Parental Imprisonment and Childrens Rights
This book brings together internationally renowned academics and professionals from a variety of disciplines who, in a variety of ways, seek to understand the legal, conceptual, and practical consequences of parental imprisonment through a childrens rights lens. Children whose parents have been incarcerated are often referred to as invisible victims of crime and the penal system. It is well accepted that the imprisonment of a parent, even for a short period of time, not only negatively affects the lives of children but it can also result in a gross violation of their fundamental human rights, such as the right of access to their parent and the right to have an input into decision-making processes affecting them, the outcomes of which will without doubt affect the life of the child concerned.
This collection foregrounds the voice of these children as it explores transdisciplinary boundaries and examines the practice and development of the rights of both children and their families within the wider dynamic of criminal justice and penology practice. The text is divided into three parts which are dedicated to 1) hearing the voices of children with parents in prison, 2) understanding to what extent childrens rights informs prison policy, and 3) demonstrating how law in the form of childrens rights can help frame both court sentencing and prison practice in a way that minimises the harm that contact with the prison system can cause. The research drawn upon in this book has been conducted in a number of European countries and demonstrates both good and bad practice as far as the implementation of childrens rights is concerned in the context of parental incarceration.
An accessible and compelling read, this book will appeal to students and scholars of law, childrens rights, criminology, sociology, social work, psychology, penology, and all those interested in, and working towards, protecting the rights of children who have a parent in prison.
Aisling Parkes is a Senior Lecturer in Law at the School of Law, University College Cork, Ireland. She specialises in researching and teaching in childrens rights, child law, international disability law, and sports law. Her interdisciplinary research incorporates a range of areas which include the right of children to have their views respected.
Fiona Donson is a Senior Lecturer in Law and the Director of the Centre for Criminal Justice and Human Rights in the School of Law, University College Cork, Ireland. She researches and teaches in the areas of penology, administrative and social justice, and childrens rights.
Dr Donson and Dr Parkes have been researching together over the past decade to raise the profile of the rights of children with a parent or loved one in prison. They have actively sought to influence law and policy development in this area. In particular, their work has fed directly into the Recommendation CM/Rec(2018)5 of the Committee of Ministers to member States concerning children with imprisoned parents (2019). They have published and cited widely in this area in peer reviewed publications of an interdisciplinary nature.
Routledge Studies in Crime, Justice and the Family
This series is the first series of its kind for Criminology. It offers a space to capture work on a range of topics that share the common theme of the relationship between crime, justice and the family, and aims to interrogate common-sense understandings of this relationship to explore just who is affected by crime and how they are affected, whether as victims of crime within the family, as secondary victims, or as parents, children, spouses, or other kin of offenders.
Edited by Rachel Condry, The University of Oxford, UK
Families, Imprisonment and Legitimacy
The Cost of Custodial Penalties
Cara Jardine
Generations Through Prison
Experiences of Intergenerational Incarceration
Mark Halsey & Melissa del Vel-Palumbo
Juvenile Lifers
(Lethal) Violence, Incarceration and Rehabilitation
Simone Jessica Deegan
Parental Imprisonment and Childrens Rights
Edited by Aisling Parkes and Fiona Donson
Parental Imprisonment and Childrens Rights
Edited by Aisling Parkes and Fiona Donson
First published 2021
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
2021 selection and editorial matter, Aisling Parkes and Fiona Donson; individual chapters, the contributors
The right of Aisling Parkes and Fiona Donson to be identified as the authors of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice : Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Parkes, Aisling, editor. | Donson, Fiona J. L., editor.
Title: Parental imprisonment and childrens rights / edited by Aisling Parkes and Fiona Donson.
Description: Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2021. | Includes bibliographical references and index. | Identifiers: LCCN 2020050922 | ISBN 9781138283473 (hardback) | ISBN 9781315270234 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Children of prisoners. | Prisoners--Family. | Childrens rights.
Classification: LCC HV8885 .P37 2021 | DDC 362.82/95--dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020050922
ISBN: 978-1-138-28347-3 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-0-367-75797-7 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-27023-4 (ebk)
Typeset in Times New Roman
by Deanta Global Publishing Services, Chennai, India
To all children who have had, or who currently have, a loved one in prison.
Contents
Aisling Parkes and Fiona Donson
SECTION 1
Voices
Ben Raikes
Una Convery and Linda Moore
Fiona Donson and Aisling Parkes
SECTION 2
Policy
Marie Hutton
Sinead OMalley, Lucy Baldwin and Laura Abbott
Liz Ayre
SECTION 3
Law
Peter Scharff Smith and Emma Villman
Justice Albie Sachs
Rona Epstein
Helen Codd
Figure
| The influence of the Northern Ireland Peace Process on discursive interventions on family contact for prisoners tabled during Dil Debates |
Tables
| Visiting allowances at research prisons |
| A sampling of issue frames for children with imprisoned parents |
Laura Abbott is a qualified midwife and Senior Lecturer at the University of Hertfordshire, UK. She is a Fellow of The Royal College of Midwives, UK, and Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, UK. In addition, she is a registered nurse and registered midwife and in 2017 was the Iolanthe Midwifery Trust award winner. Laura has been awarded a Mildred Blaxter Post-Doctoral Fellowship with the Foundation for the Sociology of Health and Illness which commenced in September 2020. Laura is a volunteer for the charity Birth Companions and is passionate about improving provisions for pregnant and new mothers in prisons and was involved in the recent UK-based review of operational policy for mothers in prison. She is widely published on her area of expertise pregnancy and prison.
