Support for Women Leaving Prison

Carolyn Harris Excerpts

Tuesday 9th March 2021 Westminster Hall

[Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered support for women leaving prison.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Charles. When you look at the female prison population, you are faced with the stark reality that, for the most part, it is nurture, not nature, that has led these women down the path they are following: a path of destruction; a path that embodies a lack of self-worth; a path that has been created for them by life experiences and subsequent complex needs.

Nearly 60% of women who come into contact with the criminal justice system are survivors of domestic violence, and more than half report having received emotional, physical or sexual abuse during childhood. Both of these figures are likely to be underestimates. If we add issues such as poverty and addiction to that, we can start to see the full picture of how past trauma leads to crime, conviction and imprisonment.

I could talk—and I have talked—at great length about the need for alternatives to prison for many women in the first place. The female offender strategy gave me a sense of real hope that more would be done to advocate for women’s centres, with the emphasis on supporting and rehabilitating women in a more constructive setting. In the strategy, the Government signalled a commitment to a new programme of work for female offenders, driven by three priorities: early intervention, an emphasis on community-based solutions, and an aim to make custody as effective and decent as possible for those women who have to be there.

I was therefore shocked and disappointed by the Ministry of Justice’s announcement earlier this year of 500 new prison places for women, at a cost of £150 million, particularly when co-funding for women’s centres, which are proven to reduce offending, is being cut.

Today, I want to look at what happens to women when they finish their sentence. What support is available to them to help them rebuild their lives? What more needs to be done to reduce the number of women whose initial conviction becomes a catalyst for a lifetime in the criminal justice system?

I recently met representatives from the Safe Homes for Women Leaving Prison initiative. Shockingly, they told me that over half of all women leaving prison have nowhere safe to go. They walk through the gate with three things: the paltry £46 prison discharge grant, a plastic bag full of belongings, and the threat of recall if they miss their probation appointment. For some, the simple fact that they have been in prison a long way from home means that they have no local connections when they are released. For others, who are victims of abuse, returning to their homes, and consequently the perpetrators, comes at a huge personal risk. Yet what other options are there?

A lack of secure housing is a significant barrier to rehabilitation. According to a report by Her Majesty’s inspectorate of probation, between 2019 and 2020, 65% of men and women who were released from prison without settled accommodation reoffended. Without somewhere to live, the chances of finding employment are minimal and the impact on mental health is devastating. A return to familiar surroundings, harmful behaviour, substance abuse and crime is almost inevitable.

The duty to refer in the Homelessness Reduction Act 2017 is failing vulnerable women leaving prison. The Government must take urgent action to change this and improve the Act’s effectiveness. Although the announcement of dedicated staff to act as brokers for prisoners in order to give them faster access to accommodation on release is welcome, having this resource in only 11 prisons around the country will not come close to solving the problem. These staff need to be placed in every women’s prison in the country and be fully trained to address the challenges faced by women when they leave prison.

Likewise, the new pilot announced by the Government of temporary basic accommodation for prison leavers at risk of homelessness does not go far enough. It has been launched in only five of the 12 probation regions in England and Wales. It is limited to a maximum of 12 weeks’ accommodation and does not address the particular needs of women at all. This needs to be a national scheme that takes into account the specific issues faced by vulnerable women with complex needs and offers safe and secure permanent accommodation to enable them to achieve resettlement and rehabilitation.

Leaving prison should be the chance for a new beginning, but the way things stand, it is just the start of another battle for many women—a battle to find somewhere safe to live, to get a job, to stay clean and to not reoffend. It is a battle to avoid being recalled, because that £46 was just not enough for a fresh start.

Will the Minister look again at the Government’s commitments in the female offender strategy? Will they make commitments to take an approach that addresses vulnerability, follows the evidence about what works in supporting them to turn their lives around and treats them as individuals of value? Will he consider what could be done to improve women’s life chances on release, be it an uplift in the prison discharge grant; a pledge to look again at additional prison places, given that it is clear that women’s centres provide better outcomes; extending dedicated support across the whole female justice estate to help with accommodation before release; making available guaranteed accommodation for all those leaving who are at risk of homelessness; or perhaps all these things?

We know that the majority of women with convictions have experienced trauma. We have all heard the harrowing stories of abuse, addiction, coercion, and self-deprivation that have led these women to commit crimes in the first place. We need a system that supports their rehabilitation and offers them freedom from the past, to help them avoid recall and allow them to choose a different path; not a system that is set up for failure from the very start.

If we are to see an end to this injustice, so much more needs to be done to offer women the support and tools they need to build themselves a better future. I talk to very many women who started on this vicious journey because of the environment in which they lived. I have met women whose original crime was not having a TV licence. Unable to pay the associated fine, they ended up in prison. I have met women whose children refused to go to school. Again, unable to pay the fine, their punishment was prison. When they are released they have lost their family, their home and their dignity. They now live on the streets, and too many are working the streets and financing the pimps and the drug dealers. We have to break this cycle. The Government must act now to prevent this cycle of inevitability.

--- Later in debate ---

[Carolyn Harris]

I thank all Members for their contributions—I am pleased to see so many people here. I came to this debate feeling really apprehensive about the subject—it is something I have sleepless nights about. I am leaving terrified at the prospect of 20,000 extra police on the streets spending a large proportion of their time filling 500 spaces for women in prisons in order to justify the money that the Government have spent on this. That is certainly not what we need to be doing. We need to provide a different service for women. We need to recognise the fact that women have specific needs. They are in large part victims, despite the fact that they have been labelled as criminals. Most of them are victims of society and, I am afraid to say, victims of this Government’s disinterest in providing anything for them.

We have to stop perpetuating the cycle of criminality and incarceration, criminality and incarceration. We have a moral duty to provide sustainable, productive, appropriate and holistic support and to encourage these women to be productive and to re-engage with society. That is a far better way of using taxpayers’ money than freeing up spaces in prisons. We have to be more humane in the way that we provide for these vulnerable and all too often exploited individuals. That is where we need to concentrate our efforts, not on putting them in prisons. I ask the Minister to please rethink the strategy. Too many women will lose their life, dignity, children, families and homes. We cannot perpetuate this any longer.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered support for women leaving prison.

Oral Answers to Questions

Carolyn Harris Excerpts

Monday 14th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Priti Patel]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right to raise the issue of online crime, online abuse and hate crime. Frankly, appalling and personal attacks are now prevalent across society. Associated with that, we have a wide range of engagement taking place, not just with our Department but with the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. That is in line with our review of online harms, and there will be future announcements about that. As the hon. Lady is well aware, legislation is coming.

[Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)]

The rail to refuge scheme run by the train operators is highly successful in supporting victims of domestic abuse and their children, but it will expire in March 2021. Will the Government please look at reviewing the scheme to ensure that they protect all victims?

[Victoria Atkins]

This is a really interesting scheme. As the hon. Lady knows, it was launched in March and, since then, on average four people a day have used it. I understand that early in 2021 the Department for Transport will review its continuation beyond March. I hope that, as with all our departmental questions, the message to victims of domestic abuse is clear: in the pandemic they can still leave their homes if they need to seek help.

Oral Answers to Questions

Carolyn Harris Excerpts

Monday 9th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)]

The Centre for Social Justice report “It Still Happens Here” estimates that 90,000 victims of modern slavery went unidentified under the previous lockdown. Under the second lockdown, what proactive steps will the Government take to identify, rescue and protect victims of modern slavery?

[Priti Patel]

I thank the hon. Lady for her really important question. She is right about the report published by the Centre for Social Justice. I am acutely aware, as are officials across the Department, of the scale of modern-day slavery. Much of it is underground, in the black economy, where people are captured and put into bonded labour. There is extensive work taking place in the Home Office and with law enforcement, and I would be very happy to share some of that work with the hon. Lady.

Children and Domestic Abuse

Carolyn Harris Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd March 2020 Westminster Hall

[Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Blaydon (Liz Twist) on securing this important debate and on her wonderful advocacy of her constituent Christine.

It is welcome news that the Domestic Abuse Bill has returned to the House. As the Bill has only been published in the last couple of hours, I have not had a chance to familiarise myself with all of the changes, but it is up to us all to ensure that the Bill is robust, makes rapid progress through Parliament and that the new legislation is in place to protect victims as soon as possible. That includes the sometimes hidden victims of domestic abuse —the children. Some children may be living in homes where they are victims of physical, emotional or even sexual violence. For others, the psychological effects of seeing a parent suffering abuse can be just as damaging. All children who experience domestic abuse, be it as a victim or as a witness, must have protected places on all NHS waiting lists, including for mental health services. Likewise, they should be given priority access to school places if required, to give them parity with looked-after children. We must ensure that child victims of domestic abuse, who already face huge upheaval in their lives, do not experience unnecessary additional disruption or trauma.

We must also look at the role of the family courts in domestic abuse cases. I am pleased that the new enhanced Bill includes a wider ban on cross-examination of victims, but I have heard too many first-hand accounts of incidents in which the courts have let down the children they should be there to protect—incidents in which the safety and wellbeing of young people is overshadowed by the rights of perpetrators. No one who is awaiting trial, on bail or facing ongoing criminal proceedings for domestic abuse-related offences should be permitted unsupervised contact with their children. Family courts need to be accountable for prioritising the physical safety and emotional wellbeing of all the vulnerable young people they are there to protect.

We must also consider children in families with no recourse to public funds. There has been much discussion about migrant women with insecure immigration status, who struggle to find protection from domestic abuse. I understand that the Government have begun a review of what support can be provided, but those women and their children need urgent action. In addition, teenagers in abusive relationships all too often are not considered to be victims of domestic abuse, but they are.

We must never lose sight of how big an impact domestic abuse can have on children, both at the time of the experience and in the future. Although physical injuries may heal, the emotional and psychological effects of being a victim or a witness last a lifetime. I welcome the introduction of the Bill and eagerly await details of its Second Reading and Committee stage. The Bill is long overdue; we must not delay any longer. Protection for those affected by domestic abuse desperately needs to be brought into legislation. Survivors want to see it happen, victims need to see it happen, and the innocent, vulnerable children who are caught up in it all deserve to see it happen.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

The Minister has oodles of time to respond, but if she brings her remarks to a conclusion by 5.27 pm, that will give Liz Twist time to sum up the debate.

Oral Answers to Questions

Carolyn Harris Excerpts

Monday 10th February 2020 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

One of the most significant deterrents that we think will be available to us is differential sentencing. A judge, on giving a sentence to somebody who is involved in county lines, can already take into act culpability factors, such as the use of children. My hon. Friend will be pleased to hear that the Sentencing Council is currently reviewing those guidelines, and we hope and believe that the most severe penalties will be meted out to those who exploit children in this way.

[Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)]

With no statutory definition of “child criminal exploitation”, different safeguarding agencies and police forces understand the risks differently, but county lines exploitation is everywhere. In order to comply with Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary’s recommendation that we need a unified definition in law of child criminal exploitation, when can we expect such an announcement so that we truly safeguard these child victims?

[Kit Malthouse]

The co-ordination of the effort across Government and indeed, across all the arms of government, including local government, will be one of the primary tasks of the new Cabinet committee that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has established. The hon. Lady is right that dealing with this phenomenon, which spans force and local authority boundaries, will take a united and concerted approach, and we will be doing so over the next few weeks.