Prisons: Children of Prisoners

Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist Excerpts

Tuesday 30th October 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton]

I thank the right reverend Prelate for raising this. I managed to speak to her, literally a few minutes before I rose to answer the Question, and I was surprised, as I am sure noble Lords will also be, that that is the case. My information is that families who look after such children, whether they are carers from the same family or non-family carers, are eligible for the same benefits as they would get if they were the parents of the child—child benefit, child tax credits and so on. Indeed, they may also get other funding under Section 17 of the Children Act. I would like to investigate this further and write to the right reverend Prelate. I will, of course, put a copy in the Library, because this is a very important issue.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

My Lords, almost exactly a year ago we debated the excellent Farmer review on this very subject. Can the Minister report on the progress, if any, on developing links between prisons and communities, which benefit the children of all prisoners, and on technology such as tele-visiting arrangements, for maintaining prisoner-child contact?

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton]

I share the noble Baroness’s appreciation for the work of my noble friend Lord Farmer, and we are making good progress in going through his 19 recommendations and ensuring that they are implemented. One of those recommendations was the introduction of new family service contracts for prison governors, which, as I mentioned, has already happened. We are trying to create outward-looking prisons so that our empowered governors go into the community and look at what is available there, whether that be third sector groups or other service provision, and use what is available locally to ensure that prisoners have contact with their families, and also the employment skills and training they need to make a successful future.