Youngest visitor to HM Prison East Sutton Park

On 2 October, Audrey and I had an unusual adventure.  We went to visit HM Prison East Sutton Park, a women's open prison in Kent.  We were invited by Only Connect, a charity founded by some friends of Fred's that works in prisons.  I was a bit worried that it might be insensitive to take a newborn to a women's prison, but was assured that the prison governor was in favour and the women keen.

Off we set at dawn to catch a train to Headcorn with about ten other women from Only Connect.

From Headcorn we were driven to the prison by one of the guards.  The setting was idyllic.  The prison is housed in a grand, red-brick Elizabethan manor that overlooks the Weald of Kent.  During our subsequent Q&A session with some of the inmates, they were at pains to describe how different ESP (as they called it) was to closed prisons:  the setting - one inmate said that when she first arrived she couldn't believe that the doors were made of wood, not metal, and that the windows had no bars on them;  the approach - the inmates all commented on how friendly and supportive the prison guards were compared to those in closed prisons;  the philosophy - ESP is about helping prisoners establish a live-work routine that will ease them back into life outside and avoid their reoffending, rather than about punishing them for their crime.

After the Q&A session we each buddied up with an inmate and were taken to lunch in their canteen.  This was my favourite bit.  I had (uncharacteristically) felt too shy and overwhelmed to ask questions in a group environment, but I enjoyed being able to chat to several of the inmates more informally.  Some of the women I met had been referred to ESP towards the end of a long sentence (including a couple who were serving life sentences), while others had only spent a few days in closed prison and were lucky to serve the bulk of their sentence in open conditions.  Many had children who were being raised by someone else.  I found myself wanting desperately to know their individual stories, how they had ended up in prison, but of course that was the last thing I could ask them.

After lunch the governor took us on a tour.  We saw the dorms - similar to university dorms:  photos and greetings cards livening up an otherwise plain, functional, impersonal space - the classrooms, where inmates can take courses in English, Maths, ICT, catering, hairdressing, etc., the gym, and most impressively the farm, where inmates learn horticulture and grow produce that is sold in the farm shop, generating some revenue for the prison.

And too soon we were off again.  Too soon to process my thoughts and emotions.  At first I felt elated, excited on behalf of those women who were being given a second chance, and for many a chance at a better life.  The way I might feel perhaps in a drugs or alcohol rehabilitation centre, or a centre for abused women.  The energy, the burning desire these women felt to turn a new leaf, to make it out there, were palpable.  And I found myself wanting to get involved, to help them.  But by the time our train was pulling into London, I felt dejected.  Dejected in the knowledge that some wouldn't make it, that their past and the system was against them.  Dejected in the knowledge that these women were such a small proportion of women prisoners, that so many weren't being offered the opportunity to go through an open prison like ESP before being released.  And most of all dejected in the knowledge that I wouldn't get involved, that life as a mother of three, including a small baby, would take over.