Annual Report 2015
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The Longford Trust Front cover: “West Country landscape” by artist Jamie Chapman, Longford Scholar, studying Fine Art at the University of the West of England. Read more about his story inside. Annual Report 2015 Annual Report 2015 As the last audience member departs from our annual Longford to access degree-level distance-learning courses while inside is Lecture, there are a few blissful moments when I rest on my blossoming, thanks especially to a three-year funding award from laurels. Challenging lecture, inspiring prize-winner, engaged the Linbury Trust. audience, and nothing has gone wrong. Phew! One of the highlights of the annual lecture comes when a group But almost immediately a realisation dawns. How to match that of scholars and their volunteer mentors take to the stage to talk next year? Or even do better? about how support from the Longford Trust really does turn lives That has been the challenge for the trustees for the last 14 years, around. Alongside all the other changes we have seen in 2015, since we launched these annual events as a chance to put one thing has remained constant. Well over 80 per cent of those questions of prison and social reform centre stage, not just in the we help continue to graduate, with fewer than 5 per cent of magnificent setting of Church House, Westminster, but also on the students dropping out and returning to prison. When you consider political, media and national agenda. I hope the capacity audience the current reoffending rate for all prisoners, that is no mean that filled Church House to the rafters on November 17, 2015, will achievement, and creates role models of successful rehabilitation agree that we did alright this time round. for other prisoners and for society at large. Michael Palin has been privately working with, and supporting, One yardstick of how well we are doing comes when others sit prisoners’ families for many years now, but did us the honour of up and take notice and want to learn from our example. The trust agreeing to an invitation from Rachel Billington to talk publicly was therefore delighted in the summer of 2015 when we were about the subject for the first time in the Longford Lecture. The approached by the Ministry of Justice to sit on the independent result was electrifying, all the more so because sitting up on the review into prison education, chaired by Dame Sally Coates. stage behind him as he spoke were the parents and siblings of This annual review also contains details of our financial prisoners, all of whom had shared their experiences with him. performance in 2015. We were not able quite to match our And in the front row of the audience, the Secretary of State for outstanding fund-raising achievements Justice, Michael Gove, was taking notes. of 2014, but came close, and continue to build. With the help of Porticus Our efforts to make the Longford Lecture a must-not-miss date UK, we were able at the end of 2015 in every right-thinking person’s diary were helped this year, as in to become a charitable incorporated many before: by our media sponsors, Telegraph Media Group; organisation (CIO),which will, we by our partners in organising the event, the Prison Reform Trust; believe, increase our potential to by our master of ceremonies, Jon Snow; by our caterers from the attract major donors. The full figures Clink; and by the team at Church House, Westminster. Our thanks are inside – both for what we have to them all. raised and how we have spent it. In our wider work with serving and ex-prisoners, 2015 has been I hope you approve. And we look another year of growth. Numbers of Longford Scholarships forward to seeing you at our awarded have increased, in line with the charity’s development 2016 Lecture this November. plan, and our partnership with the Prisoners’ Education Trust and the Open University to boost the number of serving prisoners able Peter Stanford Director Longford Trust About the Trust “My mentor is my second voice” The Longford Trust is a registered charity (no 1164701) and was set up in 2002 by his friends, family and admirers to continue the work of the late Lord Longford in the area of prison and social reform. Frank Longford (1905-2001) was for 70 years a campaigner for the rights of prisoners and outcasts in society. He believed strongly in the wider social benefits of forgiveness and the paramount importance of education in rehabilitating prisoners. “If we are really concerned with the reform of prisoners, what we do when they emerge from custody is at least as important as what we do for them while they are inside.” Lord Longford (1994) Jamie Chapman at work photograph by Tarron Spencer The Longford Trust aims to increase awareness and engagement in Jamie Chapman is a Longford scholar currently studying Fine prison issues, as well as giving practical support to prisoners, and to Art at the University of West of England, based at their Bath those who work with them. Spa campus. Whilst in prison he had submitted work to the It offers 20 Longford Scholarships each year to enable young Koestler Trust and it was during their annual exhibition, in serving and ex-prisoners to continue their rehabilitation by studying which his work had been highlighted in Inside Time, that he for degrees for up to three years at UK universities. The trust also met one of the Longford trustees, and was encouraged to runs the Frank Awards to enable serving prisoners to complete apply to our scholarship scheme. A mature student, recent modules towards an Open University degree while still inside. experimentation in plaster has added to the range of his The annual Longford Prize recognises outstanding work in the field artwork, of which making murals had always been a pivotal of prison reform by individuals and organisations and is awarded as part of Longford Lecture. This prestigious and high-profile event part. He cites the support of his Longford mentor, Carolyn, aims to inform and influence public opinion on penal policy. Entry as being “worth its weight in gold”. She has also, he says, is free of charge and each November an audience of up to 700 given him a “second voice” when he has questions about his gather in London to hear speakers who have included the Nobel art practice. Our front cover this year reflects his interest in Laureate, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and President Mary McAleese the textures of the West Country landscape and marks a new of Ireland. This year the actor, comedian, writer and broadcaster ambitious stage of his work, attracting admiration in the office Michael Palin, highlighted the plight of prisoners’ families. where it has recently been displayed. The 2015 Longford Lecture (clockwise from top right): A packed Assembly Hall at Church House, Westminster, listens to Michael Palin deliver his lecture; Longford Trust trustee and Master of Ceremonies, the broadcaster Jon Snow, talks to Secretary of State for Justice, Michael Gove, before the latter presents the 2015 Longford Prize; Michael Palin takes questions from the audience; Jon Snow welcomes back 2013 Longford Lecturer, the human rights campaigner, Bianca Jagger; Michael Gove meets Cassius and Justin, two current Longford Scholars; a group of Longford Scholars and mentors join Longford Trust director, Peter Stanford, on stage, as Daily Telegraph deputy editor, Liz Hunt looks on (right); Longford Trust patron, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor asks a question from the floor, as trustee Rachel Billington looks on (left); Michael Palin meets current Longford Scholar Andrew Hart at an exhibition of his recent works in the reception room after the lecture; and (centre of the page) Jon Snow thanks the team of volunteer ushers from St Michael’s Catholic Grammar School in Finchley. Photographs by David Sandison The Longford Lecture And while their loved one is incarcerated, families experience their own punishment. “In prison not a lot can happen, the daily routine providing a regular if monotonous structure to life behind bars. For the family outside everything can happen…Daily life becomes a series of little lies and deceits as parents or relatives have to deal with the question of what to tell the children. One child had been told that their father had gone to work for the Queen, another that he was working at a police car-wash, another that their father was travelling abroad.” For those parents determined to maintain contact and tell children the truth, he reported, there are many obstacles. “The prison visits are strictly limited and can be traumatic for a child. Even babies have to be searched as desperate people will sometimes hide drugs inside nappies. The prison officers themselves hate this part of a job in which there is no way of avoiding hurt and intrusion. In an already soured atmosphere, emotional spontaneity is discouraged and displays of love and affection must be curbed.” For many prisoners, he explained, the hardest time was not while they Michael Palin giving the 2015 Longford Lecture photograph by David Sandison were inside, but on release. “One woman I spoke to, who had served an eight year sentence, referred to what she described as a ‘Dunkirk Spirit’ “Collateral Damage: The effects of prison sentences that prevailed when she was still in prison…As she walked free she felt on offenders’ families” for the first time the pent-up anger and resentment that her children could The voices of prisoners’ families “need to be heard”, the actor, comedian, no longer contain. The idea that the doors swing open and the prisoner writer and broadcaster Michael Palin told an audience of 650 plus who is welcomed with open arms is a dangerous misconception.