New funding will improve support for justice-involved women
A research programme to improve outcomes for women in the criminal justice system has received new funding from The JABBS Foundation for Women and Girls.
The three-year grant, worth £1.9 million will enable researchers to gather evidence on ‘what works’ and the effectiveness of women’s centres as an alternative to custody. It follows £2.3 million of previous funding since 2015.
Women’s centres were designed as a community-based service that could help to address the circumstances that bring many women into the criminal justice system. These circumstances might involve abuse and exploitation, past trauma, parenting, substance abuse and accommodation issues.
While there is a growing recognition that prison often does not work in reducing re-offending, quantitative evidence demonstrating the efficacy of women’s centres is scarce.
The Effective Women’s Centres Project, a collaboration between the University of Birmingham and seven women’s organisations was set up to address this gap and to provide evidence to inform national policy and practice.
This important research will mean the needs and strengths of justice-involved women are better recognised, evidenced and met.
A key tool used to identify needs and plan interventions is the Women’s Risk Needs Assessment (WRNA), originally developed at the University of Cincinnati as a way of predicting reoffending risks, and of identifying and addressing the needs of women in the justice system.
Earlier research by the project team has enabled this tool to be validated in the UK for the first time and introduced into more centres – to date, more than 2,000 women in England and Wales have been assessed using WRNA. With extended support from The JABBS Foundation for Women and Girls, the team will be able to build an even more comprehensive picture, as well as continuing research into early interventions that could improve outcomes for women and girls, and reduce criminal offences overall.
Professor Simon Pemberton, an expert in social policy and criminology, is leading the research. He said: ‘We are already starting to see positive impacts from our partnership with women’s centres. In particular, use of the WRNA has enabled women’s centres to better address needs and offer enhanced support.
‘The new funding from The JABBS Foundation for Women and Girls will allow us to build the evidence base further. This is particularly important as the Government is making reforms aimed at reducing women’s imprisonment and increasing the number of women supported in the community.’
Over the past 12 months, the work of the research team has been increasingly recognised in policy documents designed to inform Government decision-making. Their work was cited in an independent report by the Ministry of Justice’s Women’s Justice Board in March, setting out recommendations to the Government on how to reduce women’s imprisonment. It has also been recognised by Chief Medical Officer Sir Chris Whitty in a landmark report commissioned by the Government to improve health outcomes for people in prison and on probation.
Dr Barbara Scott (BSc Biological Sciences, 1977; PhD Medicine, 1981), Patron and Trustee at The JABBS Foundation for Women and Girls, added: ‘This important research will mean the needs and strengths of justice-involved women are better recognised, evidenced and met. Working together, women's centres, services users and academics are transforming the system into one that offers genuine opportunity for women to rebuild their lives.’
In a separate £3 million programme, The JABBS Foundation for Women and Girls has partnered with the University, Henry Smith Foundation, and The Nelson Trust to support more women’s centres to use the WRNA tool. This work will increase the ability of more women’s centres to identify and address needs, as well as building an even more robust base for the research team to gather evidence.