Adapted from the Women in Prison Website:
Women in Prison hosted a Mass Lobby of Parliament on Wednesday 26th June, 2019 to mark one year since the publication of the Ministry of Justice’s women’s strategy (entitled the “Female Offender Strategy”). We called on supporters of the campaign to reduce the women’s prison population to join together at Westminster and meet with their MP.
The main message for MPs is that in order for the Strategy to be delivered we need greater investment, growth and support for the specialist network of community-based Women’s Centres – ‘one-stop-shops’ that enable women to address the root causes of offending in a supportive, non-judgemental environment. We will also be asking for the £80m that our HM Treasury has received from the sale of HMP Holloway (the only women’s prison in London) to be used to deliver the Strategy and ensure growth and sustainability of the specialist Women’s Centre network and other support services.
We believe an event like this can really bring together and amplify the voices of those calling for an end to the harm prison causes to individuals, their families and our communities which cannot be ignored.
Rita Leaman from SI Scarborough and President Elect of SI Yorkshire, attended the event. The event was sponsored by two women MPs and well organised in the Emmanuel Centre, Westminster. She had not received a response to her request to meet the local MP, so stayed in the centre, talking to staff and ex offenders through the day. WIP have written a 10 point Manifesto under the title #Open Up Women’s Futures. See attached.
Rita was delighted to meet a variety of women who knew of the work of the Soroptimists with other agencies. The work for the Prison Reform Trust was mentioned, as was the work of Women Together in Bradford and The Women’s Support Alliance in Manchester.
Three members of SI Woking and District attended and were able to lobby their MP. Woking is one of only 17 places in the UK to have the specialised Women’s Centre requested by WIP.
Rita will be arranging a meeting with her local MP together with other members of SI Scarborough, to talk through the Manifesto. SI Scarborough started to support a local centre two years ago, but lack of funding meant that it unfortunately had to shut down.
