Detainees underfed - Gov't spends $200 daily to feed inmates
Published:Sunday | June 26, 2011 | 12:00 AM
Tyrone Reid, Enterprise Reporter
Hundreds of persons held in overcrowded police lock-ups across the island are battling for space and food as the Government of Jamaica pays a paltry $200 per day to feed each person held in a lock-up.
Human rights vanguard Jamaicans for Justice (JFJ) has lambasted the State's niggardly spend on meals for the presumably innocent-until-proven-guilty persons in jail cells across the island.
Dr Carolyn Gomes, executive director of the human rights lobby, likened the stingy expenditure on food for the inmates to torture.
A loaf of bread costs $220.
Karl Angell, director of commu-nications at the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF), confirmed the State's meagre spend on food for inmates.
"Based on the recommendation of the Jamaica Constabulary, the Ministry of National Security has entered into contracts with various entities across the country for the provision of prisoner meals on a daily basis ... . The current contracts call for payment at the rate of $200 per person per day," noted Angell in response to questions from The Sunday Gleaner.
No set meal standards
Angell pointed out that the Government does not stipulate nutritional standards to the food suppliers. He also stated that there was no standard menu list.
At least one food supplier lamented that the Government did not pay the penny-pinching $200 per person on time. Nevertheless, Angell argued that the timeliness of payment to the contractors is a function of how soon they submit their invoices to the station commander, the commander's approval and submission of the invoice to the JCF's finance branch, and the availability of funds at the finance branch to pay the suppliers. "Despite all this, contractors receive some payment each month - even if it is not the total amount owing," Angell stated.
Meanwhile, figures contained in the 2011-2012 Estimates of Expenditure have revealed that the State has significantly slashed the allocation for "the purchases of goods and services" to the Detention and Courts Division of the JCF. This arm of the police force is responsible for the administration of all lock-ups and the jury process in Kingston and St Andrew.
In the 2009-2010 financial year, the provisional expenditure on the purchases of other goods and services - which covers the purchase of food for the prisoners - was $12.9 million, but it was slashed to $4.5 million the following year.
This year, the State reduced it even further to $2.135 million.
A jailhouse meal supplier told The Sunday Gleaner that the persons held in police lock-ups are usually given two slices of bread and some mint tea for breakfast, which is usually served shortly after 7 a.m. On Sundays, the inmates are given a little callaloo or cabbage with the two slices of bread and tea for breakfast.
Lunch, served at approximately 12:30 p.m., is usually chicken back or chicken neck, or liver with rice. Sometimes rice and peas is served with the meat.
The next meal is supper, and that is usually a little syrup with bread. On Saturdays, the detainees are fed soup.
A dietetic assistant at a prominent hospital told The Sunday Gleaner that the meals provided to the persons held in police lock-ups were grossly inadequate.
"That sounds like a mild version of fasting. The children here (at the hospital) are getting more food than the prisoners. That is not food," said the dietetic assistant, who asked not to be identified because she was not authorised to speak with the media.
Shocking
The nutritional expert, who was shocked by what was being provided to the inmates, pointed out that the meals were unbalanced because they largely lacked proteins, fats, and vegetables.
She cautioned that persons with ailments such as diabetes would not last long on the current menu of meals offered. If a diabetic's blood sugar level drops too low, he or she may end up in a coma.
The suppliers know that the daily portions are inadequate to meet standard nutritional requirements,but they lament that their hands are tied by the Government's close-fisted approach.
"We can't do anymore. We have to pay workers, pay light bill, and pay taxes," the source revealed.
The suppliers once provided other types of meat, but the economic crunch has all but reduced the options to solely chicken back.
Meals provided to lock-ups have to feed up to 199 mouths at times.
When told of the menu and the amount of money allocated in the Budget for feeding persons being held in lock-ups, Gomes advanced that the diet of those caged in police lock-ups across the island was inhumane.
"That's not nutritionally adequate. When you starve a man, what you are doing is torturing him," stressed Gomes, who is a medical doctor. Gomes was flabbergasted by the minuscule budgetary allocation. "I can't imagine ... . That's $1,000-plus, or $2,000 for the year (per person). I was not expecting those figures. That sounds completely inhumane," she said.
Gomes told our news team that her organisation had received serious complaints about the quality of the food and how the persons deprived of their liberty are forced to eat it.
She revealed that persons held in lock-ups very often have to eat with their hands or make-shift-utensils made from styrofoam.
"You get a box lunch and you have to eat it with your hands, or make a spoon with the lid," Gomes revealed.