SCOTLAND
PRISONS
The Daily Record, 26th October 1995
Jail kids storm – Boys of 14 locked up
A row flared yesterday over the soaring number of Scots kids locked up in adult prisons.
Thirty-nine problem boys between 14 and 16 were put in jail last year because they couldn’t get a secure place in a childrens’ home.
The total, revealed in official figures, was a dramatic rise on the 21 kids jailed in 1993.
Eight of last year’s child prisoners, who mix with adult cons in recreation periods, served more than three months.
And Annie Gunner, of charity Children in Scotland, said: “Kids are entitled to have their welfare considered and prison is wholly inconsistent with that.”
John McNeill, chief executive of prison welfare group SACRO, added: “It’s unacceptable that 14-year-olds have to be held in jail because of the absence of places elsewhere.”
Most of the boys went to the youth remand unit at Longriggend in Lanarkshire, but one was sent on his own to Inverness jail.
One was locked up for between two and three months and two for over a month. Eleven served between 15 and 29 days and the rest 14 days or less.
There are 84 secure places in Scots kids’ homes, a figure which hasn’t grown in years.
The Scottish Office said jailing kids wasn’t their policy, but circumstances sometimes forced them to do it.
THE SOURCE 