Slopping out compensation offer from SPS

Prison service's legal team to make offers in "doubled-up" slopping out cases

News, 18 September 2006

The Scottish Prison Service (SPS) has announced that it will settle outstanding "doubled up" slopping out cases.

Doubled-up slopping out refers to where a prisoner has been detained with another in a small cell for a significant period of time which has resulted in both having to use the same chamber pot in front of each other.

The SPS has accepted that the effect of recent decisions by the European Court of Human Rights is that the practice amounts to a breach of article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which prohibits inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. It has instructed its legal representatives to make an offer in settlement of all claims for doubled-up slopping out, to help deal with the large number of slopping out cases in the courts as efficiently as possible.

In the first case based on slopping out, decided by Lord Bonomy in April 2004, prisoner Robert Napier was awarded £2,000 plus interest for a skin complaint aggravated by prison conditions including slopping out. As a result, 1,400 current or ex-prisoners launched similar cases, for which the SPS has set aside £58 million.

It a statement the SPS said its acceptance of liability in doubled-up cases was without prejudice to any argument Scottish Ministers may have in relation to time bar, acquiescence, mora and the like which may arise in any particular case. An appeal on the application of time bar in such cases is currently pending before the Inner House.

Building and refurbishment work by the SPS has led to a reduction in slopping out places in Scottish prisons, from 1,900 in 2000 to about 350 currently.