Women In Prison

In the UK, there are a small proportion of women within the prison which comprise of 5%. Due to the small amount of women within the prison population, in theory this should mean that women are well catered for (Walklate, 2004). However, women are disadvantaged as the specific needs of female prisoners are overlooked and dealt with inappropriately as they are imprisoned within a male dominated prison environment (Walklate, 2004).This leads to female prisoners being disadvantaged due to their numbers, as males make up 95% of the prison population. The small number of women in the prison means that the prison culture has been dominated by male’s needs rather than women’s (McIvor, 2004), this has resulted in “women’s prisons are inappropriately

Baroness Corston (2007) argues that treating men and women the same results in inequality outcomes as different and distinct approaches are needed for women as they require specific needs compared to men. The most obvious difference is that women tend to commit far less/ minor offences that are more acquisitive and have a lower involvement of serious crimes while men commit more serious, violent crimes (Corston, 2007:3). Therefore, there is a need for different treatment for women, due to women committing different offences, behaviour differs, biologically and socially women are different (Carlen and Worrall,

An example given by Corston (2007) is the regular, repetitive, unnecessary overuse of strip-searching. The effect on women is disproportionately greater than the effect on men due to previous sexual assault (Bastick and Townend, 2008). The experience of strip search for women is humiliating, degrading and undignified and a dreadful invasion of privacy. Corston (2007) found that one in three women have suffered sexual abuse within prison compared to one in ten men.
Women are located much further from their homes compared to male prisoners as they tend to remain closer to home (Corston,2007:21). Another, disproportionate factor is that prison is harsher for women in prison and practise as prison has been designed for men’s use (Corston, 2007:21), the majority of its standards and orders have been written only with men in mind (Corston,2007:22).
The criminal justice system is ineffective regarding women due to the inequality of treatment within the prison service between men and women. The treatment of women and girls within the criminal justice system is very sexist as described by (Heidensohn, 1985). As there is evidence of a fundamental difference between the treatment of male and female offenders (Corston,