

I wonder how they came up with that number. I have never been asked by either the SPS or the NHS about incidents of self harm despite the fact that on NHS forms, I have ticked the box to says in the past I have self harmed. I can only imagine that I am not the only person to have missed out on the data gathering and I have to say that I have observed the marks of self harm on other prisoners on a great many occasions.

So whilst any attempt to reveal the truth to the public is values, the true scale of the problems was not shown by Disclosure. It is truly socking. I appreciate that prisoners are despised but you need to remember that this could be you, your mother, your son or your brother. You do not need to actually commit a crime to be found guilty of committing a crime. You don’t need to be a criminal to become a prisoner.

The X files tagline was “The truth is out there” but, unfortunately, that isn’t true in relation to prisons. However, I hope that people will start to think more about what happens behind these walls.

NaN.