'Medical treatment is a right': Nova Scotia prisoners write letter calling for reforms

The Central Nova Scotia Correctional Facility, in Darthmouth, N.S., is shown in this June 3, 2005 file photo. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/Mike Dembeck)

Some inmates across the U.S. are staging work strikes, sit-ins and hunger strikes to protest their living conditions. In Nova Scotia prisoners are taking a different approach to voicing their concerns.

Inmates at the Central Nova Scotia Correctional Facility in Burnside, N.S., have written a letter outlining 10 things they’d liked to see change at the prison. They dictated their demands to local activist and professor El Jones, who says she made very minor edits before sharing their piece with the Halifax Examiner.

Number one on their list is better health care. “Medical treatment is a right: being deprived of health care is not part of our sentences,” the inmates write.

They also say they want more and better rehabilitation programs. “We need programs that address mental health and addiction problems; that teach us employable skills; that help us to learn financial management and other life skills; that help us build healthy relationships with our families; that help us reintegrate into society,” the letter reads.

They’re also asking for indoor exercise equipment, physical contact like hugs with visitors, the right to wear personal clothes and shoes, healthy food, access to a library, no time limits on visits and better air circulation, according to the letter.

Jones says the goal is to create discussion, even if the inmates don’t get everything they want.

“A lot of people have been saying, ‘Well don’t go to jail then or don’t commit crimes,’” she says. But the prisoners, according to Jones, are asking, “How do we be accountable for this?”

“These aren’t people that just want to sit around all day doing nothing, these are people that want to be active, that want to be learning, that want to be working on the things they need to change.”

Jones says access to equal health care is one of the most contentious concerns considering that health services can be difficult for many Nova Scotians to access.

“But we’re talking about very basic things like you can’t get a broken bone fixed,” she says.

Jones says she’s heard of a pregnant inmate who couldn’t access prenatal appointments and lost her baby, diabetics who couldn’t access insulin and people with mental health conditions who were cut off from medications.

Another concern she highlights is access to the library. Inmates not only can’t access the internet, but they lost the right to visit the library in the jail years ago and now have to rely on guards to get them books, she says.

Jason MacLean, a veteran Nova Scotia correctional officer who currently serves as president of the Nova Scotia Government & General Employees Union, says he’s impressed by the letter-writing approach.

“Usually when you see protests in a facility, it’s by means of a hunger strike or people being united not to leave a certain area, and as far as has been reported to me, none of that is happening,” he tells CTVNews.ca.

“They have issues they want to have heard and I believe they are being heard, and that is much better than any type of room being wrecked or beat up,” he adds.

While MacLean commends the prisoners for using words rather than vandalism or rioting, he doesn’t agree with all of their demands.

He says health care is a right but he’s not convinced prisoners are getting worse care than other Nova Scotians.

MacLean says he disagrees with their request to choose the clothing they wear because it will lead to violence.

“If you have somebody with a nice pair of Jordans (running shoes), somebody could look at them and say, ‘That’s mine,’ and take it,” he says.

When it comes to the demand for indoor exercise equipment, MacLean thinks adding things like chin-up bars would be good for prisoners’ mental and physical health, but he wouldn’t support adding things like dumbbells.

“I’ve seen them throw it around,” he says. “And I had an offender come up to me (threatening) to smash every window with the weight bar,” he adds. Prisoners used exercise equipment to pry open a fence and escape in Cape Breton in 1998, he adds.

MacLean is, however, in favour of allowing some prisoners to have physical contact with visitors, if they are on good behaviour. “That’s good for somebody’s mental wellbeing,” he says.

According to MacLean, prison guards aren’t opposed to reasonable reforms but a lot of it comes down to whether the province is able and willing to fund enough guards to properly supervise things.

“As far as I’m concerned, they always try to skimp and they always try to hold out in funds,” he says of the province.

“These guys talking out in this way sets up the stage to be more empathetic of their issues,” he adds.

Sarah Gillies, a spokesperson for the Nova Scotia Correctional Services, did not specifically address the inmates’ health care concerns but said in a written statement that the government provides healthy food and is working on a new air ventilation system at the Burnside facility.

She added that “a wide range of programs are available to inmates,” through the department and its partners, including substance abuse programs, anger management, mental health supports, employment readiness programs and educational programs.