Recommendation 10: Guideline content: common background and interviews

The guidelines should proceed on the assumption that the lack of privacy which cell-sharing entails is more likely to be ameliorated if prisoners with a common ethnic and religious background share cells. But that should only be the starting point for the process. All prisoners should be interviewed on their arrival, either in the first night centre or during their induction, to enable them to explain their preferences for the type of prisoner they would prefer to share a cell with.