BBC Radio 4 20170816

In 1890, while he was staying in the asylum in Saint-Rémy and just five months before his death, Van Gogh painted a picture entitled ‘Prisoners Exercising’. The picture is Van Gogh’s reworking of a drawing made by Doré of the exercise yard at London’s Newgate Prison, and it shows a line of prisoners listlessly shuffling round a small yard enclosed by looming walls. Going round and round in circles is our expression for futility, and this circle of prisoners, for all we know endlessly following this route to nowhere, is a very image of hopelessness and despair.

In 2005 the then Home Secretary, now Lord Blunkett, introduced the principle of ‘imprisonment for public protection’, so called IPPs. When a prisoner was given an IPP, a minimum term or tariff was set. But when that term was reached, the prisoner was not automatically released, but was under a duty to prove to a parole board that they no longer posed a risk. And how could they do this? According to Nick Hardwick, the chair of the Parole Board, this is a very difficult thing for young offenders to prove – and the prison service is at such a stretch, that it hasn’t had the resources to offer sufficient places on rehabilitation courses, attendance at which would indicate a prisoner’s willingness to address their offending behaviour. But whatever the cause, the result is that hundreds of IPP prisoners remain in jail, years after they have exceeded their tariffs. One egregious case is that of James Ward, who received a ten month sentence for setting fire to his mattress in his cell when he was 21, and is still imprisoned, 11 years later.

It is odd what one does and doesn’t remember from say, a quarter of a century ago, but I remember very clearly from back then a quietly spoken contribution and serious contribution to what was, I suspect, no more than light-hearted, donnish chit-chat. If you could add another sin to the list of seven deadly sins (pride, greed, lust, envy and so on), someone asked, what would you add? ‘The sin of causing another human being to despair’ said a smallish voice.

In his own anguished final months, Van Gogh painted in quick succession after that prison scene two great images representing the overcoming of despair – the Good Samaritan and the raising of Lazarus. In the one painting the Samaritan lifts the wounded man on to his donkey. In the other, Lazarus’s sisters are astonished at the stirring of their, so they thought, dead brother. In these images Van Gogh grasped at hopes of healing, rebirth and new life, which were never realised in his own case.

IPPs were abolished for future use by another Home Secretary, Ken Clarke, in 2012; he called them a ‘stain’ on the justice system, but those sentenced before that date still remain subject to open-ended sentences. Lord Blunkett has said something must be done, and the Ministry of Justice has committed to addressing this particular issue as a matter of urgency – but until it is addressed, we risk leaving these prisoners, like Van Gogh’s prisoners in their exercise yard, in an intolerable circle of despair and with no chance of a new life.