A new report published by The Women’s Justice Board recommends a set of measures to reduce women’s imprisonment across England and Wales.
The report makes the following recommendations:
- The Ministry of Justice and Welsh Government should establish a two – to three-year Women’s Justice Reform Programme to provide oversight for delivery of all the actions proposed in the new report.
- An anti-racist, intersectional approach should be adopted to address disparities faced by Black, Asian, minoritised and migrant women, and those with other protected characteristics.
- Incentives and accountability mechanisms should be introduced to ensure all police forces have gender-specific, trauma-informed diversion pathways for women, including a strong focus on reducing arrests and increasing deferred prosecution.
- Greater understanding of the circumstances and needs of longer sentenced women currently in prison, to support individual sentence progression and reduce future imprisonment – where appropriate – for women accused of more serious offences.
- The development of a Young Women’s Strategy aimed at preventing young women’s entry into the Criminal Justice System and imprisonment, particularly for care experienced young women and victims of VAWG (including modern slavery, human trafficking and criminal or sexual exploitation).
The report also recommends that the imprisonment of pregnant women should only be used in the most exceptional of cases, with residential alternatives to custody leading to much better outcomes.
To read the full report, click here.