Agenda item 2 is a one-off evidence session on the implementation of the recommendations of the commission on women offenders. I welcome Michael Matheson, the Cabinet Secretary for Justice. I also welcome Colin McConnell, the chief executive of the Scottish Prison Service, and the Scottish Government officials: Andy Bruce, the deputy director of the community justice division, and Jane Moffat, from the community justice division. I believe that the cabinet secretary wishes to make an opening statement.
I am pleased to be able to join the committee this morning to discuss the implementation of the recommendations in the report by the commission on women offenders.
Achieving better life outcomes for women who get caught up in the criminal justice system and reducing the female prison population are important aspects of the Government’s social justice agenda. As the committee will be aware, this is the third progress report since Dame Elish Angiolini reported in April 2012, and I am pleased to say that significant progress has been made. The committee will, no doubt, wish to ask questions about the detail of that work. As pleased as we are with the progress that has been made, however, there is still much to be done particularly to divert women at an early stage in their involvement with the criminal justice system and to get an integrated approach from all the mainstream services that women need to help them to change their lives for the better and live a life that involves not offending.
Last week, I visited one of the one-stop-shop women’s centres that we have created—the tomorrow’s women Glasgow centre. I spent time there with the multidisciplinary team and some of the women who use the centre. I was very impressed with how collaboratively the team is working and how much of a positive difference the centre is making to the lives of some of the most vulnerable people in our community.
However, looking ahead, we need to get better alignment between community justice planning and provision and wider community planning partnership activity. That is why I announced yesterday that one of the key features of the future model for community justice will be the local strategic planning and delivery of community justice services through our community planning partnerships.
I am conscious of the fact that the committee will want to discuss the report in more detail, and I am more than happy to respond to any questions that the committee may have.
You have just won friends, cabinet secretary, by making a very brief opening statement.
Good morning, cabinet secretary. I do not know whether you have had sight of the report by the Howard League for Penal Reform. It is very critical of the direction that the Government is taking in replacing Cornton Vale with what seems to be a large prison, which is contrary to the recommendation of the Angiolini commission report that we have a smaller, specialised prison for women who are serving statutory defined long-term sentences and who present a significant risk. Would you like to comment on that?
I am aware of the Howard League’s view, and I met its representatives last week to discuss the matter with them in more detail. A significant amount of planning is being undertaken by the SPS into the development of a new women and young offenders institution in Inverclyde. I intend to take the opportunity to understand all the different aspects that feed into our thinking about the future shape of that facility before any final decision is made on the matter. That will include looking at its size as well as the model and approach that we will choose.
I do not necessarily accept the Howard League’s interpretation of the SPS’s proposal as going against the commission’s report. The commission recommended a hub-and-spoke approach, and the facility in Inverclyde will not only be a national facility; there will be a regional facility there, too. We also have the new regional facility for women offenders up in Grampian, at the new prison there, and we are at the final stage of planning a new women’s facility at Her Majesty’s Prison Edinburgh. Therefore, I am very much of the view that we are taking the hub-and-spoke approach that was recommended by the commission.
On the final configuration—the size of the hub and so on—I want to take a wee bit of time to understand all the various dynamics that feed into that before I come to any final decision on what approach we should take going forward.
The recommendation certainly was for a hub-and-spoke approach. The Angiolini commission reflected what the Equal Opportunities Committee said in its report, which was welcomed and well received by the Government. However, it is a question of size. The hub seems to be much bigger than expected—almost bigger than the existing facility at Cornton Vale—and the spokes were supposed to be modelled more on the 218 centre, with that kind of facility being replicated throughout the country. That is where the disparity lies.
I do not think that there is a difference of view around our wanting to reduce our female prisoner population. At present, our female prisoner population is too high and I want to see further measures that will assist us in reducing the female prisoner population in Scotland, which has almost doubled over the past 10 to 15 years. I also want to ensure that female offenders who are in prison are in an environment that is suitable for them. It must be humane and provide the right support and conditions that will help them to address their offending behaviour and prevent their offending again. That has to take place within a modern estate, and we know that Cornton Vale is not a suitable environment for that at the present time.
It is worth keeping in mind that around 75 per cent of female offenders who receive a custodial sentence receive a sentence of only a short period. The primary focus of the hub-and-spoke approach is to ensure that, for example, women offenders in the north of Scotland who are serving a short sentence or who are on remand go to HMP Grampian. Similar women offenders in the east will go to HMP Edinburgh, once that is established, and in the west—which is where the largest number of them come from—they will go to the regional facility in Inverclyde. The national facility will be for those—
What will happen to those in the south? Two of us on the committee represent Borders constituencies.
They would probably go to either the unit in the west or the unit in the east. That hub-and-spoke approach reflects the proposals that were outlined in the Angiolini commission’s report. The final determination of the size of the facility will be based on what I think about the projections going forward, how much we believe we can reduce our female prisoner population and what I think is in the best interests of meeting the on-going needs of our female prisoner population.
There is no difference between the view of the Howard League and that of the Scottish Government about our desire to reduce the size of the female prisoner population. Whatever the decision is at Inverclyde—if, for example, the decision is to go with the existing proposal—it will in no way reflect any lack of determination on our part to see a reduction in the size of our female prison population. The important thing is that the facility that is developed is flexible enough to reflect that change, as we start to see that reduction in the years to come.
I am glad that the issue is being looked at, especially to see whether the geographical placing of prisoners nearer home—which is welcome—reflects the kind of service that could be expected in a 218-type centre.
You said that it is important that women prisoners are in the right environment. Will you update the committee on progress on dealing with women with mental health problems?
We have undertaken work with the ministerial group on offender reintegration, which I was involved in as part of my previous ministerial responsibility. The issue is very complex because of its multi-agency nature: it involves health, housing and other support services, including mental health services.
We identified that work was needed to ensure that female prisoners could access the right psychological support and the mental health services that they may require. A recommendation that has come from the group and our national prisoner health network is that a review should be undertaken of the way in which we deliver psychological therapies—they are now delivered by the national health service—in the prison estate and how that can be improved. We expect to receive a report from the national prisoner health network by June next year on how we can improve the delivery of mental health services in the prison estate.
At present, serious violent male offenders go to Carstairs. Is there anywhere similar in Scotland that can deal with violent female prisoners with severe mental health problems?
Risk assessments regarding a prisoner’s nature and their needs are undertaken. Colin McConnell will explain how the prison service manages women who have complex mental health issues.
We discussed the Inverclyde facility. The SPS proposes to have a facility at Inverclyde that can better manage female prisoners who have complex mental health conditions and who may require more support and assistance than we can provide presently.
I ask Colin McConnell to outline in a bit more detail how we manage those individuals in the SPS.
Thank you, cabinet secretary.
Margaret Mitchell hit the nail on the head when she referred to particular or acute needs. Our close working relationship with the NHS is developing as we move along day to day. For the most part, as far as possible, men or women who are in custody in the circumstances that you described get access to quality of care and treatment that is at least equivalent to what you would find in the community.
However, you and I would probably agree that those who are sent to custody who present with extreme or extraordinary conditions are quite unique. It is probably not in my bailiwick to comment on whether facilities exist in every circumstance to meet every need, but I can tell you that we have relationships with facilities in England and Wales, so we look at the issue on a national basis.
A recent case was Tertia Kidd at Cornton Vale, who had experienced difficulties over a long time. Tertia was prepared to work with us—some others are not—so it was not a case of looking for somewhere such as the male facility at Carstairs. We looked more widely at what would be the appropriate facility for that individual. Tertia went to Rampton hospital, I think, which was quite appropriate.
There is a challenge for us all to ensure that, as far as possible, we can address individual needs as they arise. We must recognise that extreme needs are probably best dealt with case by case and by looking broadly at where the opportunities to address those needs are.
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I have a brief supplementary question about NHS Lothian, which is carrying out a pilot that was referred to when I last asked about mental health generally. Some of the tests that have been done in that pilot, which is halfway through its two years, might be good to look at for women prisoners. Do you have any feedback on that?
Is that the mentalisation programme?
Yes.
Mentalisation-based therapy for those who have attachment problems was initially piloted at Cornton Vale. It is about interpreting the person’s behaviour in relation to others, which perhaps touches on some of the issues that affected Tertia in her day-to-day life.
A two-year pilot is on-going in Edinburgh and some positive indications are coming out that perhaps mentalisation-based therapy will have some application not just in custody, but in the community. With regard to the discussions that we are having here, that integration is undoubtedly the way to go forward.
On application in the community, we have the willow centre in Edinburgh and the multidisciplinary team is linked to prison staff. The plan is to transfer that knowledge from the prison back to the community, so that workers who support individuals understand the basics of communicating with people with borderline personality disorders and continue the good work that started in the custodial environment.
An important part of improving the way in which mental health services are delivered is the linkage between community-based and prison-based services. Some aspects of our national mental health strategy recognise that, with regard to our prison population. The strategy period concludes next year, 2015, and we are already engaged in looking at how we can build some of the prison aspects into the process much more effectively, to improve that linkage. That is why we commissioned some of the work to review the delivery of mental health services in prisons by the summer of next year, to feed into the process.
We will move on. Colin McConnell said that there are a number of women in special circumstances for whom orthodox prison, as it were, is not appropriate, and that other facilities have to be found to deal with them. Can you give us an idea of the numbers involved?
In my time in the SPS there has been only one—Tertia Kidd. Tertia’s history expands over a number of years, not just in custody but in the community.
It is useful to know how often such cases occur.
Cabinet secretary, my question follows something that Margaret Mitchell said regarding the recommendation that Cornton Vale should be replaced by a smaller specialist unit. Some sheriffs said that they sent women to Cornton Vale because there was a dearth of appropriate places in the community for the women: there was no alternative.
I will just float this idea: unless, things change in the community, is there a possibility that all these super-duper new facilities and arrangements in prison that tie up with the NHS will make a custodial disposal more likely for women?
I do not accept the idea that if you build a facility that has so many places in it, you will fill it. Polmont is an example of that. It has undergone major refurbishment and is now a state-of-the-art facility for young offenders, but the numbers there have been decreasing. A range of different measures have been taken on alternatives to custody, et cetera, which has made an important contribution to that reduction. Therefore, I do not accept that if you create facilities, sheriffs will just fill them. However, I accept the point, which is the key to your question, that if there is no shrieval confidence in and knowledge of the community alternatives, sheriffs will tend to just give custodial sentences—although I accept that it is not quite as simple as that.
A big part of the work that we have been doing since we received the commission’s report has been to ensure that we not only improve the quality of alternative sentences and support mechanisms in the community but offer a greater range to reflect local needs. I fully accept that an important part of our approach to reducing the population of women offenders in prison is making sure that we have good-quality, sustainable and accessible alternatives and support mechanisms in the community. That goes without saying. However, it is extremely difficult to assess whether providing X in the community will result in Y of a reduction in the prison population. I do not think that anyone has cracked that yet, because it is very difficult to measure. Very often, the impact is found out through experience, rather than our being able to model what the result will be.
That is part of the challenge around making a decision on Inverclyde. We are seeing improvements in the way in which alternatives and support mechanisms are provided in the community, but at this stage it is still difficult to tell what impact that will have on the female prison population in future years. We anticipate that we will see a reduction in that population, but until we see it, it is difficult to plan on that basis, given the lead-in time for building a prison and the facilities that go with it.
I fully accept that the quality and standard of what is available in the community, and confidence in it, are absolutely key to supporting us in working to reduce the female prison population in Scotland. The committee identified a number of years ago that shrieval confidence was key to making sure that we see that change in attitude towards alternatives.
Are there any specific proposals that will give confidence to the bench that there are viable alternatives in the community that are commensurate with the welcome good facilities for those who require to be in custody? None of us wants to see anyone incarcerated who can be dealt with in the community.
As we outlined in the annual report, we have been taking forward a range of things. The tomorrow’s women Glasgow project, which I visited last week, is a very good example of a project that is helping to make a difference by reducing the risk of women reoffending. It is joining up and integrating services in a collective way. The team in the centre comprises not just social work but housing, the police and the prison service, which has staff seconded to it. They are all working in partnership to try to reduce reoffending among the women who are referred to it. In Edinburgh, the willow centre takes a similar approach, as does the centre in Aberdeen.
Other models are being taken forward. In Lanarkshire, the criminal justice social work team has a specific women’s team working with women offenders, testing that model. In some of our rural areas, an outreach approach is taken, which is about helping to support women in their community much more effectively in order to test that approach. What works in Glasgow will not necessarily work in the Highlands, so we need to test different models.
All the work that we are supporting now will help to inform us on the most effective way to support women in the community and to reduce reoffending. An evaluation is being wrapped around all those initiatives to help us to understand better. We will have the results of some of that evaluation work next year, which will allow us to assess the best way forward.
Having just come into the job, I am considering how we can draw that type of work together much more effectively in order to share good practice across the sector. I am starting to develop my early thinking around how we might be able to achieve that on the criminal justice side, given some of my experience of how we went about it on the health side.
We are doing a range of work, using different models and approaches, which we are evaluating and which will all feed into our thinking around how we can work better to reduce reoffending and support women much more effectively in the community.
I just wanted to come in on the back of some of the really useful things that the cabinet secretary has just said. I want to slay the dragon of the suggestion that somehow modern prisons are distinct and disconnected from the community. The direction of travel is increasingly to integrate the custody facilities with the wider approach that the justice community and social justice community takes.
My offer to the committee is the recognition that we should be investing in the custodial estate. You have heard me say before that Scotland should not be embarrassed about having a world-class prison service, because having a series of integrated facilities as part of the overall service is fantastic for the community to have. That touches on some of the issues that Mr Finnie has just raised.
I have one final matter to raise. The phraseology used in the report, which I assume was compiled by your predecessor, cabinet secretary, suggests that a measure of persuasion has been required to get everyone on board with the problem-solving approach in court. Will that be resolved? Will that approach be rolled out further?
I will bring in Andy Bruce, who has been involved in the process. It is a new way of working and that, combined with new approaches, can bring its own challenges. We now have agreement with the sheriff principal in Aberdeen on the establishment of a problem-solving court. We are in the process of working through some of the practicalities of how to take that forward.
We would have hoped to have made a bit more progress on that than we have been able to, but we can now pilot and test out the approach, in agreement with the sheriff principal in Aberdeen. I am confident that that will allow us to look at how that model can be used in other areas, in the same way as we have done with other specialist courts that have been developed in recent years. Once we have tried and tested the process, we can learn from it and look at how the approach can be utilised in the rest of the criminal justice system. Andy Bruce can maybe give you a bit more detail.
John Finnie is absolutely right that it has taken a bit of persuasion. There was a need to explain to local partners what the problem-solving approach was and to build their support for it. As the cabinet secretary said, we have done that. Aberdeen sheriff court will be the target and we have a supportive sheriff principal and an enthusiastic sheriff, who is up for it, and partners in the community will wrap around it. Work is now required to identify the cohort to focus on, which it is likely will cover both women and men. With the female element, there is the chance to link in with the women’s justice centre in Aberdeen, which we fund.
What is the problem-solving approach?
In effect, it frees up the judge so that, rather than being the passive arbiter in proceedings, he or she can get down off the bench and try to join up the services roundabout. I guess that there are similarities with the children’s hearings methodology. It is about freeing up the sheriff’s own problem-solving approach. One of the benefits is that there is continuity—the sheriff will continue to be involved in the person’s case if it comes back again.
Is it like the drugs court, where the same person would come back to the same sheriff?
It is very similar to the drugs court—Sheriff Wood would describe what he does in the Glasgow drugs court as a problem-solving approach.
The centre for justice innovation is expert in this field and is working with us to develop, shape and take forward the approach.
That is fine. Thank you.
Good morning, everybody. I have been involved in work on violence against women and children for a good number of years. It is quite clear to people involved in that area that one of the biggest problems for women prisoners is thinking about their family back at home and their children, particularly when a husband or partner has flown the nest or there is a worry that that might happen.
The commission has suggested using videoconferencing to help with that. However, the chief executive of the Scottish Prison Service said that personal access to those facilities was not available. He went on to say:
“we are not currently planning to provide such access, on the basis that it would have to be well consulted on in order to check out the sensitivities and risks that may be perceived.—[Official Report, Justice Committee, 5 August 2014; c 4782.]
I believe that if we could get this right and keep women in prison in touch with their families in a more meaningful way, it might really help the process and, perhaps, stop people going into depression, taking drugs and all the other things that are associated with these situations. What does the Government feel about that?
10:15
At Cornton Vale, we now have videoconferencing facilities available. They are there for issues relating to access, contact with families, court proceedings and interactions with legal agents. We also have the facilities at HMP Grampian, which is for males and females.
Colin McConnell can talk a bit more about the SPS’s approach to the issue. It is testing out the effectiveness of the facilities and the impact that they can have before we think about rolling them out further in the prison estate in Scotland.
We have made progress on facilities at Cornton Vale and HMP Grampian. I recognise that, particularly at a national facility such as Cornton Vale, enabling children to contact their mothers is an important aspect of what we are doing. There are issues around how that is managed and how the child is supported, as the process can be quite difficult for young children. We have to understand that sort of thing more fully—how we can make as much use as we can of videoconferencing in a way that is appropriate and with the right safeguards in place.
In the general conversation that we were having, Mr Paterson, your comments should be reframed. Every prison in Scotland currently has video facilities that can link with the courts. Some are increasingly linking with agents and, in some cases, some social work locations, but primarily videoconferencing facilities are there to service the courts. That is the first point to make.
Beyond that, if you look at our organisational review or if you ever have the time or the inclination to read some of the speeches that I have been making, you will see that, conceptually or ideologically, there is not a cigarette paper between our positions. What you are describing is an extraordinarily positive direction to be going in. However, I recognise that much of the technology that is already there and which we could use—particularly the social media-related technology—carries with it some risks. Therefore, although, as I say, the direction of travel is undoubtedly towards exploring how we can better connect women with their children and, more broadly, how we can connect those in custody with their families day to day, we have to do so cautiously. In answer to Mr Finnie, the cabinet secretary quite rightly said that the shrieval benches must have confidence in the offer in the community. Similarly, the SPS has to ensure that parliamentarians, the Government and the public can have confidence in the new approaches that we introduce.
If we put everything in context, we can see that the direction of travel is undoubtedly as you describe it. However, we are taking a cautious approach in order to properly explore and build up that confidence.
But you are going in the right direction. That is good. I am pleased to hear that.
Another issue that causes women who are in prison anxiety is the possibility of losing their house or their tenancy while they are in prison. That is an enormous problem. What is the Government doing to minimise that issue, while recognising that housing is a local government matter?
There are a couple of aspects to that. There are women who receive a custodial sentence and then lose their property as a result of not being there. Part of the challenge is to ensure that we make much more effective use of community-based disposals, which reduce the risk of women losing their property in the first place. John Finnie also highlighted the importance of ensuring that we have good-quality community alternative programmes in place to reduce reoffending. Those are important ways of helping to reduce the difficulties that result from a woman losing her property.
The other aspect is the fact that a person’s home can often be their anchor in the local community and, when we liberate someone from prison, it is extremely important that we ensure that they are in a position to go to a home—either their home or somebody else’s—in order to establish themselves back in the community. The ministerial group on reoffending has established a pilot at HMP Perth in order to examine much more effective ways of ensuring that, when individuals are liberated from prison, their housing provision and needs are sorted before they go back into the community. If those things are not sorted out, the danger is that people who are liberated from prison quickly get drawn back into offending behaviour.
We are doing a piece of work on that, and we have commissioned some research across the country to enable us to understand more fully the work and engagement of housing providers and how we can better align the work of the SPS with housing providers’ work on the reintegration of offenders, in order to support the work that we are doing to reduce reoffending rates.
Last week, when I was at the tomorrow’s women centre in Glasgow, I met one of the full-time members of staff, who is from the Glasgow Housing Association. Their job is to work with housing agencies to support the women and help them to get their housing issues addressed. The solution involves being much more integrated in supporting those who go back into the community, while, at the same time, ensuring that we have the right alternatives in the community in order to reduce reoffending and the need for women to go into prison for short-term periods, which can lead to loss of their property and the complications that flow from that. That is why it is important that we continue to take forward work around supporting women in the community.
You will be aware that one of the first things that the 218 project did was to ensure that women there kept their tenancy with the Glasgow Housing Association, which would otherwise automatically be lost. That is terribly important, given that, according to the statistics, 77 per cent of women offenders serve sentences of six months or less. Of course, a woman’s home might be the wrong place for them to return to—for example, the circumstances there might be one of the reasons why she is in prison—but, that aside, the aim that we are talking about is already being tackled, certainly by project 218.
That is exactly the kind of thing that we need to build on. For example, the housing official at the tomorrow’s women centre in Glasgow explained to us that, sometimes, there is a good reason for a woman not to return to a particular property or area. That is not always appreciated by housing officials when they receive a referral for a property for someone who is coming out of prison or is in a particular programme. That is the sort of thing that, by joining up the services much more effectively, the centres can help to address in a better way. We need to continue to develop that.
I think that the committee would support that.
What progress is being made on throughcare and enabling women to be rehabilitated into the community? I am from the south of Scotland, so I am particularly interested in what happens when a woman’s place of incarceration is not near her home. Are there issues to do with support in that regard? Are lessons being learned about how to ensure that throughcare is effective for women whose communities are far from their places of imprisonment?
It is about ensuring that we do more to support such individuals. One aspect that we have been taking forward in that regard is the mentoring service, which involves identifying women who are serving short-term sentences or are on remand and working with them much more effectively to try to achieve better outcomes for them. A range of work is being done; Jane Moffat might be able to give more detail about the service’s impact on the ground.
We are learning that the mentoring programmes that we support, which I think support in the region of 700 women annually, can help to improve throughcare in the prison system and the community, reduce reoffending and make links to agencies, which is an important way of supporting women, particularly when they are from more remote areas.
Women from the south of Scotland, in particular, are held either in Edinburgh or in the west. Mentors are based in those prisons, and they will start work early with a woman, with a view to understanding what is going on in her life and what the issues are. Mentors make connections with agencies, so that as much preparatory work as possible is done before liberation. They then link with local mentors—in Dumfriesshire, for example—and a relationship is built up between the mentor in prison, the woman and the mentor who will take over responsibility for supporting the woman when she comes out.
The outreach approach that the cabinet secretary mentioned is one of the four themes in our support for services throughout Scotland, post-Angiolini. The teams in the area will know that the woman is coming back to Dumfriesshire and that she has a mentor who will be able to help her to navigate the various services and agencies that she needs to navigate if she is to get her life back together again.
Do the local mentors go to the prison to work, too?
Yes they do, absolutely.
It is good to have that continuity, so that the woman knows that there is an individual in her community whom she can trust, particularly given her anxieties around release.
The relationship is key. We have learned that, even at this early stage. As the cabinet secretary said, we are evaluating the mentoring service and all the services that we have supported post-Angiolini. At this early stage, we know that the quality of the relationship between the woman and her mentor is crucial to successful reintegration.
A woman’s desire to reintegrate herself is also crucial. We are finding that a mentor can help a woman to keep mentally positive and to navigate the difficulties that she might encounter. For example, there can be delays in getting housing or access to her children. The mentor is someone who is positive and who can show her a different way of living her life, which gives her hope for the future. The system seems to be working really well.
That is interesting.
Gil Paterson spoke about access for families. For someone from my constituency, that is not easy: public transport links with Inverclyde and Edinburgh are not good. We know that women offenders tend to get fewer prison visits from their families. There is accommodation at Inverclyde to enable children to stay overnight, but there seems to be less accommodation than there was at Cornton Vale. I think that there were seven places at Cornton Vale and that there are only four in the new prison.
We have to be careful when we talk about the number of places. We can get confused, given the history of Cornton Vale: over time, things have come and gone and been labelled in all sorts of different ways.
You would expect me to say this, but Inverclyde will be an international exemplar of excellent practice. The approach to relationships with people who pass from the community to custody is growing and developing, almost daily, and will be continually updated. There will be excellent facilities at Inverclyde, regardless of scope or scale, to enable women to spend good, quality time with their children and wider family. That is for sure.
10:30
In some Swedish prisons low-security prisoners can receive visitors in their cells rather than having to go to the visiting room. Has thought been given to allowing that for some female prisoners? It might be better for children to visit their mother in her cell than to meet her in a formal visiting room.
As we consider scope and scale, that might be appropriate for some people. However, we must also think about the consequences for children and other family members of moving into that environment. In the round, the direction of travel is to bring families together, for all the positive reasons that we know about. We recognise that what you suggest might be more appropriate for some people than for others, but we want to maximise the opportunities as they come along.
Elaine Murray asked about throughcare. At times there can be a disjointed approach, with different assessments for different purposes, such as housing and health. The ministerial group on offender reintegration, of which I was a member but which in my new role I chair, has proposed a single, multi-agency assessment for every prisoner, whether they are serving short or long-term sentences, to ensure that there is a comprehensive assessment of needs, so that throughcare is managed much better, with everyone having a part to play in achieving that much more effectively. Such joined-up working, which the SPS is taking forward, is starting to bed in, and I think that that will help to improve outcomes for female offenders, particularly those who go back to more remote areas.
Another recommendation from the ministerial group on offender reintegration was to do with Friday liberations, which I know is an issue that the committee has raised in previous studies of throughcare. As a result of the group’s consideration, the Prisoners (Control of Release) (Scotland) Bill contains provision to allow prison governors flexibility to release prisoners up to two days early and avoid the Friday liberation scenario, particularly when people are going back to remote and rural areas and it is in their interests to be released early, because a plan is in place to help them to reintegrate more effectively in the community.
If a child is visiting a parent who is incarcerated—in this case, a mother—is it not the case that the test is always what is in the child’s best interests, notwithstanding the benefits to the prisoner? Is the welfare of the child always paramount? I am sure that that is the rule.
Yes, absolutely.
Thank you. I just wanted to make that plain, because something might not be in the child’s interests, in some circumstances.
Last week, I had a briefing from a third sector programme in Aberdeen—adjust—which works in partnership and co-ordinates services in exactly the way that the cabinet secretary has been talking about. We talked about videoconferencing, among a lot of other things, which in Aberdeen it seems is available only for families of male prisoners—it is not yet available for families of female prisoners.
The minister mentioned a pilot in Aberdeen, but I take it that that is for male and female prisoners. I seek reassurance that there will not be a two-tier system, with male prisoners getting facilities first but female prisoners falling behind, as has happened with videoconferencing. I visited HMP Grampian and it seemed a bit unfair that one gender should get facilities that the other gender does not get.
The video link at the Apex Scotland centre in Aberdeen, which I think is what you are referring to, is a fantastic concept, and we hope to build on the lessons that are being learned from it. It is important that we remind ourselves of the genesis of that great idea.
The video link was originally put in place for people in custody who would otherwise have gone to Aberdeen or Peterhead but who had been displaced because of the interregnum between those prisons closing and Grampian opening. In essence, it was for families in that area whose relatives or partners were in Perth or Barlinnie—all points south, really. That was the genesis of it and it worked well. It has been kept going and is beginning to give us some indications of how we might do things in the future.
These are the sorts of dragons that crawl around, but we can slay this dragon: we are not talking about a facility that is, per se, for men in custody, because women have used it. I draw on the example of Cornton Vale in particular—this relates to what Elaine Murray said. It is an uncomfortable truth that women in custody tend not to get many visits—that is just a harsh fact—but we are trying to change that. Because women from the north-east and the north more generally are now being held at the facility at HMP Grampian, the pressure that might otherwise have been put on Cornton Vale to connect through the Apex hub at HMP Aberdeen has diminished significantly. Over the time that the facility has been available, only two women have used it for a virtual visit in that sense. The facility exists, but the demand for it among women in custody has not been as great as the demand among men in custody—again, that is just a fact.
We have already talked about the direction of travel. We want to flex the facilities as much as we can, but in a way that is robust and sustainable and which provides assurance for everyone who is engaged in the process.
Is one of the problems the gender-specific training that is required for staff, which is maybe not optimal yet?
When my predecessor was before the committee, the possibility of providing additional training for SPS staff who work with female offenders was explored. That training has now been embedded in the induction programme, so all SPS staff who work with female offenders attend a two-day programme specifically on female offenders. I think that a one-day training programme was initially tested—I am not entirely sure about that—but a two-day programme is now part of the induction programme for SPS staff. There is also an additional one-day training programme for SPS staff in general on female offenders. What was initially a test programme has now been embedded in the standard induction programme for all SPS staff who work with female offenders.
Gil Paterson talked about housing and the provision of accommodation. I am reassured by what the cabinet secretary has said about the possibility that someone who is in prison for a short period will be able to keep their tenancy. What about women who are looking for social security benefits? Have you spoken with the United Kingdom Government to see whether, instead of prisoners’ benefits being stopped, they could be merely interrupted so that prisoners could know in advance of their release that they would not need to reapply and that their benefits would start again automatically on their release?
The ministerial working group considered access to welfare benefits, as concerns were raised around the stopping of benefit provision. In my view, part of the challenge is the need to reduce the number of women who receive short-term custodial sentences: we may question whether prison is the right place for them anyway. That is the approach that we are taking to deal with the issue.
There have been issues with female prisoners reintegrating into the community, and we want to ensure that those issues are addressed much more effectively. We have pursued the issue with the Department for Work and Pensions, as the area is reserved. We have some powers through the Scottish welfare fund, which can be used to buy things such as furniture as well as for crisis grants and community care grants, although there have been issues with how that fund is operating. We want to make that provision more effective—we want it to respond more quickly to the needs of those who are being reintegrated into the community. As a result of the work of the ministerial working group, new guidance was issued to shape the approach that is taken to the management of applications for that funding and how they are dealt with in prisons as well as how local authorities deal with the matter. The guidance has helped to speed up the process and has clarified when the application process can be started so that the money can be released as early as possible to support individuals who are being reintegrated into the community. We have been able to make some changes to improve the situation where we have the powers to do so, but some of the wider aspects are outwith our control.
Those changes are very welcome. Are the assessments already being made before the women are released?
Yes, they are.
Have you written to the DWP to try to get it to make the benefits that it provides subject to the same assessments?
Jane Moffat may be able to comment further on that. We are limited in what we can do because of the pan-UK approach to those benefits. However, the issue for us is the need to reduce the number of women who receive short-term sentences, who may lose their house and their benefits, which brings other welfare challenges especially if they have a child. If we can prevent that from happening to individuals who should not be in prison anyway, because prison is not the most appropriate environment for them, that will probably be the most effective way to tackle the issue.
Jane Moffat may be able to mention some of the wider work that we are doing around welfare provision.
Some committee members will remember that the cabinet secretary’s predecessor wrote to Lord Freud immediately after the Angiolini commission reported. The two had a meeting, on the back of which we now have a small-scale pilot scheme operating at Cornton Vale whereby women get access to benefits advice much earlier before liberation than is normally the case, with the aspiration that they will get access to their money much more quickly than they currently do. That is a small-scale pilot scheme and, as the cabinet secretary says, it is a reserved area of policy. The matter is at the discretion of the UK Government and I do not think there are any plans to extend the pilot, but we are being allowed to continue it at Cornton Vale at the moment.
What is important is how we support the women when they come back out into the community through the justice centres that the cabinet secretary has talked about. For example, in the Glasgow centre, a benefits adviser comes in to support the women, to ensure that they are maximising their entitlement to benefits and that they are claiming for everything that they can. In addition, as the cabinet secretary says, the Scottish welfare fund makes sure that the women have some transitional support to help them through the early days after release, when money is tight. It helps them to access the support that they need to furnish their house and so on, so that they have something to come back out to.
Do the same problems arise in England?
Yes.
Is the situation exactly the same? Do they face the same issues?
Yes. It is exactly the same. It is not a Scottish issue; it is a UK issue.
It is to do with the DWP generally.
Yes.
I would like to focus on the £3 million of funding that has been allocated to support the local criminal justice partners over the 16 projects. I am not sure that I fully understand how that works for the more rural projects—the outreach projects. Do women in those situations get the full range of support that women get from the other projects?
Yes, they do. For example, the Fife team decided that they did not want a fixed base because they did not think that that would be the best way to support women in Fife. They therefore work out of three locations and, for one full day a week at each of those locations, women can drop in or make appointments. In the interim, that is followed up with one-to-one sessions with an individual and their key worker, and any work that needs to be progressed will be progressed.
We have organised the provision in Scotland by working with the local partners. They all use the Angiolini commission report as their reference document—it is seen as a really valid, critical piece of work that informs how they shape their service provision—but, in rural areas, they tailor the provision to what they think best meets the needs of the women in those more rural localities. The women themselves do not want to have to travel to a centre many miles away, and the local services are provided where the women live, so the idea of the outreach approach is that the teams go into the rural localities and work with the women there to link them into the relevant services, wherever they might be.
And an independent evaluation will be carried out.
Yes.
10:45
To what extent will the results of that evaluation be a factor in the consideration of community planning partnerships with regard to the delivery of community justice?
They will have an important part to play in helping us to understand the most effective approach for delivering services. A big part of ensuring that the CPPs are able to do their job effectively with regard to the delivery of community justice programmes is to ensure that they are using an evidence-based approach that is based on experience, so that they can make an informed decision about the best approach to apply at a local level. It is important to ensure that we are using an evidence-based approach. All the models are being independently evaluated so that we can identify what the pros and cons are and can use them to support on-going work.
As I mentioned earlier, I want to give a bit more thought to how we can ensure that we share that practice and experience in a much more effective way. We have practitioner forums and so on, but I think that there is a wider issue that I want to explore: I want us to share and spread good practice and improvement methodologies in a way that can assist us in delivering the most effective approaches in local areas and ensure that CPPs have the right type of advice, support and information to make informed decisions.
On the evaluation of the success of mentoring projects, can you add anything else to that equation?
Jane Moffat is probably the best person to talk about that.
Again, we are having the mentoring service independently evaluated by Ipsos MORI. We have extended the evaluation in line with the fact that we have extended the change fund for another two years. Two years in, we saw early signs of the effectiveness of the mentoring service, but we wanted to give it more time to demonstrate its positive impact.
As Gil Paterson said, the on-going provision of the services is the responsibility of local government, and the idea behind the evaluations is that they will help local government and partners in communities identify where they want to spend their resources on an on-going basis. As Elish Angiolini said, all of this can be achieved within existing resources. What we have tried to do is provide some additional money in the two-year period to give people a bit of breathing space in order to reconfigure their services in the way that she described. Ultimately, however, the sustainability will come from within localities. That is why we have allowed the service provision to grow organically in line with local partners’ needs and desires. We see that as being the most sustainable way in which to take things forward in the long term.
In the context of the evaluation of mentoring services, you will be aware that we are changing the role of prison officers to dovetail with the work that is going on in the community to secure that integrated approach. As you know from a previous briefing, the pilot that was run at HMP Greenock was evaluated in the middle of this year by colleagues working out of the University of Edinburgh, and the results were really encouraging, giving us pointers about the positive effects of practical support that reaches back into the community as people resettle.
One of the things that we have learned from all of this is the fact that women are the most likely people to engage in on-going mentoring services. There is a real convergence in terms of approaches, integration and targeting the people who are most likely to benefit from what we are doing.
Does the cabinet secretary support the introduction of child impact assessments to effectively deal with the often devastating effect that the imprisonment of a parent can have on children?
In what way do you see them operating?
Impact assessments would consider the overall effect on children of a parent being imprisoned, from the child’s perspective.
I mean, do you envisage that being something that is submitted to the court when the sentence is being imposed?
It would be a formal impact assessment.
It is important that we ensure that, when sheriffs are making determinations, they have as wide a range of information as possible to enable the issues to be considered. Clearly, there are different factors that must be weighed up in terms of public safety and appropriate sentencing, but welfare and child impact aspects should be fed into that process, so that people are aware of any wider issues.
If issues are identified but a custodial sentence is still considered to be the most appropriate route, it is important that the right support services are put in place in order to support the child in a way that appropriately meets their needs.
Such impact assessments have a role to play in informing the court and ensuring the court understands such matters, along with all the other factors that sheriffs and judges need to take into account when determining a sentence.
You mentioned the £3 million of funding that has been allocated to support local criminal justice partners across Scotland. Could you provide the committee with a written breakdown of how that has been allocated to different areas?
Yes, we could provide details of the 16 projects that have benefited from it.
Thank you, that would be helpful.
That ends this evidence-taking session. I suspend the meeting for two minutes to allow witnesses to change over.
10:51 Meeting suspended.Next
Modern Slavery Bill