PRISON REFORM TRUST NEWS RELEASE

17 FEBRUARY 2003
EMBARGOED 00.01 TUESDAY FEBRUARY 18

Speaking today in response to the HM Chief Inspector of Prisons report on HMP Holloway , Juliet Lyon, Director of the Prison Reform Trust said:

“The women’s prison population has increased dramatically in recent years. This report raises questions, not only about whether Holloway can hold women in decent, safe conditions, but about why we still incarcerate severely mentally ill women, those in urgent need of drug treatment and vulnerable girls when they could, and should, be treated in secure health settings, drug treatment programmes and specialist local authority provision.”

She added:

“The Government has become locked in a policy of imprisonment when it should be driving forward its own strategy to reduce the use of custodial remand, respond to the mental health and drug treatment needs of women who offend, develop a range of effective community sentences as well as smaller units closer to women’s homes, and improve chances of resettlement. Surely a flawed institution like Holloway cannot be its only solution to preventing offending by women?”

NOTES FOR EDITORS:

1. 17 February 2002, there were 4,277  women in prison, out of a population of 71,869. This is an increase of 174  per cent in the last ten years. Ten years ago, in 1993, the average female prison population was 1,561.  Five years ago, in 1997, it was 2,680. 

2. Around 11,000 women are received into prison each year. England and Wales imprisons 0.019 per cent of the general female population aged 15 and over, the third highest rate in the European Union, behind Portugal and Spain.

3. In 2001 just over 12 per cent were sentenced for violent offences (violence against the person, sexual offences and robbery). The average custodial sentence (excluding those on life sentences) was 10.4 months

4. Remand prisoners make up over 20 per cent of the female prison population. Of these 64 per cent do not receive a custodial sentence and one in five is acquitted altogether.

5. 51% of women are reconvicted within 2 years of release from prison. 

6.  In all, 25 per cent of women in prison are from black and minority ethnic backgrounds, and 15 per cent are foreign nationals.

7. The rapid rise in the female prison population has led to an increased need for accommodation for women.  HMP Downview and HMP Buckley Hall were both re-roled from men’s prisons to women’s prisons during 2001, causing disruption to the men who had been held there and concerns about the appropriateness of the facilities, and the level of staff training and experience in working with women.

8. Women are held at great distances from home, family and relevant services.  The majority are in prison for non-violent offences, they have fewer previous convictions than men and a lower rate of reconviction.

9. Women in prison have many of the characteristics of social exclusion.  According to research quoted in the Social Exclusion Unit’s recently published report ‘Reducing re-offending by ex-prisoners’ (July 2002), 15 per cent of sentenced women prisoners had previously been admitted to a psychiatric hospital, 37 per cent had previously attempted suicide, around 40 per cent could be diagnosed as harmful or dependent users of drugs, as many as half have been victims of domestic violence and up to a third have been the victims of sexual offence.  Only 39 per cent of women in prison have any qualifications at all, compared with 82 per cent of the general population, and significantly less than the figure for male prisoners of 51 per cent.  Around one-third of women prisoners lose their homes, and often their possessions, whilst in prison.

10. Women prisoners are often inadequately prepared for release.  Only 24 per cent of women with a prior skill had the chance to put their skills into practice through prison work.  Just 11 per cent of women received help with housing matters whilst in prison.  Home Office research has found that 41 per cent of women in prison did not have accommodation arranged on release, despite the fact that having stable accommodation is key to achieving paid employment and effective resettlement.  Only a third of women prisoners who wanted help and advice about benefits and debt received it.  According to Home Office research, just 9 per cent of female prisoners expected to take jobs on release.  This was partly because a higher proportion than male prisoners said they were not looking for work as they would be looking after the home or family or had a long term illness or disability.

11.  Each year over 13,000 children are separated from their mother by imprisonment. A Home Office study of a large sample of imprisoned women and mothers published in 1997 found that 60 per cent of female prisoners had dependent children under the age of 18. Another smaller but more recent study of women prisoners and their work in custody published in 2000 found broadly similar results. Out of a sample of 567 sentenced women, 66 per cent had dependent children under the age of 18.

12. HM Prisons Inspectorate has found that 25 per cent of women prisoners stated that their children’s father or a spouse or partner was caring for their children; 25 per cent were cared for by their grandmothers; 29 per cent were cared for by other family members or friends and 12 per cent were in care, with foster parents or had been adopted. 

13. Just 5 per cent of women prisoners’ children remain in their own home once their mother has been sentenced.

14.  Many women in prison are held a long way from their homes, making visits from families difficult.  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.