A 'social experiment' to revive the 1930s borstal system shows the military-style regime must be reinstated for modern Britain, according to a former prison governor and star of the ITV reality show. Mark Tallentire reports

“MIND over matter: I don’t mind and you don’t matter.”

So screams Darren Dugan, the muscle behind the governor on ITV reality show Bring Back Borstal and known to the band of young offenders spending a month in the 1930s-style regime simply as ‘Chief’.

But it’s not all hard labour and isolation units.

Staff at the borstal, Northumberland’s Ford Castle, spend hours with the inmates; discussing their background, criminality, attitude and future.

There are strict rules and punishments, but also the chance to change.

And that’s what attracted former prison governor Gerry Hendry to come out of retirement and take part as a housemaster.

“I strongly believe in the borstal principles,” the 66-year-old says, sitting in the front room of his home in Bearpark, near Durham.

“Over the years, youth custody has lost a lot of what it’s about.

“We’re just churning people through without really tackling re-offending. Reoffending rates are very high in this country.”

Gerry speaks as a man with more than 30 years’ experience of working in the prison system, including at Northallerton, Full Sutton, as assistant governor at Deerbolt Young Offenders’ Instiution (YOI), deputy governor at Durham and finally governor at HMP Shrewsbury until its closure in 2012.

He despairs of the current setup.

“What’s the point of imprisoning someone for 12 months or less?” he asks.

“There’s no time to work with them. It’s a pointless exercise.

“All you can do is contain them. You can’t do anything with them.

“We’ve had decline in our society for years and we’re now seeing consecutive generations of families always unemployed.

“Unless something is done to break the offending cycle, all we’re going to do is continue to warehouse young people. We’ll never do anything to help them.

“I realise in times of austerity people have to make cuts. But we’re acting as if prisons and prisoners don’t matter.”

Bring Back Borstal took 14 young offenders with more than 60 convictions between them and pitched them together for compulsory schooling, exercise, chores and community service.

By the end of the third episode, screened last week (Thursday, January 22), there had been fights, abuse, damage and more than half of the inmates had walked out.

But Gerry insists it was a success.

“I expected people to quit,” he says, “I predicted it.

“These guys are failures. People come into prison not only having failed in society but as bad criminals too – because they’ve been caught.”

But, without wanting to give away the conclusion of tomorrow night’s (Thursday, January 29) final episode, Gerry is convinced his efforts, four weeks living at the borstal and working 15- or 16-hour shifts, made a positive impact.

“It was absolutely fantastic,” he says, “It was a dream. I’d gone back to my roots – back to a period of which I lamented the passing.

“They need this type of system – that focuses on them, gives them skills, a work ethic, education, with everything tailored to meet their needs – and a sense of being valued.”

He has kept in touch with the inmates since filming finished last summer and many have got into jobs or training, starting – he says – on the way to turning their life around.

Now he wants the Government to Bring Back Borstal for real.

“I would like some serious discussion among the criminal justice system. I’d like politicians to sit up and take notice,” he says.

A Ministry of Justice spokeswoman said crime was falling and fewer young people were entering the criminal justice system, but the department was committed to ensuring offenders were given skills, training and support to get their lives back on track.

She highlighted the Secure Colleges scheme, which she described as a “pioneering approach to youth custody with education”.

Ministers want the first such college, accommodating hundreds of young offenders, to open in Leicestershire in 2017.

“We are also doubling the amount of education in YOIs, helping young people turn their backs on crime for good,” the spokeswoman added.

Jenny Chapman, the Darlington MP and Labour’s prisons spokeswoman, said not enough was being done to prevent young people offending and the best way to cut youth crime was to intervene early with “at risk” cases.

The final episode of Bring Back Borstal will be on ITV1 tomorrow (Thursday, January 29) at 10.40pm. Previous episodes are available now on ITV Player.