Kate visited HMP Styal, a women’s prison in Cheshire, on Tuesday to meet inmates and ex-offenders who have been helped by a mother and baby unit run by the charity Action for Children, which the princess represents as royal patron.
The mother and baby unit is one of three Action for Children run in prisons in the north of England, and they provide a separate living area for inmates, who are helped to care for their babies by trained prison staff and early years and family support practitioners.
Kate meets prison mums who say childcare is better in jail than on the outside Mums who gave birth in a prison that has been dubbed ‘hell on earth’ have told the Princess of Wales childcare is better there than it is on the outside.
REUTERS/Phil Noble/Pool] She sat down with two former inmates – one who left the prison six weeks ago with her toddler son after serving a 14-month sentence for an undisclosed offence and another who was 30 weeks pregnant when she began an 11-month sentence and gave birth to a daughter in prison.
When Kate chatted with staff from the mother and baby unit, she asked about its effects on reoffending, suggesting it was ‘massive’, and was told normal reoffending rates for women were around 70% but this reduced to just 12% with those receiving parental support.
