Prison After-Care Report of the Maxwell Committee
| Published date | 01 October 1953 |
| DOI | 10.1177/026455055300602303 |
| Date | 01 October 1953 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
LAW, PSYCHOLOGY &CRIMINAL
(Cont.)
undue
reliance upon hearsay, upon Incomplete documen-
tary
evidence
and
upon academic theories."
Perhaps
worst of all Is
the
tendency to say
that
certain
conduct prohibited by law Is
not
Important
or does
not
matter.
Ihave
had
frequent experience
both
In reports
and
In conversation
with
psychologists of
these
kinds of
statements,
particularly
about
indecent
exposures, minor
cases of Indecent assault
and
Importuning.
In
whatever
sense
this
is
meant,
it Is socially unacceptable,
and
dangerous.
Though
these
manifestations
of
human
peculiarity
are
not. admittedly, as
harmful
as others,
what
kind of monkey hills would large cities become If
It were widely believed
that
this
behaviour did
not
matter
and
the
law's
not
over successful endeavour
to prohibit It were
st11l
further
weakened?
Is
not
the
truth
that
the
experiments of psychology
are
best allied to
the
work
not
of
the
law
but
of
the
sociologists?
The
contemporary view seems to be
that
delinquency, as
far
as It
has
any psychological cause
at
all, Is due to personality disorders largely caused by
parental
Inadequacies supplemented by some especial
stress.
If
this
is true, prevention of crime from
the
psychologist's
point
of view
can
only be achieved by
re-
shaping
home
and
social life
and
education. By
the
time
an offender
appears
at
court-particularly
the
adult
court-the
game is
half
lost,
and
as we
have
seen, cure
w11l
be such
an
immensely difficult
and
lengthy business
as to be Impractical on
any
scale.
Far
better
work
can
be done from
the
lawyer's
point
of view by more
and
more
and
yet
more policemen. As
far
as anybody
can.
be
certain
in
the
field of
human
administration,
I would
say (with one of
the
archbishops)
that.
if
crime pays it
ftourtshes,
and
that
at
the
moment, by reason of
the
low
ratio
of detection to offences committed,
it
pays
handsomely.
In
the
year
1938,
when
the
percentage
of
offences to population was, I
think,
the
lowest since
statistics
have
been published,
the
ratio
of detection to
offences committed was
the
highest. Surely
this
points
the
moral which is, bluntly,
that
criminal
law should
spend Its money on policemen
and
not
on psychologists,
and
if
there
is
any
over then, on prisons to replace those
we have,
many
of which,
through
no
fault
of those
that
work in them,
are
overcrowded menaces to
the
moral
health
of
our
times.
·PRISON
AFTER
-
CARE
REPORT
OF THE MAXWELL COMMITTEE
The
t1rst serious
inroad
into
the
work of voluntary
societies for assisting discharged prisoners was
made
In
1911
when
it
was realised
that
they
were
not
able
adequately to provide
the
serious after-care
and
super-
vision needed for prisoners leaving prison on licence
after
sentences of
penal
servitude, as
distinct
from those whose
remission was absolute. Accordingly, a
Central
Associa-
tion was formed to
care
for discharged convicts
and
was
given
substantial
assistance
by
the
State.
Since
that
time
the
voluntary societies
have
continued to be respon-
sible for aid on discharge,
with
a very limited
amount
of
after-care, for
ordinary
local discharged prisoners,
but
the
State
has
subsidised
them
to
an
increasing
extent
as
the
years
have
passed.
With
the
opening of regional
training
prisons,
such
as Wakefield, it was also necessary
to reorganise
the
work, as no single local D.P.A. Society
could be responsible for helping prisoners from aU over
the
country.
The
National Association of D.P.A. Societies,
reorganised
after
serious criticisms
had
been
made
of
its predecessor which
had
been mainly an administrative
body. conferred
with
the
Societies
and
In
1936
established
a
central
committee
at
Wakefield
(and
later
at
other
training
prisons)
to'
be responsible for assisting men
leaving there.
This
development was also recognised by
the
State,
with special
grants
towards its cost.
The
situation
changed
again
after
the
passing of
the
Criminal Justice Act,
1948,
when
the
old
penal
servitude
and
preventive detention were replaced by corrective
training
and
a new form of preventive detention,
and
many
more
men
and
women
than
had
formerly been
the
case were to be released from prison
under
supervision.
which It was hoped would be combined
with
constructive
after-care.
The
D.P.A. Societies
either
were
not
asked, or
did
not
offer, to reorganise themselves to meet
this
situa-
tion
and
the
Secretary
of
State
created
the
new
and
now
tamtllar
Central
Arter-Care Association to absorb
the
old
Central
Association
and
to
take
responslb1l1ty for
men
and
women leaving corrective
training
or preventive
detention,
and
for all Borstal discharges
and
certain
categories of young prisoners.
The
internal
changes
In
the
prison
system
also
meant
that
fewer prisoners
than
formerly were serving sentences in
their
local prisons
near
tothe
agencies of
the
local D.P.A. Societies;
and
again
the
National
Association
had
to
take
some responsl-
b1l1ty
and
call'for
State
help.
There
was
thus
a
gradual
but
steady growth of
the
area
of responsib1l1ty assumed
by
the
State
for
the
care
of
discharged
prisoners.
WORK IN PRISON
Parallel
with
this
development
had
been
the
accep-
tance
of a new conception of welfare work for prisoners,
arising
from
the
realisation
that
to offer merely aid on
discharge
was
only a stop
gap
measure
and
not
a very
constructive way of improving a
bad
social
background
or solving
the
problems
which
may
have
contributed to
the
downfall of
aprlsoner,
Agents or some of
the
D.P.A.
Societies
began
to
attend
prisons
daily
and
in some cases
to
sit
with
reception
boards
and
enter
Into
the
affairs of
the
prisoners
with
a view to solving some of
their
problems
during
sentence
and
so giving
better
hope of recovery
on discharge,
and
the
National Association of D.P
..
A.
Societies
appointed
resident
welfare workers in
the
prisons for
which
it
was responsible.
In
these
cases,
again,
the
State
contributed
grants
towards
the
salaries
of
these
officials.
Against
this
background
the
Home Secretary, in
1951,
appointed aCommittee
under
the
chairmanship
of
Sir
Alexander Maxwell, a former
Chairman
of
the
Prison
Commission, to discuss
the
parts
to be played by
the
voluntary societies
and
by
the
State
respectively In
the
future
re-establtshment
and
welfare of discharged
prisoners,
and
to consider
relevant
matters
arising from
(Continued overleaf)
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