Women Ex-offenders

Justice shown blindfold is a potent symbol of the principle of everyone being treated equally under the law. Yet for a woman, to serve a custodial sentence has a far greater impact than for her male counterpart. Even-handedness does not lead to equitable treatment.

Even though the number of women in prison is rising, women still make up a small proportion of the prison population (around 5%). Women are likely to serve shorter sentences with three quarters of women prisoners serving sentences of less than 12 months. Yet the impact of even a short custodial sentence on a woman can be very damaging and the social costs high, not only for her, but her family too.

Many women have caring responsibilities before entering prison. 20% are lone parents, over half have children under 16 years old, while a third of mothers in prison have a child under five. Most men in prison have partners looking after their children and keeping the home going. A woman who is sent to prison risks not only losing her children, but also her home and all her belongings, creating real practical difficulties for her in attempting to re-establish normal family life on her release. Maintaining contact with her children while in prison can be an insurmountable problem.

There are only 19 women prisons across the country (none in Wales), so the likelihood is that a woman will be many miles from her children, making visits extremely difficult. One recent study found that only half of the women with dependant children had received a visit from them since their imprisonment. The situation for mothers with babies is equally problematic. Only 68 places nation-wide are currently provided in mother and baby units. For the majority of women prisoners a custodial sentence will be the first time they have been separated from their children. Worries about them and their care only add to their anxieties and mental health.

A woman serves her sentence because of her own actions but her children suffer as well. Only 5% of the children of women prisoners are able to remain in their own homes. Too little attention has been paid to the needs of prisoners’ families; the effect on the children of having a mother in prison and the disruption to their lives, with all the social consequences that follow, needs to be taken seriously. Little wonder that women leaving prison face major emotional and practical difficulties in restoring fractured relationships within their families.

Stable housing is a key factor in resettlement, helping women re-establish family links and prevent re-offending. Yet the importance of housing as part of an effective resettlement programme is only just beginning to be acknowledged. The last thing a woman taken in to custody will think about is her housing, yet it is vital that issues around housing are dealt with as soon as her sentence starts.

Prisons are ill equipped to offer specialist housing advice, yet a woman needs to know whether it will be better for her to give up her tenancy immediately, or to maintain it. Doing nothing may result in the woman building up arrears, jeopardising her chances of re-housing on release or saddling her with a crippling burden of debt.

For many women there is no option. Housing benefit is currently only paid for 13 weeks while in prison, so many lose their home and with it all their belongings. No one will pay for storing a house load of possessions, so these are dumped, not infrequently with passport or other means of verification, creating yet another problem for the woman who needs to establish her identity on release in order to gain benefits.

There is no consistency in how women are treated by local authorities on release and few formal cross-authority arrangements. Some are prepared to put a woman on their waiting list while she is in prison, others insist that she can only apply when she comes out. Even if she has dependant children, the local authority is likely to treat her as single where the children are in care, while social services will not allow her children back until she has suitable accommodation for them. So she finds herself in a vicious circle, perhaps in unsuitable temporary accommodation, back in her old haunts, where the temptations for slipping back in to old habits and associates increase the chances of re-offending. The latest regulations under the Homelessness Act adding ex-offenders to the vulnerable category may help ease this situation; but in areas of intense housing demand, such as London, it remains to be seen whether this will have any impact.

It is encouraging that issues about women and the criminal justice system are receiving a wider audience with the publication of the Social Exclusion Unit Report, Reducing re-offending by ex prisoners, and recent comments from high profile personalities as Cherie Blair. We all have a vested interest in seeing crime reduce and our communities made safer places. Women who have served their sentences need to be helped in re-establishing care of their children and through the provision of stable housing to start on the route to constructive resettlement.

Title: Women leaving prison – Are the scales stacked against them?

Author: Elizabeth Clarson

Date: 19 August 2002