THE director of Scotland's only prison for women, that has a notorious image as one of the toughest in the UK, has admitted that facilities in parts of the institution in fact resemble a well-equipped hotel.
Ian Gunn, newly installed governor of Cornton Vale, said women prisoners held in the newest block enjoy bright, spacious cells with en-suite showers.
Prisoners within Wallace House, the most luxurious section of the jail, have a key to their own
door and freedom of movement within their own section. Gunn admitted: "It's like a Premier Travel Inn. It's not like a prison cell at all."
Authorities were so concerned with a spate of suicides and self-harm that took place at the prison between 1997 and 2002 that a new regime was installed to help the prisoners, many of whom have serious psychiatric, drug and abuse problems.
Gunn said: "Prison is not to punish people. We are here to care for people. They have lost their freedom - that's their punishment. We have to give them back their dignity and self-esteem."
The prison, situated near Stirling, had previously earned a fierce reputation for its harsh regime, bullying and intimidation, for which it earned the nicknames "Cornton Hell" and "Vale of Tears".
The 80 places in Wallace House, out of a total 340 places in the jail, are only awarded to prisoners free of drugs and who have been well behaved.
But ideally the director would like to see the facility used for the most vulnerable prisoners. "If we really want to stop self-harming, perhaps we should have prisoners out and about more often," Gunn said.
The Conservatives yesterday branded the comments "unfortunate". Margaret Mitchell MSP, the Scottish Conservative justice spokeswoman, added: "If that facility is for people who are nearing the end of a very long sentence and have served their time it would be acceptable to house them there before reintegrating into society. But we should not lose sight of the fact that many of the prisoners will have committed serious violent offences. Prisons are there to protect the public and also to act as a deterrent."
Last year an upsurge in violence at the jail was linked with overcrowding and rising numbers of violent inmates.
By November, there had been 77 reported assaults and 125 reported fights, an average of 7.7 assaults and 12.5 fights a month. This compares with 5.41 assaults and 7.83 fights a month in 2004.
However, Cathy Stancer, director of the support charity Women in Prisons, insisted the move was still not liberal enough because most of the inmates should not be held in any sort of prison in the first place.
She said: "I'm sure that he [the new director] is coming in to Cornton Vale with lots of good ideas and obviously the prison service needs people with that kind of approach.
"But these women are highly vulnerable and usually don't pose any risk to the public. The kind of regime in women's prisons doesn't solve the problem, especially when they are denied access to their children and support groups. Most should be in mental health institutions."
