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Saturdays differ from every other day of the week because you’re not supplied with a plastic bag containing breakfast the night before when you queue for supper. At 9 am your cell door is opened and you go down to the canteen for a cooked breakfast – egg, beans and chips. I accept the egg and beans, and wonder how many Saturdays it will be before I’m willing to add the chips.
10.00 am
I’m given the choice of taking exercise in the yard, or remaining banged-up in my cell. I sign up for exercise.
On the first two circuits of the yard I’m joined by a group of drug dealers who ask me if I need anything, from marijuana to crack cocaine to heroin. It takes them some time to accept that I’ve never taken a drug in my life, and don’t intend to start now.
‘We do a lot of business with your lot,’ one of them adds casually.
I would like to have replied, ‘And I hope you rot in jail for the rest of your life,’ but didn’t have the guts.
The next inmate to join me is a hot-gospeller who hopes that while I’m in Belmarsh I’ll discover Christ. I explain that I consider one’s religion to be a personal and private matter, but thank him for his concern. He isn’t quite that easy to shake off and sticks with me for five more circuits: unlike a visit from a Jehovah’s Witness, there’s no way of slamming the front door.
I hope to manage a few circuits on my own so I can think for a moment, but no such luck because I’m joined by a couple of East End tearaways who want my opinion on their upcoming court case. I warn them that my knowledge of the law is fairly sketchy, so perhaps I’m the wrong person to approach. One of them becomes abusive, and for the first time since arriving at Belmarsh, I’m frightened and fearful for my own safety. Paul has already warned me that there might well be the odd prisoner who would stick a knife in me just to get himself on the front pages and impress his girlfriend.
Within moments, Billy Little and Fletch are strolling a pace behind me, obviously having sensed the possible danger, and although the two young hooligans are not from our spur, one look at Fletch and they are unlikely to try anything. The tearaways peel off, but I have a feeling they will hang around and bide their time. Perhaps it would be wise for me to avoid
the exercise yard for a couple of days.
I’m finally joined by a charming young black prisoner, who wants to tell me about his drumming problem. It takes another couple of circuits before I realize that he doesn’t play in a rock band; drumming is simply slang for burglary. I consider this particular experience a bit of a watershed. If you didn’t know what ‘drumming’ was before you began reading this diary, you’re probably as naive as I am. If you did, these scribblings may well be commonplace.
12 noon
Lunch. I am now a fully fledged vegetarian. Outside of prison I founded a club known as VAF and VOP, which many of my friends have become members of after sending a donation to the Brompton Hospital.* VAF is ‘vegetarian at functions’. I have long believed that it is impossible, even in the best-run establishments, to prepare three hundred steaks as each customer would wish them cooked, so I always order the vegetarian alternative because I know it will have been individually prepared. VOP stands for ‘vegetarian on planes’. I suspect many of you are already members of this club, and if you are, pay up and send your five pounds to the Brompton Hospital immediately. I am now adding VIP to my list, and can only hope that none of you ever qualify for membership.
2.00 pm
The cell door is opened and I am told that Ms Roberts wants to see me. I feel my heart pounding as I try to recall her exact words the previous evening.
When I join her in a room just off the bubble, she immediately confirms that my solicitors have been in touch, and she has told them that she wants me out of Belmarsh as quickly as possible. She adds that they moved Barry George (murder of Jill Dando) this morning, and I’m due out next. However, she has just received a phone call from a chief inspector in the Metropolitan Police, to warn her that they have received a letter from the Baroness Emma Nicholson, demanding an inquiry into what happened to the £57 million I raised for the Kurds.
I assure Ms Roberts that I was in no way involved with the receiving or distribution of any monies for the Kurds, as that was entirely the responsibility of the Red Cross. She nods.
‘If the police confirm that they will not be following up Ms Nicholson’s inquiry, then we should have you out of Belmarsh and off to a D-cat by the end of the week.’
As I have always in the past believed in justice, I assume that the police will quickly confirm that I was not involved in any way.
Ms Roberts goes on to confirm that Ford, my first choice, is unwilling to take me because of the publicity problem, but she hopes to discuss some alternatives with me on Monday.
Ms Roberts suggests that as my next lecture is coming up on Thursday, I should be released from my cell from nine in the morning until five in the afternoon, so I can prepare for the talk in the library where I will have access to reference books. She knows only too well that I can give this talk without a moment’s preparation but, unlike the Baroness Nicholson, she is concerned about what I’m going through.
4.00 pm
Association. During the Saturday afternoon break, I go down to the ground floor, hoping to watch some cricket on the TV, but I have to settle for horse racing as a large number of prisoners are already sitting round the set intent on following the King George and Queen Elizabeth Stakes at Epsom. The sport of kings has never been one of those pastimes that I’ve taken a great deal of interest in. I’ve long accepted George Bernard Shaw’s maxim on horse racing, that it’s nothing more than a plot between the upper classes and the lower classes to fleece the middle classes. I turn away from the television and see a slight, rather anaemic-looking young man standing alone in the corner. He’s wearing a raspberry-coloured tracksuit, the official garb of prisoners who do not have their own clothes. I’ve not come across him before, but he looks a most unlikely murderer. I stroll across to join Fletch, who I feel confident will know exactly who he is.
‘He’s got twenty-one days for shoplifting,’ Fletch tells me, ‘and has a mental age of about eleven’ He pauses. ‘They should never have sent him to Belmarsh in the first place.’
‘Then why put him on the lifers’ wing?’ I ask.
‘For his own protection,’ says Fletch. ‘He was attacked in the yard during exercise this afternoon, and some other cons continued to bully him when he returned to Block Two. He’s only got nine more days left to serve so they’ve put him in my cell.’ Now I understand why there are two beds in Fletch’s cell, as I suspect this is not an unusual solution for someone in distress.
One of the phones becomes free – a rare occurrence – so I take advantage of it and call Mary in Grantchester. She’s full of news, including the fact that the former head of the prison service, Sir David Ramsbotham, has written to The Times saying it was inappropriate to send me to prison – community service would have been far more worthwhile. She tells me she also has a sackful of letters talking about the iniquity of the judge’s summing-up – not to mention the sentence – and she’s beginning to wonder if there might be the possibility of a retrial. I think not. Mr Justice Potts has retired, and the last thing the establishment would want to do is embarrass him.
After thirty-seven years of marriage I know Mary so well that I can hear the strain of the last few weeks in her voice. I recall Ms Roberts’ words the first time we met: ‘It can be just as traumatic for your immediate family on the outside, as it is for you on the inside.’ My two-pound BT phonecard is about to run out, but not before I tell her that she’s a veritable Portia and I am no Brutus.
The moment I put the phone down, I find another lifer, Colin (GBH), standing by my side. He wants to have a word about his application to do an external degree at Ruskin College, Oxford. I have already had several chats with Colin, and he makes an interesting case study. In his youth (he’s now thirty-five), he was a complete wastrel and tearaway, which included a period of being a professional football hooligan. In fact, he has written a fascinating piece on the subject, in which he now admits that he is ashamed of what he got up to. Colin has been in and out of jail for most of his adult life, and even when he’s inside, he feels it is nothing less than his duty to take the occasional swing at a prison officer. This always ends with a spell in segregation and time being added to his sentence. On one occasion he even lost a couple of teeth, which you can’t miss whenever he grins.
‘That’s history,’ he tells me, because he now has a purpose. He wants to leave prison with a degree, and qualifications that will ensure he gets a real job. There is no doubt about his ability. Colin is articulate and bright, and having read his essays and literary criticism, I have no doubt that if he wants to sit for a degree, it’s well within his grasp. And this is a man who couldn’t read or write before he entered prison. I have a real go at him, assuring him that he’s clever enough to take a degree and to get on with it. I start pummelling him on the chest as if he was a punch bag. He beams over to the duty officer seated behind the desk at the far end of the room.
