Motherhood in the Justice System: Overview Briefing
Reducing the harms of maternal imprisonment and preventing intergenerational trauma are key aims for both our operational and policy work. In the last two years we have supported research on this area, interviewed experts for our Justice Podcast, polled practitioners, responded to policy consultations and opened our residential community Hope Street as a blueprint for change for mothers and their children.
In this briefing, we bring together this learning, and newly published data from recent polling we have undertaken with practitioners and those in our network. Through our polling we sought to learn more about whether respondents feel motherhood plays a role in the sentencing of women, why they think community sentences aren’t being utilised effectively with women, and their thoughts around the imprisonment of pregnant women.
Redesigning the Justice System for women and their children:
Hope Street - a blueprint for change
These briefings show how Hope Street, our residential community for justice involved women and their children, has been developed, designed and built to inform wholescale system change.
Building Hope: Co-producing trauma-informed space with women in the justice system
Dr. Madeline Petrillo, Associate Professor, University of Greenwich
Trauma theory has demonstrated how trauma lingers in the body and can be triggered by what survivors see, hear, feel and smell (Van der Kolk 2014). Trauma-informed design starts with a recognition that all buildings have an effect on people and that there is constant communication between space and those who inhabit it. In this paper, Dr Madeline Petrillo from the University of Greenwich summarises the co-production process employed to design Hope Street, our pioneering residential community for justice involved women and their children.
Hope Street, A Trauma Informed Design Case Study
Mike Worthington RIBA, Director of Snug Architects
This briefing is a case study written by Mike Worthington RIBA, Director of Snug Architects about working with One Small Thing on the design and build of Hope Street in Hampshire.
It explains how a Trauma Informed Design approach to the project was applied, highlighting the architectural thinking. The resultant project design is a collaboration between One Small Thing, the design team and women with lived experience of trauma and the justice system.
Trauma Informed and Gender Responsive Working Snapshot Survey
What do practitioners think it means to be trauma informed and gender responsive today? And what are the barriers that still exist that prevent them working in this way?
We conducted snapshot polling with practitioners through our events and online networks at various points over 2022/23 with response rates of up to 126 people. The questions were co-produced with One Small Thing’s Women’s Involvement Advisor, who ensures the voices of women affected by the criminal justice system are included across our work.
Maternal Imprisonment Research
One Small Thing collaborated with Dr Sophie Mitchell from Northumbria University to launch and disseminate her research on the intergenerational impact on maternal imprisonment. Her research interviewed mothers who had experienced a period of imprisonment in the North East of England and staff who had supported them. Her findings highlight a need for urgent reform.
To read the summary click here
Healing Trauma Research
One Small Thing launched the first UK evaluation research into the Healing Trauma Intervention in women’s prisons in England as part of the wider Becoming Trauma Informed Initiative that the charity has been delivering in prisons since 2015.
For the full story please click HERE
Verbal Evidence
Watch our short film highlighting the story of Lina, whose hearing took place in Parliament at the Human Rights Committee recently. The hearing shines a light on the plight of families who are too often ignored, forgotten and displaced by the Criminal Justice System.