Young people are still dying in prison

Our director Richard Garside is a co-signatory to this letter in today's Daily Telegraph, which calls for a wide ranging independent review of the way children and young people in conflict with the law are treated, to look beyond the issues that can be covered by individual inquests.

The letter, organised by Inquest, states:

'Inquests into individual deaths are held in isolation from each other and do not address wider systemic failures in state care both within and outside prisons. The Government’s response has been fragmented and piecemeal, with little recognition of the wider public health and welfare implications, as well as criminal justice issues, raised by these deaths.'

An Inquest briefing on why an independent  review is needed can be downloaded from the Inquest website here (pdf).