Rosie Hart, the director of Kairos Women Working Together, discusses with the Custodial Review the work which the small Coventry charity does to support women prisoners at risk of exploitation, including women in prostitution.
Could you outline the work you do with women in prisons?
Kairos Women Working Together (KairosWWT) is a grassroots charity in Coventry supporting women at risk of sexual exploitation, including those caught up in prostitution. We meet our service users through outreach and drop-in sessions that we run, as well as receiving referrals from probation services, prisons that know of our work and from other partner agencies locally.
Doctor Meng AwYong works in Emergency Medicine, in pre-hospital care, as a forensic medical examiner for the Metropolitan Police and has co-authored the Royal College of Emergency Medicine Best Practice Guidance on the Management of ABD. Here, he outlines what is thought to be the most dangerous condition to affect detainees: ABD.
Following the Emergency Services Show at the NEC in September, we spoke to Mahbu Rahman, Blue Light Programme Manager at Mind charity, about mental health issues among police officers...
A recent Mind survey of over 1,000 current or former staff or volunteers within the police force found that 93% had experienced stress, low mood and poor mental health at some point while working for the emergency services. Over 61% had experienced a mental health problem – such as depression, anxiety disorder, OCD, PTSD, bipolar disorder or schizophrenia – while working or volunteering in their current or previous role.
A BBC report which highlights the harsh reality that budget cuts are having on frontline policing should stand as a ‘stark reminder to government’, argues National Chair John Apter.
The report revealed that there were barely enough officers to meet the demand on a busy Saturday night in Hartlepool, with two officers having to drive 15 miles to take a prisoner to Middleborough custody suite simply because the Hartlepool suite was not staffed.
Friday the 23rd November was a key date in Police Federation's campaign to protect police drivers from being unfairly prosecuted simply for doing their jobs.
A Private Members Bill by the senior government backbencher, Sir Henry Bellingham MP, is due to receive its second reading at Parliament. His Emergency Response Drivers (Protections) Bill seeks greater exemptions from civil liability or criminal prosecution for blue light workers.
The Prime Minister and Home Secretary “should hang their heads in shame” says the National Chair of the Police Federation of England and Wales as a highly critical report concludes that the mental health system in this country is broken and it is the police who are left to pick up the pieces.
Brain injury charity Headway support people in the community following head traumas. Here, we speak to Headway’s James Coxon about the charity’s ID cards which can help aid communication between the brain injury survivor and police officers…
Headway – the brain injury association supports people affected by acquired brain injury through a wide range of services, including rehabilitation programmes, carer support, social re-integration, community outreach and respite care.
Waterside Press are giving away a copy of Confessions of a Prison Chaplain by Mary Brown and Opening the Doors: A Prison Chaplain’s Life on the Inside by Paul Gill in a prize worth over £30. Here, Bryan Gibson writes about the titles which follow the authors' work…
A stereotype image of the prison chaplain is perhaps of a ‘meddling do-gooder’ who can embarrass hardened inmates by talking to them as if they are children. Someone ‘born yesterday’ who is distant, easy to con, wears a ‘dog-collar’ or beads, is not from the establishment concerned, and who pops up now and again with a kindly smile on his face (unlike the guards).
But modern chaplains are not like that – and they can be a real ‘safety valve’ and outside link. Nowadays they are likely to be from one of a number of faiths (or even none), part of a team – including women – dedicated to a non-judgmental approach. They are a central component in diffusing tensions, reducing re-offending and helping offenders to change (or rescue) heart, mind and even life. If this sounds pompous it’s the nature of the work!
Tim Tate is an author, investigative journalist and filmmaker who worker with the late Ray Wyre – a pioneer in treatment of child sex offenders. Here, Tim describes how Ray’s work challenged the lack of rehabilitation options for paedophiles and asks if the current system is doing enough to protect children from abuse…
For someone whose work would become so influential, Ray Wyre’s introduction to sex offenders was surprisingly accidental.
In 1981, three years after joining the Probation Service, he was transferred to Albany, the high security facility on the Isle of Wight: here, by chance, he was assigned to the E Wing, which then housed 36 sex offenders in segregation from the rest of the prison’s population.
The Police Federation of England and Wales (PFEW) has announced that formal legal proceedings will now commence following the Government’s failure to act on police pay recommendations.
The staff association for police officers in England and Wales has lodged an application to Judicial Review proceedings into the lawfulness of the Government’s decision to ignore the recommendations of the Police Remuneration Review Body (PRRB) for the second consecutive year.