Prisons
NOMS (National Offender Management Service) - The Prison Service
In January 2004, the Home Secretary announced the creation of a new single National Offender Management Service, which will build on the achievements of the Prison Service and the National Probation Service. The new service will provide end-to-end management of adult offenders - whether they are serving their sentence in prison or the community - and have the responsibility for both punishing offenders and reducing offending.
When someone is convicted of an offence and sent to prison, they pass into the care of the Prison Service. For a long sentence, they could be held in a prison anywhere in the country. For shorter sentences, however, they are likely to remain in their local area.
The Prison Service is responsible for the security, supervision, training and rehabilitation of offenders. This can involve carrying out security checks and searches, maintaining proper order and supervising visits.
While public safety is paramount, everyone in prison has to be treated with fairness and humanity. As well as trying to reduce crime by promoting law-abiding behaviour, the Service aims to provide productive activities that will educate and rehabilitate prisoners so that they won't re-offend when they are released.
One such activity is the Prison Service Drug Strategy Programme. Drug misuse is a major factor in offending and re-offending. The drug strategy aims to reduce the supply of illegal drugs into prisons through a range of supply reduction initiatives and to reduce the demand for drugs amongst prisoners through effective treatment interventions such as:
- Reducing dependence through detoxification
- Providing drug rehabilitation and support
- Mandatory and voluntary drug testing programmes to encourage prisoners to remain drug-free.
Since the strategy was introduced in 1995, the level of positive mandatory drug tests has halved from 24.4 per cent in 1997 to 11.7 per cent in January 2003.
More information about the Prison Service.
The information in these pages has been provided by The Criminal Justice Board.