Now calling criminals ‘convicts’ is offensive: Prison service tells warders to drop the phrase ‘ex-con’ and instead call them ‘persons with lived experience’

Prison officers have been ordered to stop calling criminals ‘convicts’ on the grounds it is ‘offensive’. Civil servants at the Prison Service headquarters have also instructed warders to drop the phrase ‘ex-con’ for former prisoners – and refer to them as ‘persons with lived experience’ or ‘prison leavers’. Comment: ‘Prison leavers’, LOL. The edict has left staff shaking their heads – at a time when jails are suffering from record overcrowding and their colleagues are leaving in droves.