Inside the governor of Lewes prison

Governor Eoin McLennan-Murray, the man responsible, meets Lisa Frascarelli and talks about drugs, practical jokes and the worst day of his career

"From a personal point of view, if I murdered someone, I'd rather die than stay in prison for the rest of my life," says Eoin McLennan- Murray. "I'd be quite happy if the state was to execute me."

It's unlikely the governor of Lewes prison will ever find himself seriously confronting that prospect - unless, that is, he wasn't really joking with his reply to my question about what he does at weekends ("I commit crime").

But really, it's quite a shocking thing to say considering the words come from a man who, this year, will have spent three decades working in our prison system. It's also something for those people who think prisons are holiday camps - all TV and table tennis - to consider.

"It's true they have televisions and recreational facilities and gym facilities," he says. "But is it easy? For me, losing my liberty, having a regimented routine, being monitored, being controlled, having to ask who I can see in terms of visitors, not to have the full range of physical contact with my partner or friends - these restrictions I would find incredibly difficult to accept.

"Giving me a television and table tennis, to be honest, wouldn't really bother me. It's a bit superficial, but other people may see it differently."

After my own tour of the prison, I have to say, Grade-II listed status aside, HMP Lewes is not my idea of a holiday camp.

F Wing - the one described in the Chief Inspector's report as "barely fit for habitation" - is pretty grim. It's like a dank Victorian asylum. A prisoner with long, lank curls sweeps the long corridor under the glare of rows of strip lights.

Another, who is preoccupied with getting qualifications so he can get himself "sorted out", lets me and the photographer into his cramped cell.

I don't know what he's in for, but like the other 526 men who stay here for an average of six weeks before being moved to a more permanent prison it could be anything from murder to a road traffic offence.

McLennan-Murray says there is a problem with damp in the prison and that the plumbing is "very tired" - which must be unpleasant if you're a prisoner, as the average cell's toilet will be inches from your face if you're unfortunate enough to be bedding down on the bottom bunk.

"It's clean but worn out," he says, adding that the wing will be getting refurbished in 2009/10.

For those worried that the more modern wings are the height of luxury, the one I see reminds me of a dilapidated leisure centre.

The prisoners seem in better spirits and have ensuite toilets, which is not as glamorous as it sounds - there is nothing glamorous about egg yolkyellow blankets and a toilet within spitting distance of your bed.

The walls of one cell are covered with cards from home and pictures of Gemma Atkinson, the Hollyoaks actress turned glamour model, grappling with her large and apparently wayward bosom.

A man in a grey tracksuit tells me McLennan-Murray is the best, loudly, and then turns to him and says, "Can you sort me an early release for saying that, governor?"

According to his governor, the prison inspector's report and an independent survey, the relationship between staff and prisoners at HMP Lewes is extremely good.

"The prisoners say very positive things about this prison," McLennan-Murray says. "They say they feel cared for. That's an acid test when you think the prison is only run with about 150 prisoners to six staff. If they wanted to take the place over there are enough of them to outnumber us.

"What stops them is they accept the position they find themselves in and they cooperate. If that balance is not right you have a very unstable prison."

In his grey suit and red tie, McLennan-Murray looks more like a teacher than a prison governor. Like a teacher, he has childlike drawings on his office wall, but the pencil etching of James Dean and the bird-filled garden scene aren't the work of school children, they're gifts from past prisoners.

He's jolly but softly-spoken. He enjoys piloting microlights and disagrees with capital punishment - "because when you have a miscarriage of justice it's such a final thing".

He studied Biological Sciences at Queen Mary College, London, and, until he flicked through the university careers booklet, he had planned on being a doctor.

"Like many people, I didn't grow up wanting to be a prison officer," he says before explaining his unusual reasons for joining the Prison Service in 1978.

"I'm going to sound shallow, but I was getting married and the thing that caught my eye was the generous holiday allowance - 30 days plus bank holidays, and they gave you accommodation. Most of my friends were in squats and bedsits and I was in a four-bedroom house a stone's throw from the King's Road."

But while McLennan-Murray thought he was onto a cushy number at Wandsworth prison, his wife disagreed.

"She was angry with me," he says. "She told me I was joining a fascist organisation!"

At university McLennan-Murray was involved in student politics and it seems wild horses couldn't stop him knocking up a banner and marching in the name of everything from government grants to ousting Margaret Thatcher. "She was the education minister," he says, momentarily forgetting himself and chanting excitedly, "Thatcher, Thatcher, Thatcher. Out! Out! Out!"

He composes himself and says he's always had "a morality". "I think it's important to do what's right, but it isn't always easy. Most prisoners know they have done something which is wrong."

During his 30-year career he has served in ten prisons.

He arrived at Lewes in 2003 in the wake of a riot and an annual report that branded living conditions "Dickensian" and "inhumane".

The report further revealed the prison had the worst suicide rate in the country (five inmates had killed themselves in 15 months) and also the worst drug problem (warder Andrew Hubbard was jailed for operating a "mini drugs supermarket"

behind bars).

The following year Lewes earned the dubious title of Britain's most violent prison, but McLennan- Murray says this wasn't accurate and that prison staff had been over-zealous in recording assaults.

"If I were to push you, that was counted as an assault. An assault to me is he thumps his hand. Now we are much better in terms of recording."

The prison pulled its socks up - thnks to both McLennan-Murray and his predecessor Paul Carroll - but suicide, bullying and drugs problems were still flagged up in the latest inspector's report. In the past 12 months there have been three suspected suicides, although one is now being treated as murder.

Vulnerable prisoners are now quickly assessed because, as McLennan- Murray says, "If they are going to try and take their own lives they will do it at quite an early stage."

There is now a wellstaffed first night centre to acclimatise new prisoners, a direct line to The Samaritans and the opportunity to talk to a Listener - a Samaritan- trained prisoner.

The prison has admitted drug importation is its biggest challenge. According to the report, 31 per cent of prisoners said it was easy to get hold of drugs in Lewes. Last October a police helicopter patrolled the perimeter walls after socks and tennis balls filled with crack cocaine found their way over the fence.

An action plan has now been put in place, which appears to be working.

McLennon-Murray didn't arrive at Lewes without controversy. Over the years he has won admirers - and enemies - for his progressive approach to prisoners.

He prefers to reward good behaviour rather than punish bad. At his former resettlement prison in Kent, Blantyre House (which he left in 2000), some prisoners were allowed out on work placements and had access to bank accounts, bank cards, cars and mobile phones.

It was an approach that eventually led to him being removed from his position as governor.

On May 5, 2000, McLennan-Murray's then area manager, Tom Murtagh, informed him he was being relocated immediately. Just hours after he left his office, the prison was raided by 84 prison officers, who expected to find large amounts of contraband. They found a small quantity of cannabis, three Ecstasy pills, three unauthorised mobile phones and some unauthorised credit cards - less than might have been expected of a routine search. No one tested positive for drugs and no prisoners or staff were charged.

The story hit the headlines and a Home Affairs select committee, which praised McLennan- Murray's style of governing, ruled, "The search was not a proportionate response to the intelligence used to justify it."

He says the incident was "devastating".

Did he ever received a public apology?

"The Prison Service didn't give me any kind of apology"

The phone rings. "Saved by the bell," he announces - but not for long. The phone rings off.

He says he did a "lot of soul-searching" at the time and considered leaving the Prison Service but made a "pragmatic" decision to stay, as he had a family to support. He spent 18 months on secondment to the Department for Education and Skills before being tempted back into the Prison Service when Mr Murtagh (who told his side of the story in his book The Blantyre House Affair - A Modern-day Witch Hunt) retired in April 2002.

McLennan-Murray says he "isn't bitter"

and has long since drawn a line under the whole affair. The Prison Service has retained an embarrassed silence.

One thing that strikes me, and probably anyone else who has had a few dealings with prisons, is the thought of convicts working out in the community. But McLennan-Murray points out that it is normal for prisoners at the end of their sentences to be re-integrated into society.

"In Kent I had prisoners who were bus drivers, delivery drivers for Tesco, car salesmen, a tattooist and a deep-sea diver," he says. "You know, there were articles in the local Press after we had some men cleaning trains. They asked readers, Is it right prisoners should do this?' Some said yes and some said no."

McLennan-Murray didn't need the public's verdict on this question because he had the figures to show there was method in what some thought was his madness. When he was governor of Blantyre House, it had the lowest re-offending figures of any prison in Britain - eight per cent, well below the 58 per cent average for adult male prisoners.

It was so successful that elements of the pioneering resettlement work have been replicated in other prisons. "I still get people writing and calling from Blantyre to let me know how they're getting on in life," he says. "Some have reoffended, the majority haven't."

But even those who have kept out of trouble are often stigmatised. McLennan-Murray was recently contacted by the solicitor of a former inmate at Blantyre for a character reference. The man was appealing to the courts after his application for a black cab licence was turned down.

"I remembered him and I wrote a note back to the court," he says. " I said, This man has been out seven years and he's been working all that time.

What does someone have to do to prove that they have changed? Really, do you want to deny this man the opportunity to prove he has changed?"

They gave him the licence.

McLennan-Murray believes people can and do change. He says he's seen it with his own eyes. I ask for examples and he says there are "many", before plumping for the armed robber ("your archetypal criminal") who is now a drugs counsellor.

There is also a former prisoner working in a very high-up and interesting place, but unfortunately he wanted to keep that one off the record.

He says working for the Prison Service is not an easy job, but it can be a rewarding one. "A lot of people who come in have a number of major issues," he says. "Many have no qualifications.

They may have substance abuse problems or often their relationships have been dysfunctional - they were abused as a child or witnessed violence in the home.

"When the father or father figure drinks and abuses his partner and the children witness this, it becomes almost their norm.

"Sometimes it's very difficult to fix these things, but if you don't fix things enough, they won't get a job and nothing is going to work out.

It's a critical mass of things that you have to put right. It isn't easy. It takes time and resources and commitment. There is no simple answer and no quick fix."

In his years he has come across high-profile prisoners such as the Birmingham Six and Moors murderer Ian Brady. He corresponded with both Brady's mother and his supporter Lord Longford, but says that Brady was a very "solitary man"

who obviously "wasn't right."

Does he ever find it hard to get past some of the prisoners' crimes and get on with his job?

"Of the very serious offenders I have met there were probably half-a-dozen that had nothing about them I liked," he says. "You know, you really kind of detest them.

"But my attitude is no matter what they have done, even the really serious offences, you can sometimes find common experience. You have to build a relationship around that, and that distracts you from what they have done.

You couldn't do this job otherwise. Their offence was dealt with by the court and my job is to rehabilitate them and keep the public safe."

He says that people who "murder sadistically and pose a continuing risk" should not be released but points out that 80 per cent of murder cases are domestic.

"It's maybe a dispute in the family," he says.

"Two brothers fight, one lands the other a nasty punch. He goes down and he kicks him as well and his brother dies. He has no criminal history. He's maybe a university student. The question is, would it be right never to think about releasing that person if he is never likely to commit such a crime again?"

It takes a man like McLennan-Murray to put things in perspective because for most of us, our only brush with prison is Bad Girls or Porridge.

"I watched Prison Break," he says. "It was a bit unbelievable but you get hooked on to these things. Of course I liked Porridge. Mr Baraclough the prison warden, McLaren the hard man, Lukewarm the gay guy, Fletcher the real old lag - these stereotypes, you find them in prisons."

He says that while there's a lot of humour in prisons, in the end he's here to fulfil a serious and important purpose.

"I believe in public service and a really worthwhile occupation and I'm committed to the work I do in prisons. Our job is to protect the public and I'd love to think reduce reoffending and help people change their lives.

"I realise that's a bit idealistic but there's nothing wrong with having ideals."