Carolyne Willow: ‘We closed workhouses, let’s get rid of child prisons’
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Version 0 of 1. Children’s rights campaigner Carolyne Willow, 48, can trace the roots of her affiliation to children who, in one way or another, have fallen foul of the law to her own dispatch to a sanatorium in Northumberland, in the early 1970s, when she was four and again, aged five. “It was an experience of being defeated as a child. I desperately did not want it to happen and despite my protests, it still happened,” she recalls. Born in South Shields, she had severe asthma and was not expected to live beyond 15. The first time, she says, she didn’t know where she was going, or what it would be like. It was not a pleasant experience. Her parents were allowed to visit only once a month. They had to list any foods their children did not like. Willow’s mum forgot to list cheese and she was given a cheese pie one day. She protested, but was told it must be eaten because it was not on the list. Staff made her sit alone in the dining room until she finished the pie. The experience formed her later commitment to always listen to children, she says. “I have vivid memories of that community of children. I was the youngest there and the others looked after me. There was solidarity. Children know who they are, know what they want. But we were powerless. That sowed the seeds of taking on the system.” Willow’s book, Children Behind Bars, published on Wednesday, on the abuse of children in custody, draws on her experiences in a long career spent trying to improve the lot of children, first as a social worker and later at the Children’s Rights Alliance. A focus of her book is on the use of restraint on children and on some of the 33 children who have died in custody in the past 25 years. Willow’s anger is evident. As a member of the advisory panel on the 2005 Carlile Inquiry into the treatment of children in custody, she says she was deeply shocked and unsettled by the now abandoned came out. and cites the practice of routinely strip-searching children. “The first experience of prison for a child was to be forced to strip and reveal their bodies to an unknown adult. Can you imagine the humiliation, the sense of powerlessness?” Willow estimates she has made about 700 freedom of information (FoI) requests to various bodies responsible for the welfare of incarcerated children in the past decade, beginning with her investigation into “distraction techniques”, which she learned involved landing a sharp blow upon children, and were approved at the highest level. “Nobody has ever designed a prison to make children feel valued, to treat them well and change their lives,” she says. “It desperately needs a minister with the compassion and courage to change things. We closed workhouses, asylums and orphanages, let’s get rid of child prisons. Let us say, we are not going to do this to children any more.” She says it has to be a politician. “You cannot rely on those at the top of the system that abuses children to say: ‘You know what, I have invested the whole of my adult life in a system that abuses kids.’ That is not going to happen. Look at the Youth Justice Board, [in the past] they defended the routine strip searching of children.” What would she do with children whose behaviour is a danger to others and themselves? She says we are talking about a minority of those in custody and the system first needs to find out where the bad behaviour comes from: “It is not normal, something has gone wrong. When doctors come across an unusual condition they seek out the cause and remedy. What do we do with children who are exhibiting unusual behaviour? We cast them away, outlaw them. Human beings want to belong, want to be loved. So, if things go wrong, you give them more, not less.” She thinks we could develop the secure children’s homes model that independent research shows significantly improves children’s education. “Children feel safer there and they are governed by standards that stress children’s rights, not punishment. And we should look at other countries who manage without locking up children as a matter of course.” Willow’s book is a harrowing read even for her. “There were times I was writing and didn’t realise I had tears streaming down my face.” Yet, although she paints a bleak picture, she remains optimistic. “We cannot go on like this”. The Ministry of Justice (MoJ), however, has defied an appeal court ruling and is pushing through legislation to allow officers in the proposed new private secure colleges to use force on disobedient children. “Labour has come out against secure colleges,” she says, “But they opposed secure training centres (STCs) last time they were in opposition. I hope history does not repeat itself and they put money before children.” She is embroiled in a legal battle to force the MoJ to fully disclose details of new restraint methods designed specifically to be used on children. When the plans were launched in 2012, she made an FoI request to see the restraint manual, because the one published by the MoJ had 182 redactions. Both the information commissioner and a first-tier tribunal have supported the MoJ’s claim that releasing the full manual would threaten security in both child and adult prisons. Willow is appealing directly to the upper tribunal. This legal fight comes 10 years after the deaths of Gareth Myatt and Adam Rickwood in custody. Myatt, 15, died from asphyxia while being restrained by three custody officers at Rainsbrook STC, and Rickwood, 14, killed himself after being unlawfully restrained at Hassockfield STC. “If the real obstacle is that these techniques are the same as those used on adult prisoners, then ministers should come clean and admit that, a decade on from the horrific deaths of Gareth and Adam, they still don’t have a system fit for children,” Willow says. Willow plans to establish a charity focused on safeguarding children in institutions called Article 39, after the part of the UN convention on the rights of a child. She says reform seldom comes from the top. “Adam [Rickwood] will go down in history as the person who stopped people in uniform being allowed to swipe children’s noses. He was unlawfully restrained and wrote a note detailing that restraint and asking what right they had to hit a child. He wrote his burial wishes, packed his belongings and hanged himself. No highly paid professional, or MP changed the law, it was a 14-year-old child who questioned and that should be honoured.” Curriculum vitae Age 48. Lives Nottingham. Family Partner, two children. Education Cleadon Park comprehensive, South Shields; South Tyneside FE college, social care certificate; Nottingham Trent University, BA (Hons) applied social studies, and social work certificate; University of Nottingham, MA social policy and administration. Career 2012-present: children’s rights campaigner and writer; 2000-12: national co-ordinator, Children’s Rights Alliance for England; 1998-2000: adult support worker, Article 12, and adviser to A National Voice; 1996-98: head of children’s participation programme, National Children’s Bureau (NCB); 1994-96: programme development manager, NCB; 1992-94: children’s rights officer, Leicestershire county council; 1989-92: part-time lecturer, social policy/social work, Nottingham Trent University; 1988-92: children’s social worker, Nottinghamshire county council. Public life 2005-12: member of advocacy committee, Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health; 2009-11: vice-chair, Council of Europe’s advisory group on child and youth participation; 2005-06: member, advisory panel, Carlile inquiry into youth custody. Interests Theatre, reading, politics, runs a debating society for home-educated children. • Children Behind Bars by Carolyn Willow is published by Policy Press, priced £10.39 • This article was amended on 11 February 2015 to correct the name of Carolyn Willow’s book. |