Breaking through prison 'ceiling'

THE mention of women in the context of governing Scottish prisons

immediately brings to mind Lady Martha Bruce, the charming aristocrat

who ruled first Gateside Women's Prison and then its modern replacement,

Cornton Vale, with the proverbial iron fist inside the velvet glove.

Lady Martha was a pioneer, a slight figure in a male-dominated world,

who remained something of a novelty item for a personality-hungry media

until her retiral in 1983.

Since then, there are more women involved in the management of

Scottish prisons, and, with cross-sex posting policies, there are now

more female officers serving on the halls and galleries of male jails

than there are serving in the sole women-only prison at Cornton Vale.

The novelty value has gone and the hierarchy of the Scottish Prison

Service operates a strong equal opportunities policy, but concern is

surfacing that women face a ''glass ceiling'' barring progress to the

very top of the service.

The focus falls on the succession at Barlinnie Prison in Glasgow,

Scotland's largest and busiest penal establishment -- a vast beehive

holding 1000 criminals in buildings well over 100 years old which have

resisted modernisation. With the leaving of Mr Peter Withers, the name

immediately on the lips of those who know the system is Mrs Kate

Donegan.

Could the tall, elegant Mrs Donegan, mother of two sons, become the

first female governor in charge of what should be the flagship prison in

the Scottish service, but which is in reality a tough, problem-ridden

posting? The chances are that she will not -- this time at least.

Mrs Donegan may have to be content with first taking charge in a

lesser prison before she reaches the very top, which she will

undoubtedly do if informed opinion is anything to go by. Her shortish

tenure of office as Barlinnie deputy and her high-profile membership of

the controversial staffing structure review team will probably not be

enough to sway the SPS board at this stage.

Whoever gets the Barlinnie job, the day cannot be long delayed when a

woman takes over a top, high-security, long-term prison in Scotland.

Eyebrows were raised last year when Mrs Sue Brookes, a slightly-built

30-year-old with an Oxford law degree (as well as one in criminology

from Edinburgh University), took over as governor-in-charge at the

Barlinnie Special Unit, a poisoned chalice of a posting if ever there

was one. The famous ''experiment'' was in its death throes, having lost

the way and was silted up with bitter, unyielding men determined to hang

on to their privileges to the last.

Mrs Brookes presided over the demise of the BSU and then leapt

straight into the front line a second time, being nominated to midwife

the imaginative National Induction Unit at Shotts Prison. That will not

be a bed of roses either.

Conceived as a means of heading off trouble before it bursts into life

in the mainstream, the unit will take in men who have just received

heavy sentences from the High Court and who face the syndrome best

described as ''drowning in time''. It is an important chance to buy

future peace in the prisons so the job of first governor becomes an

onerous responsibility.

At the other end of the penal scale the Scottish prison system has

been successful, despite constant attrition from tabloid journalism, in

creating an open prison system to resocialise long-term prisoners.

Dungavel, near Strathaven, is the latest addition in that field and it

is governed by Mrs Mary Wood, who took over from a man, and by her

deputy, Ms Susan Gemmill. In British terms it may be a unique double.

When the new specialised small unit comes on stream at Peterhead

Prison in April -- designed to handle a small number of difficult and

disruptive prisoners in conditions more structured than those at the

highly individualistic Shotts unit -- the boss will be another female

high-flier, Rona Kite, daughter of a famous prison governor father.

Other women are pushing forward towards the top ranks -- Mrs Edith

Chapman, deputy governor of Aberdeen Prison; Mrs Theresa Medhurst,

deputy governor of Polmont; Mrs Angela Barnshaw, deputy governor of

Shotts Unit, and Mrs Edith Chapman, a deputy governor at SPS

headquarters.

The main union, the SPOA, counts 314 women members, a number of whom

are now appearing in the senior ranks. It all begs the question whether

the time has come for a major breakthrough in a highly traditional and

male-dominated field. The very largest prisons, those with the highest

security and the largest concentrations of serious criminals, remain in

the hands of men.

Is their ''glass ceiling'', actual or psychological? Mr Edward

Frizzell, the chief executive of the SPS, believes there is not.

''There is no glass ceiling. I look forward to the day when we have a

woman on the prisons' board as a full executive member. As far as I am

concerned there is nothing to stop a woman rising right to the top of

this service. First they have to be in a position to apply for top jobs

and that is now happening.

Mr Frizzell is all for more female involvement in prison management.

He says there is a lot of evidence that women are a moderating influence

in jails; that women bring a different dimension to the handling of

conflict.

Others are not so sure about the increasing role of women in the

service, fearing that the pendulum of positive discrimination, conscious

or otherwise, may be swinging too far.

Mr Bill Stephens, the prison officers' union chairman who has spent 30

years working in jails, says: ''I think there have to be some

reservations about women governors of all-male jails, purely on

practical grounds. I do not think females should be exposed to the sort

of things, brutality and violence, for example, that males are subjected

to in this job from time to time.''