left alone. If the weather was nice we could sit out in the garden at tables. Visitors were checked when they arrived and we were checked when we went back into the house in case we had been handed anything which was still not allowed. But they could bring clothes and toiletries and books and plates and other things one needed, particularly in the first twenty-eight days of getting there – thereafter clothes could be exchanged every three months but you still had to keep to the upper limit of items allowed at all times, which the women found too restrictive. You were also entitled to five toiletry items a month (women’s sanitary needs were met for free inside ESP) and, if you had money on your account, purchases of up to £20 a month were allowed from the monthly Avon catalogue or Pak Cosmetics company, which specialises in products for Afro-Caribbean women. This was all in addition to weekly purchases from a ‘canteen’ sheet which contained some 100 items from which residents could buy extra products using their weekly wagesand up to £25 from their ‘float’ if they had one. The list of items ranged from cigarettes to hair dyes. Most of the girls spent their money on phone calls and the rest on sweets and cereals though a number of us used ‘canteen’ to buy some healthier items to eat each week such as fruit and olive oil.
My family duly brought me lots of things I needed and that was great – more items arrived with each visit over the next month: books, stamps and stationery were allowed but had to go through reception first. I couldn’t understand why stamps had to be sent separately rather than handed out to us when we met our families. I later discovered that there was a concern traces of LSD or other drugs may have been pasted on the sticky bit by whoever was sending them. Similarly magazines were considered to be dangerous as there could be other drug substances smeared on the pages. I had no idea! As a result, during my entire time inside I thought it was some bureaucratic rule to frustrate everyone for the sake of it – no one had explained to me why the system was as it was. This lack of communication is not a trivial point – academic research into experiences of imprisonment shows that rules without explanation serve to fuel anger, frustration and a sense of injustice among prisoners. Worse, these experiences will likely be reinforcing the inequality or unfairness many have encountered prior to their time inside. 85
I was thrilled to see my visitors and they were so pleased to see me in a much more pleasant environment compared to Holloway. The two hours passed very quickly and the treat for me was also being able to have a drink of Blantyre apple juice, which was made with local apples and bottled bythe Blantyre inmates. Having compared the juice in these bottles with other apple juice available on the outside I would vouch that it was brilliant – and my children and other visitors thought so, too. For some reason it was not available in ESP except through the coffee shop in the visitors’ building although it was also sold to the general public in the farm shop that sold the produce from the ESP farm, meat factory and gardens. But they never made enough of it and for some of the weekend visits we were left disappointed with no juice available. There is some business opportunity being missed here, it seemed to me. Also for some incomprehensible reason the farm shop closed at 12 on Saturdays when it could have sold a lot to the visitors who arrived at 1.30 p.m. if it stayed open a bit later. Many of us suggested this while I was there but never got a proper answer. In this rather tight fiscal environment, with cuts across the MoJ’s budgets requiring the service to ‘sweat’ the assets, this seemed to many of us to be another lost opportunity to increase revenues.
Come the end of visiting time, we women hugged our children, parents, partners; waved our desperate goodbyes as cars departed
My family duly brought me lots of things I needed and that was great – more items arrived with each visit over the next month: books, stamps and stationery were allowed but had to go through reception first. I couldn’t understand why stamps had to be sent separately rather than handed out to us when we met our families. I later discovered that there was a concern traces of LSD or other drugs may have been pasted on the sticky bit by whoever was sending them. Similarly magazines were considered to be dangerous as there could be other drug substances smeared on the pages. I had no idea! As a result, during my entire time inside I thought it was some bureaucratic rule to frustrate everyone for the sake of it – no one had explained to me why the system was as it was. This lack of communication is not a trivial point – academic research into experiences of imprisonment shows that rules without explanation serve to fuel anger, frustration and a sense of injustice among prisoners. Worse, these experiences will likely be reinforcing the inequality or unfairness many have encountered prior to their time inside. 85
I was thrilled to see my visitors and they were so pleased to see me in a much more pleasant environment compared to Holloway. The two hours passed very quickly and the treat for me was also being able to have a drink of Blantyre apple juice, which was made with local apples and bottled bythe Blantyre inmates. Having compared the juice in these bottles with other apple juice available on the outside I would vouch that it was brilliant – and my children and other visitors thought so, too. For some reason it was not available in ESP except through the coffee shop in the visitors’ building although it was also sold to the general public in the farm shop that sold the produce from the ESP farm, meat factory and gardens. But they never made enough of it and for some of the weekend visits we were left disappointed with no juice available. There is some business opportunity being missed here, it seemed to me. Also for some incomprehensible reason the farm shop closed at 12 on Saturdays when it could have sold a lot to the visitors who arrived at 1.30 p.m. if it stayed open a bit later. Many of us suggested this while I was there but never got a proper answer. In this rather tight fiscal environment, with cuts across the MoJ’s budgets requiring the service to ‘sweat’ the assets, this seemed to many of us to be another lost opportunity to increase revenues.
Come the end of visiting time, we women hugged our children, parents, partners; waved our desperate goodbyes as cars departed
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