SCOTTISH PRISONS: INMATE MOTHERS TO KEEP CHILDREN

Commenting today on the decision by the Scottish Prison Service to extend to five years old the age at which children can remain with their imprisoned mothers, Kimmett Edgar, Research Manager at the Prison Reform Trust, said:

The decision by the Scottish Prison Service to extend the age at which children can stay with their mothers in prison up to five years old is by definition an experiment. We cannot know in advance what effects it will have on the children to grow up in a prison environment. While cautiously welcoming the idea, the Prison Reform Trust believes that prison is too often needlessly imposed on women who are not violent or serious offenders and who could be supervised in the community. The Scottish Executive has made a public commitment to reduce the number of women in prison, whereas in England and Wales, over 17,700 children a year are separated from their mothers by imprisonment.

Dr Kimmett Edgar
Research Manager

* Figures are not collected centrally on the number of women in prison who are mothers. PRT estimates that each year more than 17,700 children are separated from their mother by imprisonment. This figure is calculated on the basis of a Home Office research finding that 66 per cent of female prisoners are mothers and that on average each mother in prison has 2.1 children. In 2002, nearly 12,650 women were received into prison.

* At the end of 2002, half of all women in prison were held more than 50 miles from their home town and a quarter were held more than 100 miles away. A Home Office study found that only half the women who had lived with their children or been in contact prior to imprisonment had received a visit since going to prison.

* On 31st March 2004, there were 1,007 women on remand, 18 per cent of the female prison population. But they account for nearly two-thirds of the women who enter prison custody in a year.

* More women were sent to prison in 2002 for shoplifting than any other crime.  Just over 2,700 women were received into custody for this offence. They accounted for nearly a third of all women sentenced to immediate custody in 2002.