by Peter Evans (Undifferentiated)
First published 2023
Britain's prison system teeters on the edge of catastrophe in 1978 when prison governors deliver an urgent warning to Home Secretary Merlyn Rees. They predict staff and prisoner deaths if overcrowding continues unchecked. Their alarm triggers the May Committee investigation, which exposes a system pushed beyond breaking point. Evans chronicles how 16,000 inmates now crowd into Victorian cells built for single occupancy, with prisoners locked together twenty-three hours daily without basic sanitation. The former Times correspondent examines the cascading failures that created this crisis. He explores how prisons house psychiatric patients who belong in hospitals, how detention centers become crime schools, and how rising juvenile and female crime strains resources further. Prison officers face low pay and lower status while governors hold responsibility without real authority. Violence erupts as overcrowding breeds desperation. Evans argues that a system rooted in nineteenth century thinking cannot serve twenty-first century needs without fundamental reform. His investigation reveals how political neglect transformed Britain's prisons into powder kegs ready to explode.
Genres: history, 20th-century, politics, crime, non-fiction, 21st-century
Vibes: suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: social-commentary
Setting: Britain, United Kingdom
Period: 1978
184 pages · Hardcover · Routledge
Content warnings: violence