UK: female Scots prisoners to have children to stay at weekend

Children of female prisoners will be able to spend nights and weekends with their mothers in Scotland’s new community jails.

Five custom-built secure units planned as part of a far-reaching overhaul of women’s prisons will include accommodation suitable for children.

Rhona Hotchkiss, governor of Cornton Vale, Scotland’s only female prison, is steering the plans and has confirmed children, from toddlers to teenagers, will be able to spend occasional nights and weekends with their mothers in self-contained apartment-style accommodation.

She said: “We are working on facilities that would allow children to come in and spend time with their mother in what is as normal an environment as possible. It will feel like a small flat. It will mean women being able to have their children in for nights and weekends.”

Low-risk prisoners will be housed in the community units, located across the country, as they are helped to prepare for release and encouraged to have regular contact with their children and families.

Ms Hotchkiss, speaking at a conference on how best to care for mothers in custody and their children, said the design and working ethos of the units would, for the first time, be specifically tailored for women prisoners.

She said: “We are trying to design things differently and be responsive to the needs of women in prison with the aim of more effectively reintegrating them back into their communities”

There are currently 370 women in custody in Scotland – down from 450 – but ministers, who scrapped plans for a large women’s prison to replace Cornton Vale last year, want to reduce that to 230.

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