Offender Rehabilitation
The Gladstone Committee Report did not use the word rehabilitation; it instead refers to treatment in relation to how prisoners were treated according to prison conditions at the time. According to the GCR, reformation is impossible to carry out in prison. The Gladstone committee focused on classification of prisoners with the aim of treating people as individuals with the aim of differentiating between offence and offenders. The committee claimed that the offences committed by individuals do not dictate or define the character of an individual. The Gladstone Committee supported the ban of prisoners talking be lifted, introduction of labour in the association, and that education should not be individual and in carried out in the cells. The Gladstone Committee report supports the separation of young offenders from the old in the prison .
Rehabilitate would be the word to choose in relation to handling offenders since once prisoners undergo rehabilitation they are recreated and restored thus making them more constructive. With rehabilitation, prisoners understand the offences they have committed and accept its consequences. Thus, whatever punishment prisoners go through in prison they fully contemplate the extent they pushed the values of morality upon committing the offences considered to be inhuman in the society. Rehabilitation creates an impact among most inmates as it shows them that society cares for them and is willing to help them out to overcome their behaviors and change. Once a prisoner undergoes rehabilitation, they would think twice before committing any crimes in the future .
Rehabilitation impacts society by showing that the society is comprised of individuals who are ready to assist each other on the basis of reformation and change. The society is comprised of human beings who are all bound to make mistakes from time to time. Therefore, with rehabilitation comes redemption that comes at a price all must pay in an effort to be a better person .
Brown, A. (2003). English society and the prison : time, culture and politics in the development of the modern prison, 1850-1920. Woodbridge: The Boydell Press.
