Porridge

I'm in and out of prison a lot.

Fortunately I'm never in there for long and they always let me out. But that's not the case for many people.

Swansea Prison is over-crowded. Nothing unusual there if you've heard any of the news reporting of the last few weeks. Swansea Prison is always over-crowded. A typical Victorian gaol, it is meant to house a maximum of 250 prisoners; most recently it was reported that there were 428 inmates, 71% over-capacity.

Opinions on prisons and sentencing are wide-ranging but there still seems to exist a view that life in prison is a cushy number.

It's not: prison is horrible. Yes, I'm writing from a middle-class comfortable lifestyle and I'm bound to think that, but take a trip round a prison and you'll see the reality.

I don't have to tell you about the cramped over-crowded cells, the sanitation, lack of privacy, lack of freedom even; you know all that. What can I say?

The noise. It never stops. It is never quiet. There is nowhere - except the chapel on Sundays - where a man can have the peace to just be.

The exercise yard. Enclosed by wire mesh fencing 20' high. The size of a netball pitch. Tarmac-ed. Walking round and round it, stopping to look at outsiders passing by. And me on the outside looking in, like a curious visitor at a zoo. 'Do they bite?' I would if it were me.

Degradation. And they call us civilised.

The chapel with its ornately decorated wrought iron windows. Bars. Pretty bars, but bars just the same.

And there are men who come in and out of here far more often, and stay longer, than I do. Men who are marched under guard from place to place. This is prison; of course they are.

I believe some choose deliberately by their actions to be inside. Because the routine, the security is what they need; they have nothing outside. But there are others for whom being inside is a hazard of the job. But I still I refuse to believe that prison is something they take lightly, something they willingly accept. It is an option forced upon them. They do the crime; they get punished. Right and proper. But why do they commit the crime?

Many of inmates have drug or alcohol problems, and a poor level of literacy. No-one should leave school struggling to read or write. But there are other vital things that need to be taught.

Love, respect, honour, trust. And hope. We all need hope.

I am dead against the Lottery because it sells hope. For most people that is an unreal hope. And even a win doesn't guarantee happiness. Hope is much bigger than that.

Politicians have been talking for years about back to basics and family values. Whatever our idea of family, the values implied are the ones we need.

Faith, hope and love. And the greatest of these is love.