Little Heresies Seminar Series5
Heresy #5: Offender Health - Why Bother?
Heretic: Andrew Gray, Academic Services for Public Management (12 November 2014).
Offender health services are contested politically. They are often ridiculed or mocked in parts of the mass media. Andrew suggests that investing effort in addressing the health and wellbeing needs of people who offend brings benefits to the communities in which offenders live and the wider public good as well as to offenders themselves.
Drawing on case stories that illustrate health and wellbeing conditions suffered by offenders, the presentation elaborated three sets of rhetorical policy contests – about offender rights, the security of communities in which offenders live, and reducing re-offending. It examined three areas of service development and draw out patterns of policy as practice. Together these rhetorical and practical policies illustrate the justification for an increasingly significant programme of national health service provision.