Skywatch: Strangeways there we came...

For Skywatch Friday. Not a typo of The Smiths' album title but a nod to mark the Strangeways Prison Riots of 25 years ago. They started on 1 April 1990 and lasted for over three weeks. Prisoners took control of the prison chapel and the riot quickly spread throughout most of the prison. The riot and rooftop protest ended on 25 April when the final five prisoners were removed from the rooftop, making it the longest prison riot in British penal history. One prisoner was killed during the riot, and one prison officer died from a heart attack. 147 prison officers and 47 prisoners were injured. Much of the prison was damaged or destroyed with the cost of repairs coming to £55 million.

The riot sparked a series of disturbances in prisons across England, Scotland and Wales, resulting in even the Thatcher regime / Major Government having to announce a public inquiry into the riots. The resulting Woolf Report concluded that conditions in the prison had been intolerable, and recommended major reform of the prison system. The Guardian described the report as a blueprint for the restoration of "decency and justice into jails where conditions had become intolerable". Sadly 25 years on, under another undemocratically elected Tory-led government, prison conditions are just as bad again, Harry Kenneth Woolf said last week.

Two Strange (way) tales...

I started a new job in the first week of April 1990, at a printers, in the street next to Strangeways... I was an hour and half late for work the first day, pesky rioters... Luckily it was only a temporary office job- I struggled to cope with the sexism of much of the male workforce, and the bossiness of my female supervisor was such that Morrissey would have aptly described as her as "Bigmouth strikes again".

A story I heard this year concerned the friend of a friend who was in Strangeways at the time for a minor offence. His cellmate was a riot ringleader and dragged him up onto the roof, where he played an inadvertent starring role in long distance tv camera coverage. The poor chap had served his time by the end of the riots but due to his accidental role in them, and the heavy handedness of the justice system, he ended up with an additional six month's sentence. So much for the great British justice system, again...