Prisonomics: Vicky Pryce in conversation with Peter Stanford

In March 2013, economist Vicky Pryce was sentenced to eight months in prison for accepting her ex-husband’s penalty points on her driving licence some ten years earlier.

After a very public trial, she was sent first to Holloway and then to East Sutton Park prison near Maidstone. There, she kept a diary in which she recorded her experiences and her strong views on how the prison system works, especially with regard to how it treats women.

The result, Prisonomics, provides a compelling analysis of the cost to the economy, as well as the human cost, of keeping women in prison. It examines both the human and financial cost of children having to go into care, family breakdown, education and the difficulty of finding employment once women are released from jail, and offers viable, cost effective alternatives to prison.

In the book, Vicky uses her personal experiences and professional understanding to look at how prison works, and should work, from an economist’s perspective. She has spoken to female prisoners, prison governors and those involved in the education and rehabilitation of women once they leave prison.

Vicky Pryce is an economist, and former Joint head of the United Kingdom’s government economic service. She is the bestselling author of Greekonomics.

Peter Stanford is a journalist and broadcaster. He has written biographies of Lord Longford, C Day-Lewis and the Devil, and has published How To Read A Graveyard. He is director of the Longford Trust for prison reform.

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