Rights For Remand Prisoners

On entry into prison, prisoners go through an ‘induction process’. Some prisons have a dedicated induction wing for this. All prisoners who have never been in custody before will go through this procedure, as will prisoners who have gone from being remand prisoners to convicted prisoners. The length of stay in induction will vary, depending on whether or not they have been in prison before, or if they are considered vulnerable.

Prisoners who are on remand should not be in contact with convicted prisoners. This means that no remand prisoner should ever be put in a cell with a convicted prisoner. A ‘convicted’ prisoner is someone who has been sentenced, or who has either pleaded guilty or been found guilty after a trial and is awaiting sentence.

When a prisoner is on remand, they are generally categorised as ‘U’ prisoners, and are in most circumstances put into Category B or C prisons. On entry into the prison system, a remand prisoner should be put into the ‘standard’ level of the IEP (Incentives and earned privileges) scheme. They should only be put on ‘basic’ IEP as a result of behavioural problems.

Remand prisoners are not required to work in prison if they don’t want to. They can wear their own clothes (unless deemed an escape risk), are allowed to purchase books, newspapers etc with their own money and can carry out business activities, in so far as is possible. They can have as many visits as they like, within reason, have a greater tobacco allowance than convicted prisoners, and can receive medical or dental treatment from a practitioner of their choice, if they are willing to cover the cost themselves.

Prisoners who have been charged with certain offences will be put into ‘provisional category A’ in accordance with PSI 03/2010. Visitors to provisional Category A and Category A prisoners must be ‘approved.’ What this means is that visits will be closed until open visits have been approved. Visits to exceptional high-risk category A prisoners will be subject to background checks by the police so there will be a delay between being remanded and having visits from relatives. That said, the delay cannot be for longer than is reasonable. Prisoners who are experiencing considerable delays in this regard should contact a solicitor for advice.