CEO of Partners in Advocacy & Chair of the Glasgow Working Group on Women & Offending
The Glasgow Working Group on Women and Offending (GWGWO) was established by the Glasgow Community Justice Authority (CJA) in response to the Commission on Women Offenders and its 39 recommendations published in 2012.
Following the implementation of the Community Justice (Scotland) Act 2016, which disbanded CJAs and established Community Justice Glasgow (CJG), members of the GWGWO overwhelmingly supported the continuation of this group, and so it continues today with a wide range of both local and national members, including justice specific and universal services which can support women involved in offending or in the criminal justice system. Links to national working groups including the Scottish Working Group on Women’s Offending and the Scottish Parliament Cross Party Group on Women’s Justice have strengthened the group, and ensures information and views flow between.
Over the last year, the GWGWO has also acted as a useful sharing and learning network for services in Glasgow. We have had many new members coming on board and informing the group of the services they can provide and making essential connections to ensure effective partnership working, ultimately helping to provide more holistic services and pathways for women.
During 2020 the group also increased its meeting frequency, while face to face meetings were no longer possible this ensured that everyone was kept informed and up to date with what was happening across members’ services throughout lockdown.
Ensuring this connection also aided better partnership working when needed, such as when Emergency Early Release (you can read more about Glasgow’s response to this in the article Improving Prison Throughcare – Pathfinder to Housing, health & Benefits (PHHaB)) – from prison was implemented. Partners were able to work together and share essential information to ensure women who were leaving prison had all the information they needed and the best opportunities to link with services while the usual face to face meeting was not possible.
As the membership has continued to evolve and expand, so too has the role and remit of the group, with Scottish Prison Service (SPS) locating one of the first Women’s Community Custody Units in Glasgow, the group has become a reference group for SPS, who have consulted with the group on developments and have used this as a route to keeping local services informed and involved in progress and design of the unit.
The working group has representation on the Strategic Interface Group who are progressing both the health and social care elements of women in Glasgow within the CCU. The GWGWO hopes that in line with the Programme for Government and the focus on women in prison and remand that we will continue to play a vital and contributory role in the development of women services.
