Support & Communications Manager at Families Outside
Children are walking miles along dark narrow roads; mothers are having to choose which child gets to visit their dad; families are skipping meals; and some are taking six buses and two trains in an 11-hour journey to visit their loved ones in prison. These are just some of the many barriers highlighted in the 2024 report “No Easy Journey” published by Families Outside. The report paints a stark picture of the financial and emotional toll of imprisonment to families and calls attention to the issues families face when trying to maintain contact with someone in prison.
Research shows that strong family ties can be a protective factor for successful reintegration. Meaningful connection between families and loved ones in prison, where appropriate, can support the health and wellbeing of everyone involved. Failure to support such contact punishes the families, who, despite not committing the offence, still suffer the consequences.
The report’s key findings reveal that local transport services do not effectively or fairly cater to all prisons, forcing families to make significant sacrifices in order to attend visits. The sole financial support available to families for travel costs is inadequate, and barriers must be removed to facilitate meaningful contact. Many are currently struggling with travel costs, geographical challenges, and local transport options, and some families have given up their homes, relocating closer to the prison their loved one is in.
Local transport services were identified as contributing to the difficulties in accessing visits. Due to the timings of services, the length of time it takes, and multiple connections, families are faced with the difficult decision of whether to make the journey.
For those that do make the journey, the timings of prison visits are often poorly coordinated to consider local transport options, meaning families are walking miles, cutting visits short, and taking taxis, incurring more costs. The Scottish Prison Service (SPS) is working to support meaningful contact between families and their loved ones but could do more, such as considering the impact on families if a person is transferred to another prison for administrative reasons.
An SPS spokesperson said:
“We recognise the importance of strong family relationships, both to those in our care and their loved ones, particularly children, and our staff work hard to support this. While we have introduced a number of options to support family contact, including in cell telephones, which replaced prison issued mobiles; virtual visits; and email a prisoner, we understand that this can only complement, rather than replace, face to face visits. We recognise there is still more that we and others can do.”
Families are also struggling to access financial aid. The Help with Prison Visits scheme is the only financial support available to help the poorest families access visits, but this scheme does not reach everyone who needs it. Many families are unaware of the benefit, it can be difficult to apply to, and the process for claiming can take too long, leaving families out of pocket. For example, for those who need to claim mileage, the payments fail to reflect the current costs of travel, reimbursing only 13p per mile.
Ultimately, the report shows that we are still seeing too many barriers and too little support for families to maintain effective contact. Families Outside hopes that the findings from this research will help key stakeholders such as the Scottish Government and the SPS to recognise and address the financial burdens placed on vulnerable families.
CEO of Families Outside, Prof Nancy Loucks, commented on the research, saying:
“Imprisonment fractures families, yet we have failed time and again to repair those fractures through strengthening support for family ties. This report is the fourth call for action from Families Outside to improve travel and transport for families when someone goes to prison. With cross-portfolio recognition and response, I hope it will be the last one we need to make.”