National Interest: The first report entitled People, place and performance: Are rural Mega prisons in the National Interest details findings by the Howard League for Penal Reform, numerous HM Inspectorate reports, academic research and Government inquiries. These sources show that one of the major reasons for the UK’s growing prison population is a high rate of reoffending which costs £18 billion per year. They find no systematic evidence that Mega prisons address prisoner reoffending and warn that logistics, staff recruitment and retention and prisoner family visits are particularly problematic in remote rural areas located far fom the judicial network, prisoners’ homes, employment hubs or affordable accommodation. Even Mega prison proponents recommend building them near large population centres and view the prison building programme as a chance to close down inaccessible rural prisons, not build more of them .

National Interest Paper Link

Local interest: Socio-economic benefits of development proposals can be afforded significant weight in the planning decision making process. However, these are usually presented by the developer after the site has been selected and rely on inappropriate data from elsewhere, rather than systematic analysis of a site’s unique social and economic characteristics. WASC’s second report People and Place: Are rural Mega-prisons in the Local Socio-economic Interest finds that in planning proposals, the Ministry of Justice (MOJ) tends to follow a ‘cut and paste model’ where it assumes that all areas are the same. It defines local as up to 40 miles away (!), has done no analysis in rural areas at all and has ignored evidence from the USA that shows that rural prisons can in fact damage local economies. The Braintree district needs better paid more highly skilled jobs, not just any jobs, especially on an inaccessible site. The WASC report also finds that crime and health outcomes near UK prisons can be far worse than average, as well as the extra traffic.

Local Interest Paper Link

It does not take a giant leap of imagination for most people to recognise that most of these issues apply to any form of detention centre or over-sized development, not just a prison. 

Prison and Asylum Centre Impact

This chart shows the impact of the prisons and the asylum centre compared with sustainable community led alternatives.

Caught Between The Devil And The Deep Blue Sea

A new report called "Caught between the Devil and the Deep Blue sea, Asylum, Imprisonment or both in rural Essex?" has been written on behalf of WASC. This report suggests that the concentration of large numbers in a remote site fails to address the national problem effectively or equitably and may have significant negative implications for the entire Braintree district in terms of traffic, crime, housing and traffic.

For those who do not have time to read the whole report, the executive summary is below

• It is time for some common sense to prevail:

• In a remote rural community that has been on tenterhooks for 21 months awaiting confirmation of the Ministry of Justice’s (MOJ) ill-conceived Mega prisons plan first mooted in September, 2021, the added mental stress of a pending asylum centre is pushing residents to breaking point. Even in isolation, each over-sized proposal is neither equitable nor effective and promises a range of severe negative consequences in terms of each of the social, economic, and environmental pillars of sustainable development. Together they represent a “colossal failure of common sense”. Neither proposal can be defined as a short-term unavoidable localised emergency and neither are in the national or local interest.

• It is clear that the MOJ and Home Office are each engaged in an attempted ex-post justification of decisions made purely in the interests of political expediency. The nature of the government’s approach and the litany of errors and inconsistencies in its (very limited) submissions of ‘evidence’, suggest the need for detailed local (and national) scrutiny of each proposal is more apparent than ever.

• Each proposal imposes an unfair burden:

• 1,700 asylum seekers equates to an 11-fold increase in the young male population in Finchingfield and over 12-fold in Wethersfield, thereby dramatically distorting the ratio of males to females. If the rumour of 2,000 asylum seekers is true, this would mean that this remote rural area would be home to more asylum seekers than several major cities including Leeds, Manchester, Sheffield, Newcastle and Cardiff.

• If the Wethersfield prisons were built, the region would have nearly 3 prison places per prisoner from the East of England, compared to just 1 in Wales, the South West, or the Midlands.

• These unfair burdens also directly detract from the government’s declared objective of smooth integration of released prisoners and successful asylum applicants into wider society.

• Each proposal is affected by the same logistical bottlenecks:

• In addition to inadequate existing onsite infrastructure, the site suffers from poor road access and is located at a significant distance from business and population hubs required to support it in terms of supplies, workforce and other support services.

• Each proposal may have significant negative impacts on the area:

• Given regional demographics and the need for higher paid skills jobs, purported economic benefits are likely to be illusory and may be offset by a decline in property values. Fear of crime, traffic pollution and accidents and restriction of access to outdoor activities may compound the strain on rural health services and negatively impact residents’ health at local and district levels. 

• Deprivation data for 100 areas in England and Wales that have a prison shows little evidence of economic benefits but a significant increase in the likelihood of being in the worst 20 percent in the country in terms of crime, health, and housing.

• These negative effects may permeate across the entire district of Braintree.

Wethersfield Airbase Contamination This is a report on publicly available information, including weblinks and replies to Freedom of Information requests compiled to support the conclusions in the Buro Happold Ltd Geoenvironmental Desk Study that there is cause for concern about contamination at Wethersfield Airbase. There is enough consistent information about Wethersfield Airbase and other USAF bases around the UK and world to confirm the chances of there being no contamination is zero. Before construction workers, residents or visitors arrive onsite a ground investigation and survey should be completed and results made available to the public. This is a public health obligation.

Prison Report 2023

Following the appointment of a new Secretary of State and changes in sentencing policy, SWAP felt that the time was right to once again lobby our local authorities, officials at the MoJ and other interested parties. To this end a new Report has been produced which summarises our concerns at national and local level. To date the Report has been sent to every BDC member the Leader of Essex County Council and some cabinet members, The Howard League, officials and non- executive Directors at the MoJ and others.

The need for this action has been reinforced by our discovering in a freedom of information response that the MoJ has written to the Home Office about the deferment of two other prison planning applications as follows: “This means we now have even more of an imperative to go full steam ahead on Wethersfield”

The MoJ has repeatedly claimed that no decision has been taken about a planning application for Wethersfield but unhappily this seems to be questionable.

You can read the full report here

Traffic Assessment Data

Using official data Transport Assessment documents for the twin Mega-Prisons' proposal obtained under a Freedom of Information Request (FOI) by The Fields Association (TFA),   Wethersfield Airbase Scrutiny Committee (WASC) have uncovered some alarming traffic projections for our villages and the entire Braintree district

Traffic volumes: A staggering total of nearly 3,000 extra vehicles every day, including 150 MORE HGVs!

Traffic timings: As staff work set shifts, there will be a significant spike in traffic from 7 to 9am and around 5pm - up to 3 times current volumes, including routes past our local primary schools and over our narrow historic bridges. 

Traffic routes:  Owing to the nature of prison jobs on offer (usually low skilled) and the make up of the local working population , the Prison Service would have to recruit from a very wide catchment area that stretches to London and Peterborough! The reports concede that very few jobs will be created for local people. Most journeys will start outside the Braintree district. So, it is not just Finchingfield or Wethersfield that face more traffic.  

• Half of this traffic will pass through villages along the B1053 towards Braintree. 

• Over 600 extra daily trips through Great Sampford

• The bridge at Finchingfield will face an extra 1,100 vehicles per day, including 50 HGVs.

• 400 extra trips along Rectory Road and Wethersfield Road, Sible Hedingham past the Church and Bus garage. 

• Over 500 trying to traverse Great Bardfield’s single lane bridge.

• 400 through the narrow streets of Bocking. 

• A web that reaches South and West as far as Witham, Great Dunmow and beyond.

You can read the full report Here