Corrections (Mothers with Babies) Amendment Bill

I move, That the Corrections (Mothers with Babies) Amendment Bill be now read a second time. I am delighted that this bill is back before the House tonight for its second reading, with a recommendation of support from all the members of the Law and Order Committee. Although this bill as originally drafted has been much amended over the nearly year and a half that it has been before the select committee, I believe that the amendments are a useful and worthy reflection of the quality of the work that was put into the bill by submitters, officials, and MPs alike.

Throughout this process I have been touched by how seriously members from other parties have taken my original concerns about the fate of babies and children whose mothers are in prison, despite the fact that this issue affects only a very small number of people each year. I would like to particularly acknowledge Simon Power and Chester Borrows from the National Party, and the chair of the select committee, Martin Gallagher, for the care and attention they put into this bill, through quite an exhaustive process. We heard a number of interesting and useful submissions from very different perspectives, ranging from prison reform groups, breastfeeding advocates, and experts on parenting and separation theory, through to legal and health professionals, and former prisoners. I would like to particularly acknowledge the latter for their courage in being willing to expose their own histories in order to help us understand the issue more clearly.

A number of critical points came through strongly as we considered the questions raised by my original bill and heard what submitters had to say. I will take the opportunity to touch on a few of those points now. One of the first big issues to arise was that of the length of time that a mother should be able to keep her baby or child with her while she is in prison. Quite a large number of submitters made the point very strongly that a period of 2 years, which was originally advocated in my bill, was actually not long enough, and that we should amend the bill to create a higher upper age limit—3 years being one of the more popular suggestions.

The proponents of the longer period felt that removing a child at 2 years was not only too soon but developmentally quite the wrong age to separate a child from his or her mother. Submitters also frequently noted that in other jurisdictions it was quite common for children to be able to stay with their mothers for 3 years or even longer. There was no common agreement from submitters on what the ideal suitable upper limit should be, with some even saying that there should be no limit at all. I confess that I was quite keen to try to move the limit upwards to at least 3 years, but in the end I have, of course, accepted the necessities of political compromise. It is far better to achieve at least the 2-year reform that I originally advocated, rather than no change at all.

I also understand arguments that were made, particularly by Department of Corrections officials, that all the women’s prisons in this country are basically high-security prisons, and that there are no open prisons of the sort that are available in other countries and are far more suitable for keeping older children within their confines, rather than the closed prisons we have at the moment.

Another criticism of my original bill, which came from groups like the Puriri Trust, was that in a humane society we should not be putting mothers with babies into prison at all. I have huge sympathy for this perspective. I believe that we should be working towards a situation where mothers who we feel should be locked up are located in some form of community-based habilitation centre outside prison walls, but until that happy day is reached I would rather achieve at least some progress rather than leave things as they are now, with babies removed from their mothers at 6 months, and with some mothers not being able to keep their babies with them at all.

I refer here to the situation of people on remand and to those prisoners who are given a security classification that completely denies them the chance to keep their babies with them. This happens because the practice in our prisons at the moment is that only sentenced prisoners classified as low security are qualified to apply to keep their babies, and because regulations do not allow the mixing of accused and remand prisoners or the mixing of differently classified prisoners within the same part of the prison.

Some organisations criticised my bill because they thought I was continuing these two exclusions. Not at all—the bill, in its original and now amended form, is geared to ensuring that, ultimately, all women who are remanded in custody will have the opportunity to keep their babies with them, as will women with a higher classification level, which currently denies them even being considered for this option.

Another issue that came up on a number of occasions while we were considering the bill was that of mothers who may not be willing or able to breastfeed their babies. Some members were concerned that the bill might discriminate against such mothers if it were wholly focused around the right to breastfeed. Again, this was a misunderstanding of what I originally intended, and we have now made it very clear, through the insertion of some new wording, that all mothers and babies are included and that all types of feeding are included, not just breastfeeding. I guess this misapprehension arose because so much of my original stated purpose for the bill was around the need to enable babies to have the right to breastfeed, but it was certainly never meant to exclude those mothers who cannot. However, all of us agreed that although a key element of this bill is to support the right of imprisoned mothers to breastfeed, all mothers should be able to apply to be part of the programme.

Given that another of the key drivers for me in putting this bill forward was my concern at stories I had heard of breastfeeding being used as a way of punishing mothers or of keeping them in line, I note the statement that we have included in the commentary on the bill, which was agreed to by all members on the select committee: “When there is no other reason to terminate the placement we expect that removing access to breastfeeding will not be used as a tool of prison management or discipline.” I sincerely hope that this will be genuinely taken on board and passed on through the Department of Corrections training and supervisions systems, and that we will not be hearing stories of such practices emanating from our prisons any time in the future.

One of the biggest problems with this bill is the lack of sufficient quantity or quality of facilities to cater for the possible demands arising from it once it becomes law. The Department of Corrections has made it very clear that substantial alterations and improvements will need to be made to all three of our women’s prisons in order to accommodate all possibly eligible mothers and children, once the bill comes into force.

As select committee members we were fortunate enough to be given the opportunity to visit the new Auckland Region Women’s Corrections Facility as part of our consideration of the bill. Although the units we were shown looked surprisingly homely, modern, and child-friendly, I think we could begin to understand some of the logistical problems that will occur once this bill is implemented and the age group of the children being kept with their mothers goes up.

Because it will take a little time—and I hope that it truly will be a little time, not a prolonged period—before sufficient facilities are ready, we agreed to an amendment that will mean there may be some limitations on who, and how many mothers and children, can be accommodated during the interim period. I note, however, that the numbers of possibly eligible women and children remain very low. In fact, when we visited the prison we found that there were no mothers with babies there at the time. I trust that the Department of Corrections will do its best to maximise the availability of facilities that do exist, until the additional accommodations are completed.

Another lingering concern I have had around this bill was the fact that I had heard that in some overseas jurisdictions—for example, the UK—some mothers with mental health problems or drug or alcohol addictions are denied the right to keep their babies with them, simply because of those problems. This denial is then exacerbated by the fact that the prison does not offer them the health support they need in order to work through and overcome their mental illness or substance abuse problems.

I am therefore pleased that we have made it very clear in section 81B, inserted by clause 5, that the prisons will be obliged to “facilitate the mother’s access to any treatment or counselling required to support the mother to care for her child:”. As long as the mother agrees to participate in treatment or programmes, these problems are not in themselves reasons to disallow a mother from keeping her baby with her. The Government has also advised that it is now putting substantially more resources into mental health, alcohol, and drug addiction services in our prisons. I certainly hope these extra resources are applied to women’s prisons as much as they are to men’s prisons.

But on a related matter, I, like other MPs, acknowledge that there are some situations where a mother should not be able to participate in the programme—for example, if she has committed violent or sexual offences against children or if she has issues that would put her child in danger. Nor should any woman be required or feel pressured to keep a baby with her in prison against her will. This bill is not about requiring or forcing any woman to keep her child with her, nor is it about doing anything that might hurt or harm her child or children. The needs of the babies and children involved are paramount, as we make patently clear in the purpose clause and elsewhere.

I would like to finish by once again thanking all the members of the Law and Order Committee and the officials who have worked so hard on this bill, as well as all the political parties in this House that appear to be continuing their support for my bill. As far as I am aware, votes for this bill appear to have continued to be unanimous, and that is a most unusual situation in this Parliament. I thank all members. It is a signal that this bill is a progressive reform whose time has indeed come.

The Corrections (Mothers with Babies) Amendment Bill that the member who has just resumed her seat referred to is legislation that most of us would like to think we would never have to pass or to use, because to think of a mother with a little baby being in prison is a horrible thought. However, I think that most members would understand that for parents, there is no greater love than the love they have for their child. When we think about those few situations where this legislation is expected to be used, where a mother with a very young child or a pregnant woman goes into prison, we have to think of the best interests of the child. Some would say that the best interests of the child would be to remove the child and place him or her with a foster parent. I wonder how that could really be in the best interests of the child long term, but in some cases it might be. But just the other day I read in the newspaper the latest story about the Chamberlain family. I am sure that all members remember Lindy Chamberlain, who was falsely accused and convicted of killing her baby Azaria. She was pregnant when she went to prison and her baby was born in prison. Her baby was removed from her and put into foster care for some years. I actually cannot remember the name of the new baby, because it was one of those unusual names—not Judith, obviously.

Hon Member: Azaria.

JUDITH COLLINS: It was not Azaria, no; it was Azaria’s sister. The newspaper reported just the other day that this young woman had grown up and she was getting married. She was walked down the aisle by what she called her four fathers. Of course, she had one biological dad—Michael Chamberlain—but she had been brought up by foster parents until her mother was able to come out of prison to reclaim her baby. Fortunately, from all reports, she seemed to have turned out a well-adjusted young woman, and she seemed to have a very good relationship with her parents, her foster parents, and the extended families. But what a sad story it was. I thought about how sad it was that that girl has missed out on having her mum at such an early stage, and that her mother has had a baby taken from her—how sad.

When our caucus looked at this bill we looked at all those issues to do with what was in the best interests of the children, and we considered very fully what the chances are for a mother who is in prison, and who, say, is properly accused and properly convicted, to be rehabilitated. To me that is a very strong point. I do not believe that most of the women in our prisons are there because they have been wrongly accused. I do not believe that at all. I believe that almost all of them are there because they have been properly convicted. But because people do bad things it does not mean to say that they will always be bad people. It does not make them bad people; it makes them people who have done bad things. If there is any chance at all for someone to be rehabilitated, then surely it will be through the person’s child, because that person will change for the child.

Many of us will have known people over the years who have acted in very strange ways and who have gone through very bad times when they were teenagers or when they were in their twenties or thirties. They may have been inconsiderate and broken the law, and then somehow, along the way, they have changed. Normally that happens because of their children. I have seen a number of people change their lives because they want to set a good example for their child. Those people can give us hope that, yes, people can change their ways.

I think it is also very important to remember that restrictions are placed on a mother if she wishes to have her baby with her in prison. Those restrictions relate to drugs, as there are no drugs, and having the mothers being part of rehabilitation programmes. They are about making sure that the babies are looked after and cared for, that they get their well child checks, and that they are in a situation where they are getting something that in many cases they would not have received if they had stayed in their own homes, even if they are in a prison. After having visited several prisons over the years, I would have to say that they are pretty bad, harsh places, but let us be frank. These children and these mums often come from the most dire situations. When we think about whether we should have babies being brought up in prison, we should also think about the homes that these children come from. This is a really sad thing to say, but, frankly, some children will have a better chance by having a couple of years in prison where at least they will have supervision, mum will be on a drug or alcohol programme, mum will get a chance to bond with her child, and mum will have a chance to be a human being, to feel, and to give love to her child. Those are the things that I think this bill can bring. The fact that this bill is being supported by all members throughout the House recognises that this is an opportunity for us to give a bit of humanity to a place like a prison, which certainly seems to me—and, thankfully, I have only ever visited prisons—to be a place lacking in humanity in almost all cases.

I see that the select committee has said that the chief executive should be able to not give that consent. I know the reasons for that are around the behaviour of the mother. They are also around the facilities and the availability of them. I would, however, have a word of caution about that provision and I would like us to keep an eye on it. I would hate to see a chief executive or a prison manager use the ability to remove a child as a punishment for a mother who steps out of line in terms of speaking up or standing up for her position or rights. I think that is something we should definitely keep an eye on. I can think of nothing worse than having a baby taken away—there is nothing worse. I simply cannot imagine how anybody could not feel like that. I do not think for a moment that I would ever want to see a child brought up in prison but, as I have said before, I think, unfortunately, there are some children—thankfully only a few—who will be in that situation. I cannot help but be reminded of those stories of Charles Dickens about the debtors’ prisons and the children growing up in them, and how terrible we thought that was.

Before I became a mother, when I knew all about parenting—that was before I became a mother, and then I got to know something and realised I was not an expert on these matters—I would have asked why we would want to do this, and I would have said that it was not in the best interests of children. I am, however, a mother and I have learnt a bit of humility—thankfully, not too much—along the way. I have also, I think, understood that unless a child is in danger, unless a child is clearly going to be severely disadvantaged, I would personally keep a mother with her child wherever I could, because it not only is the right thing and the best thing for the mother but has to be the right thing for the child.

In conclusion, the committee has kept the opportunity for the child to be always at the forefront of this legislation and there is the ability, if the mother is not complying with the drug and alcohol programmes—if she is not, in fact, looking after the child—for the child to be removed. I would like to hope that that will not happen, because I would like to hope that these little children will bring a ray of sunshine into those places and that they will help these mothers rehabilitate.

I thank the two previous speakers for their contributions to this discussion. Some important points were made by both those speakers. I listened very carefully to the previous speaker, Judith Collins, who touched on one point that I also want to touch on—that is, the best interests of children.

As I take a call on this very important Corrections (Mothers with Babies) Amendment Bill, I speak in support of the interests of the most vulnerable in our communities, our children, who are usually the unintended victims of maternal imprisonment. Māori children are particularly impacted as Māori women make up over half the prison population, and this makes it difficult to break intergenerational offending. Not a lot of us in this House can relate to that, but we have seen it in our own communities.

Maternal imprisonment has been shown to have a negative impact on a child’s future development across a range of indicators including physical and mental health, academic achievement, social skills, employment, and risk of offending. Maternal imprisonment has much more detrimental impact than paternal imprisonment, because women continue to carry out most of the primary caregiving responsibilities for children and especially young children. This means children are likely to have a stronger attachment to their mother, and this is disrupted when they are separated from their mother. Women are also more likely to be sole parents than men, and therefore likely to face greater difficulties in finding alternative caregivers for their children. The family unit is more likely to break down when the mother is imprisoned than when the father is in prison.

In addition to being separated from their mothers, these children may often experience disruptions to their living arrangements. They may be required to move to someone else’s home. If they have siblings they may be separated from them. They may not receive the level of care from a new caregiver that they would from their mother. They may experience being handed from caregiver to caregiver for the duration of their mother’s time in prison, and they may also lose contact with friends and the wider whānau. From a social perspective, they could also get lost in the system—and we can all relate to that—if they go from school to school, change doctors, change friends, change contacts, and change from the environment they are accustomed to. There are wide-ranging social effects in terms of children of women prisoners.

The best way to reduce the impact of maternal imprisonment is not to send women offenders to prison, at all, particularly if they have dependent children. It is a very serious matter when we consider the impact on the family of sending mothers of children—young children—to prison. This Government has introduced a range of changes to improve the existing sentencing regime. It has provided tougher alternative, community-based sentences, to reduce the need to send offenders to prison because there is no suitable alternative. I acknowledge the work of the previous Minister of Corrections, the Hon Damien O’Connor, in introducing these programmes and providing the courts with broader sentencing options, particularly when it comes to women prisoners who have children.

As of 1 October 2007 three new sentences came into effect. Home detention became a sentence in its own right. Home detention is a sentence that requires an offender to remain in an approved residence at all times under electronic monitoring and close supervision by a probation officer. Community detention requires an offender to comply with an electronically monitored curfew imposed by a court order. Offenders can be sentenced for up to 6 months on community detention and the curfew can be for up to 84 hours a week. Intensive supervision is a sentence in its own right, and can be used in tandem with other sentences like home detention and community detention. Intensive supervision requires offenders to address the causes of the offending, with intensive oversight from probation officers.

If these sentences are used as intended, the children of women offenders should benefit, as their mothers are not sent to prison and thus are able to continue to care for their children within their own homes or other environments. Using community-based sentences also presents an opportunity to get women engaged in key social services like Family Start, Strengthening Families, and many others. Community-based sentences also present a better opportunity to utilise community-centred approaches to addressing offending and creating positive futures, and that is likely to be particularly beneficial to Māori children.

If prison is unavoidable, we need to determine how best to mitigate the negative impact on our children. Our focus should be on what is in the best interests of the child. The options for mothers and babies are solutions for very young children, so that babies or toddlers do not experience a dramatic disruption to the key development stages of bonding and attaching to a primary caregiver. If the mother is breastfeeding, the child can continue to breastfeed. Breastfeeding has well-established health benefits for the child, and mother and child may enjoy a more stable and supportive environment than they might experience outside of prison.

However, even allowing for the above, it may not be in the child’s best interest to reside in prison, simply because there may be a person or persons willing and able to provide good primary caregiving to the child. From the child’s perspective, what matters most is not the biological relationship with the caregiver, but that the caregiver meets his or her developmental needs, including providing love. The mother may not be able to support the child and provide all those things, because she is grappling with big issues in her life such as serious alcohol and drug addictions.

Either way, our focus should always be on what is in the best interests of the child, not what is in the best interests of the mother. I believe that this bill’s proposals go some way towards that. We do not want to see women cynically trying to take advantage of the options for mothers and babies simply because they view it as an easy way to serve their prison sentence.

I have outlined in my contribution to this debate that the Department of Corrections has come some way over time in providing a range of options in terms of sentencing, and this particular option put to the House by the member Sue Bradford is another one of those options to improve the environment around children whose mothers spend some time in our prisons. I understand that the Law and Order Committee heard a range of submissions throughout the hearings, that during the select committee process there was cross-party support for this proposal, and that the bill came back to the House with some minor amendments, which had been proposed during the first reading and highlighted at that time by the previous Minister of Justice, the Hon Mark Burton.

It has been my pleasure to contribute to this discussion, although I have not had any input to it prior to today. I congratulate the member on introducing the bill, and I am sure there will be many more valuable contributions made on it. That is my contribution to this bill.

It is a delight to stand here and speak to the second reading of the Corrections (Mothers with Babies) Amendment Bill. Those listening might think that peace has broken out across the House, and that does happen from time to time when there is a good idea and it is workable. Some of the changes that have been made through the select committee process have really enhanced the bill, so I would like to pay tribute to the members on the Law and Order Committee who have played that role.

The member who just resumed his seat, Mita Ririnui, made the very important point that initiatives like these can go a long way towards reducing intergenerational crime and recidivism, and towards making changes to some families who really do need some kind of circuit-breaker in order to have change in their lives. Although Sue Bradford pointed out quite rightly that we are talking about a small number of families—a small number of mothers—this initiative will make a huge difference, I think, in forming good connections within those families. I cannot point to any particular academic evidence that would prove it at this point, but I just have a belief that when one looks at the love that a mother has for her baby, and that innate connection, one sees that this can be something that becomes a strength in that mother’s life, and she can work on that. As a result of that, many problems can be solved along the way.

The other thing is that when we look at the inmates currently in our prisons, we see that they are there for a wide range of reasons. Simply because a woman has committed some crime, it does not necessarily follow that she is a bad mother, that she does not have a love for her children, or that that connection is not going to be something that is positive in her life. I can think of one woman in particular who was done for bank fraud. She was breastfeeding her child at the time, and letters were written to the editor about this issue. She had to break off from breastfeeding, simply to go into prison. I have maintained an ongoing connection with a constituent of mine. Some members may remember that she was handcuffed during labour and the birth of her baby. I will never forget the pain she went through and the process she went through when she was told that she was not even allowed to start breastfeeding because she would not have her baby with her in prison—she would not be eligible.

It might come as a surprise to a number of members in the House that women in prison have had the right to keep their babies with them since about 1961. There is a regulation that says there is that right with babies under the age of 6 months. But the reality is that in all of those decades there have not been the facilities to allow that to happen. So there has also been an access problem with facilities, and good facilities. I think the self-management units were a step forward, but the reality for a lot of inmates was that the idea of having a baby brought in for breastfeeding a number of times during the day was never going to be practical. If we look at the placement of a lot of our prisons, we find that inmates have to have access to resources and people who are going to bring in the baby at certain times. I know that a lot of women just gave up.

I think the success of this bill will hang on the quality of the facilities. If we look at some of the facilities that have been set up in the United Kingdom and Australia—in fact, almost everywhere around the world, except Slovakia and New Zealand; we are really out on our own on this one—we find that there are plenty of really good examples of the way it has worked. These centres, or mother and baby units—whatever we want to call them—are very structured. They have mothers engaged in plans, which is part of the bill. Mothers sign up to a plan for their babies, and to a set of rules and guidelines. If those rules and guidelines are breached, in certain circumstances there are consequences. But the big thing is that the best interests of the child are paramount. The safety of the child is paramount. That is the overriding feature that is strongly protected and preserved in this bill. There will be some really tough cases where the department has to say: “No, we’re going to make a decision. This is not the best place for the baby to stay with you.” There will still be some heartbreak about that in the prison system; there will be some tough calls.

I do not want to see a system that is similar in some cases to Child, Youth and Family, where babies and children are kept with parents at all costs, basically beyond common sense, and, in some circumstances, to the detriment of the children. I think this will work only if there are common-sense guidelines. If mothers do sign up to those guidelines they need to understand that it is a relationship and there are some rules, and that there are good support networks around these mothers. I think it will take a lot more than just having regular Plunket visits.

I was quite shocked actually when I visited Christchurch Women’s Prison and was told that none of the staff who were involved with any of the babies who had been at the prison from time to time had early childhood education experience or some kind of knowledge of working around small children. I think that in the long term, working with various non-governmental organisations, there is an opportunity to make sure that we structure more support around these parents. It is not a case of just opening up a centre and saying: “Go for it. It’s almost like being at home, except you can’t leave.” We have an opportunity, where we literally have a captive audience, to be able to deliver some parenting advice, some guidelines, and some training. For a lot of these mothers, the reality is that they have not necessarily had the good parenting skills handed down to them from their mothers, their grandmothers, and their great-aunts that many of the members of this House have enjoyed and got a lot from.

I am very keen to see the maintenance of breastfeeding. It is kind of a shame that that had to be clarified, because I do not think anybody ever assumed that women who chose not to breastfeed or who were not able to do that would be disadvantaged somehow. But I think it was a good idea to clarify that, if that had been a concern during the select committee process.

I have found it quite moving to read some of the submissions, and to hear some of the personal stories of people who have written to us and told us of their experiences. Although some people in our communities say that a baby should never be in prison, I really think they are in a minority. As Judith Collins said, we do not want to see any babies in prisons, frankly, but we have to ensure that we get real. A lot of women inmates have children of varying ages—and I think that the age will go up over time, as well—and we want to maintain their connections. Once they get out they will still be mothers. I can think of one constituent who has felt an enduring loss at not being able to keep her baby, and pain at not being able to have a connection—the same connection any mother enjoys with her baby—when she left prison and found that her toddler had a stronger connection with the grandmother than with her. That is something that she probably will not recover from over time.

So here is the start. It is all dependent on the quality of the facilities and the support we put around them. The safety of the child is paramount. I think that everybody is in agreement with that. We have to have the right people in the prisons, and proper rehabilitation and proper services. Members would be appalled to hear that when I asked the question about rehabilitation in Christchurch Women’s Prison right now, I was told there was ping-pong and that was about it. Well, I think we can do more for our mothers. We can do more for our inmates to ensure that once they leave they are better people, and they have the skills they need to be mothers on the inside, and, more important, mothers on the outside.

Hon Damien O’Connor: Tell that to Simon Power.

KATHERINE RICH: That member over there should not chip in, because when I asked him how many women gave birth in prison, he told me that it was not important enough for his department to actually count the numbers, even though Matt Robson had done that. It is 10 a year, which is not hard to count, I tell Mr O’Connor—not hard to count. It is obvious when women have babies; people can kind of notice. So I do not think it would have been a big thing to count them.

I thank all those who are involved with this legislation. I think this is a really major step forward for our country.

Debate interrupted.

The House adjourned at 9.58 p.m.