Another important method of maintaining contact between prisoners and the outside world, especially with their families, is through regular visits.
The international instruments make it clear that contact with a family is a right, not a privilege to be earned.
PRACTICAL RECOMMENDATIONS
This is an emotional area for prison staff as well as for prisoners. This session must be handled with that in mind.
Discussion is to be encouraged, but anecdotal content must be kept under control by the trainer.
TOPICS FOR DISCUSSION
A list of topics is provided in the Manual.
Methodology:
The trainees should be divided into small groups for discussion. Each group should be given the three topics to discuss.
There is no need for a reporting back session, but it would be helpful to have facilita-tors from the training team move around the groups to ensure maximum benefit from the discussions.
The trainees should be encouraged to draw on the practical recommendations and the international instruments during their discussions.
Points to be highlighted/suggested areas for discussion:
39. – Taking account of security needs, visits should take place in as relaxed an atmosphere as possible;
39. – Ideally, families should be allowed to hold visits in private, out of the hearing and sight of staff;
39. – If this is not possible, there should be as much privacy as possible. For example, by having them within sight of staff, but out of earshot;
39. – Provision might be made for volunteers or trained childminders to take care of children while parents have private discussions;
39. – The intimacy of conjugal visits can be seen as the most likely way to keep a family together during the imprisonment of one of the parties;
39. – Such visits may also be the cause of a great deal of stress because of the circumstances in which they take place;
39. – Health issues would need to be considered for all parties engaging in sexual activity;
39. – Conjugal or partner visits might result in unwanted pregnancies and children that cannot be afforded by women already struggling to survive without their partners to provide for them and any existing children;
39. – The authorities might find it difficult to decide who is eligible, and who is not, to have such visits. For example, would it be only married couples, or all people who said they were couples, including homosexuals?;
39. – There would always be the risk of institutional prostitution if the system were abused;
39. – If the prison director had to make the decision, it could lead to complaints and unrest and possibly security difficulties;
39. – There would always be security considerations because of the unsupervised nature of these visits;
39. – If conjugal or partner visits are allowed, they must be organized so that privacy is assured and there is no possibility of exploitation by anyone. The environment must be clean, suitable and dignified;
39. – Women prisoners would need to have access to contraception and medical advice to ensure that unwanted pregnancies did not occur;
39. – The prison authorities would need to consider how they might cope with pregnant prisoners and the children of serving prisoners;
39. – Visiting arrangements are an important area of work for prison staff; it is not always easy to make the environment right and prisoners do not always cooperate;
39. – A prisoner who seems worse after a visit with a particular individual may be being abused in some way;
39. – Without the prisoner’s cooperation or a definite security problem, it is difficult for prison staff to intervene;
39. – It might be appropriate for a member of the prison medical or welfare team to ask to speak to the visitor with a view to finding out if there is a problem;
39. – It might be possible to persuade the prisoner to talk to a member of the medical team about the staff concerns;
39. – If the medical staff are concerned, it might be appropriate for any correspondence between the two to be monitored.
CASE STUDIES Methodology:
A round-table discussion is suggested, with members of the training team taking part for the first study.
Points to be highlighted/suggested areas for discussion:
CASE STUDY 1
39. – Prison staff have to deal with this type of situation quite regularly;
39. – It would be reasonable to allow a special visit once the staff had decided that the situation was genuine;
39. – It would also be reasonable to provide a private area for the mother to deliver the news as sensitively as possible;
39. – A risk assessment would be needed to decide whether any special conditions were necessary;
39. – Some prisons have a chaplain or social worker on duty who would be alerted to provide counselling or support once the visit was over.
CASE STUDY 2
39. – This study requires a report to be written outlining recommendations for the Government regarding the precise nature of conjugal or partner visits to be introduced into the prison system;
39. – Trainees may work on their own or in small groups of no more than three in order to compile their report;
39. – It is good practice to learn from other jurisdictions before introducing a new system;
39. – The international instruments should be referred to in order to ensure that human dignity is maintained at all times;
39. – Discuss with the trainees the scope of the principle of non-discrimination and its application to unmarried long-term partners, as well as to long-term same-sex partners;
39. – A day and a night are more appropriate than a few hours;
39. – If a couple have children, their presence will make the situation more realistic;
39. – From this perspective, apartments are preferable to small rooms;
39. – The availability of good medical care is essential;
39. – The eligibility for conjugal or partner visits must be clear and unambiguous; it is likely to be different across the jurisdictions.