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Coalition calls for closure of all child prisons
A coalition of more than 70 organisations have called for party manifestos to pledge an end to the imprisonment of children.
We are a member...
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Letter to party leaders urging reasoned public debate
Our Director, Richard Garside, is a signatory in a letter to party leaders across England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland calling for constructive discussion, debate and policies around criminal justice issues in the lead up to the general election.
The signatories request that...
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Speech and reception with Professor Nutt: the film
Last week we held an evening with Professor David Nutt and Professor Alex Stevens at Kings College.
The event was held ten years to the day that Professor Nutt was fired from his role as chair of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs for standing for drugs policies grounded in science and evidence.
Thank you to everybody who came for the fascinating speech, presentation and...News
High court challenge to PSPO use
After it was revealed that Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole (BCP) council had targeted homeless people with a public space protection order (PSPO), there will now be a landmark high court case against the council.
Public space protection orders are a tool to restrict certain actions...
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Cannabis testing in prison "contributed to the rise of spice"
Testing prisoners for cannabis has 'massively contributed' to the rise in the use of spice in prisons, drugs expert Professor David Nutt says in an interview today.
'There were 16 deaths last year from spice in prisons', he told The Observer paper. 'There has never been a death from cannabis.' The failure to treat Britain’s heroin problem...
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New research: link between online hate speech with real-world hate crime
The latest post on the Oxford University Press blog examines the link between online hate speech and hate crime as it happens in the real world.
Researcher and blog post author, Professor Matthew Williams, has been conducting research in this area. His findings suggest that anti-Black and anti-Muslim hate speech online is linked to heightened racial and religious violence and harassment.
The post is a summary of an article by...
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Professor Alex Stevens to speak at David Nutt lecture
We're pleased to announce that Professor Alex Stevens from the University of Kent will be speaking at our event with Professor David Nutt, which we are co-organising with Drug Science.
He will join us on 30 October to say a few words in light of his recent resignation from the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD). He resigned from the ACMD over...
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State is failing young people leaving custody
Youth resettlement – final report into work in the community, the latest report from HM Inspectorate of Probation and HM Inspectorate of Prisons, has prompted calls for more support for young people released from custody. Our Director, Richard Garside is amongst those calling for the state to address it failures.
The report found that children leaving custody are not being given adequate support as they re-integrate back into life in the community. Both ITV News...
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Centre's Director in today's Times
Our Director, Richard Garside has been quoted in a Times article, 'More prison time for rapists and killers', on plans to toughen sentences for serious offenders. The plans, to be proposed at the Tory conference, will see an increase of 3,000 in prisons in England and Wales over the next decade.
Justice Secretary Robert Buckland will propose to end the current automatic early release half-way through a sentence, so those convicted of serious violence and sexual offences will, in future serve, two-thirds of their sentence.
Richard was asked to comment, saying:
...
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Is it a crime to be poor?
We are working with partners to plan an event next year on the theme: Is it a crime to be poor?
The aim would be to share knowledge and research, and to discuss how we, as academics, practitioners and penal reformers can act to end this endemic abuse of the criminal justice system.
There are many examples of ways in which the criminal justice system criminalises poverty.These...
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Centre's Director in the Mirror
Our Director, Richard Garside, was quoted in the Mirror on Saturday in an article about the costs of prisons, and in particular, Young Offender Institutions.
Richard offered an alternative to the costly option of imprisoning young people, advising that:
We should be investing in programmes to help young people stay out of trouble and reach their potential.
The article can be read...
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Centre's research cited in LSE publication
Our work has been cited in the latest report from the Social Policies and Distributional Outcomes research programme at the London School of Economics.
The report, Physical safety and Security: Policies, spending and outcomes 2015-20 by Kerris Cooper and Nicola Lacey, evaluates social policies in relation to the criminal justice system from 2015 and cites...