Jonathan Aitken Interview

Jonathan Aitken, by his own admission has had one of the most high profile and colourful careers in British public life. Born to a Conservative MP and daughter of the 1st Baron Rugby, Jonathan became a journalist, notably as a war correspondent in Vietnam, he then became an MP for Thanet East / South. He went onto hold appointments within government which included the Minister of State for Defence and the Chief Secretary to HM Treasury. However, in the late nineties he pleaded guilty to charges of perjury and served 7 months of an 18 month prison sentence. Following his release he has written many books, and in 2007 was appointed as the Chairman of the Centre for Social Justice’s policy study group on Prison Reform.

He is now an avid supporter for prison reform, and has been fundamental in the Change the Record campaign organised by Nacro. We have had the opportunity to interview him about his experiences, the reformation of the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act and the Change the Record Campaign.
What do you find are the biggest obstacles and prejudices that offenders face when leaving prison, or having been charged with a criminal conviction? Having been in the situation yourself, did you have problems with things such as obtaining home insurance?

Prison is a chastening and disorientating experience and anybody coming out has quite a variety of problems, the highest on the list are finding somewhere to live and being able to get a job; both can be quite difficult and involving huge obstacles.

Finding somewhere to live can be made easier if you have a family to go back to, but if you are starting from scratch it is much harder.

Getting a job is made infinitely harder because, as a requirement of the present law, if you fill in any application form you have to say whether or not you have got a criminal conviction. This means that 9 out of 10 employers don’t even bother giving an interview to people with convictions. Even though they may be by far the best qualified and their previous conviction may clearly have no bearing on their suitability for a job, for example applying for a job in an accounts department, it really isn’t relevant that they committed a dangerous driving offence. So the prejudice against anyone that has got a conviction is very, very strong.

After I came out of prison, I went back to Oxford University to do a two year degree course in Theology and so I did not run into many of the problems that other offenders run into, such as difficulties in getting a home and finding a job, and nor did I run into any problems with home insurance, but I was an exception to the general flow of offenders.

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