'Something needs to change': B.C. jail violence alarms outnumbered guards
Credit to Author: Glenda Luymes| Date: Fri, 15 Nov 2019 01:33:38 +0000
B.C.’s prison guards want the provincial government to do more to keep them safe on the job.
Staff at the Alouette Correctional Centre for Women gathered Thursday to protest working conditions that allow one guard to work alone in a living unit with 48 inmates.
“Something needs to give,” said Dean Purdy, vice-president of corrections services for the B.C. Government and Service Employees’ Union. “Something needs to change.”
Purdy said 124 provincial prison guards were assaulted on the job in B.C. in 2018, including 11 at the provincial women’s prison in Maple Ridge. Assaults on staff reached an “all-time high” last year, but have been rising year over year for the past five years.
“On top of the assaults on our correctional officers, there’s additional violence our officers regularly witness including overdoses, suicides by hanging and slashings, assaults on other inmates with homemade weapons, jumpers (and) riots,” he said.
Guards at Alouette frequently experience attacks with containers of urine and feces, he added.
Purdy was unable to provide a breakdown of when and where the assaults occurred before Postmedia’s deadline, but said some of the violence can be attributed to a changing inmate population, with more gang-affiliated inmates behind bars, as well as those with mental health issues.
But Purdy also blamed the B.C. government for changing the inmate-to-staff ratio in living units as part of a series of prison policy changes almost two decades ago. Prior to 2002, the ratio was capped at 20:1, so there would be one guard stationed in a living unit with 20 inmates. But without a cap, guards in Surrey Pretrial and the Okanagan Correctional Centre can see a 72:1 ratio, he said. At Alouette, the female guards sometimes work with a 48:1 ratio.
‘On top of the assaults on our correctional officers, there’s additional violence our officers regularly witness including overdoses, suicides by hanging and slashings, assaults on other inmates with homemade weapons, jumpers (and) riots,’ says Dean Purdy of the B.C. Government and Service Employees’ Union.
Living units consist of a large room with several tiers of cells and a shared living space, eating space and shower space. Inmates are monitored constantly via closed-circuit TV.
“You can imagine what it would be like to be the only officer in a living unit,” said Purdy.
B.C. is the only province with direct supervision living units without a cap on the number of inmates per officer, he added. In other provinces with a similar system, there would be two guards in a unit with 40 inmates.
The BCGEU is calling on the provincial government and WorkSafeBC to sit down with the union to address the problem.
Purdy said he has spoken with Public Safety Minister Mike Farnworth, both when he was in opposition and since the NDP formed government.
“We know he’s aware of the problem. We want to see solutions. We can’t keep going this way.”
Postmedia asked the Ministry of Public Safety for an interview, but officials were unable to provide someone familiar with the issues before deadline. In a statement, B.C. Corrections said “absolutely nothing matters more to us than having staff go home safe at the end of their shifts.”
Ration of inmates to officers in living units in BC prisons has risen since 2001 from from 20:1 to 72:1 in some facilities, according to union. @VancouverSun pic.twitter.com/Kt8Vj2dsg8
B.C. Corrections said it has made an “unprecedented effort” over the past three years to introduce new and innovative classification and case management approaches as part of the overall risk assessment process, which is expected to decrease violence.
“It’s important to understand that the vast majority of incidents occur in segregation units, often with two or three officers present on a unit at the time of an incident,” said the statement. “This demonstrates that ratios do not change inmate behaviour or prevent violence.”
A safety review of B.C. Corrections conducted by the previous provincial government in 2014 also emphasized the importance of using a “risk-based approach” to determine where to place inmates.
“For example, at Vancouver Island Regional Correctional Centre the ratio of inmates with mental disorders to staff is currently 12:1,” said the report by Laurie Throness, then the parliamentary secretary for B.C. Corrections. “Much of the violence against staff occurs in segregation units which are already routinely double-staffed.”
But he noted it is “common sense that a higher inmate to staff ratio would normally be a less safe environment for staff and inmates, unless targeted measures are taken.”
WorkSafeBC said it has had discussion with the union and the provincial government and has shared inspection reports done through its Correctional Services Initiative. They were unable to provide more information before deadline.
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