Ruby's story: Why I spend my time with people on the inside
Every fortnight or so, I leave work a little early, get on my bike, turn down a lane on Brixton Hill, and enter a place most people will never go: prison. I lock all my possessions in a locker apart from a slip of paper and a ten-pound note. After passing through a scanner and a search, I’m assigned a number and sit down on a slippery plastic chair to wait to speak to a man who has lost his freedom.
"I’ve taken part in other volunteering opportunities before, but it always felt that there wasn’t a big difference if I was there or not. With prison visiting, you are making a huge impact in one person's life."
I’m a volunteer visitor at HMP Brixton and today I’m visiting Alfie. He’s friendly and has a huge booming laugh. His story is difficult to hear and doesn’t always join up. There are pieces that don’t make sense, but I know that the last time he was released from prison, he had nowhere to live. He started drinking and using again, and ended up back inside.
I enter through the same entrance as the other visitors. People rocking babies, little children waiting to see their dad. It’s the parents of prisoners that touch me the most – like at weddings, where I always find the parents' speeches the most moving.
Maintaining relationships and social connection is the “golden thread” in rehabilitation. Prisoners who maintain positive family relationships are 39% less likely to reoffend. But many families find it difficult to visit, or were never there to visit in the first place. I’m not family, but I can provide a small slice of normality: a conversation about how things are going, without motive, just to build a sense of connection and hopefully in turn, self-esteem.
I’ve questioned my motives for going. Maybe it’s curiosity, or guilt, or just a need to do something that feels tangible on a human level after a week in my policy-based charity job. I’ve taken part in other volunteering opportunities before, but it always felt that there wasn’t a big difference if I was there or not. With prison visiting, you are making a huge impact on one individual, and that feels very meaningful to me.
My friends and family are curious: No, I don’t know exactly what they’ve done. You get a sense, though, after a few conversations. Maybe you hear about gangs, violence, abuse, homelessness, trauma. But I wouldn’t ask directly. I don’t ask people to walk me back through their worst choices – that’s their story to offer.
"How do I know what to say? You just talk. It’s real conversation, sometimes funny, sometimes awkward, sometimes surprisingly ordinary and you find new reference points when the usual ones aren’t there."
How do I know what to say? You just talk. It’s real conversation, sometimes funny, sometimes awkward, sometimes surprisingly ordinary and you find new reference points when the usual ones aren’t there. Sometimes that’s about TV — lately, chats about Married at First Sight, who’s being unreasonable and which couple might actually make it. It’s ordinary, almost silly, but it gives us something that exists outside the prison walls, a world we can both step into for a bit.
These ordinary conversations have revealed something to me: that small bids for human connection can be very powerful. Sometimes I’m one of the only people that they know and speak to regularly. So I hold hopes for them, and aspirations for them, even when they may struggle to hold those for themselves.
Our collective blind spot towards those we imprison is incredibly damaging. As a society it is our not only responsibility to rehabilitate and care for those we imprison, but also in our best interests – if we don’t, we are all stuck in the same loop of offending, reoffending and victimhood.
"Sometimes I’m one of the only people that they know and speak to regularly."
Alfie is due to be released soon. I hope he finds somewhere to live beyond the few weeks of probation housing that has been secured for him. I hope he continues to go to therapy where he’s begun, for the first time, to speak about the abuse he suffered as a child. I hope he can reconnect with his children and be a different kind of father than the one he knew. I won’t know whether any of these hopes are realised, but I’ll think about Alfie over the coming weeks.
When I go back to the lockers to collect my things, I take my phone out and text my husband: “Just leaving prison now.” He always finds these texts bizarre - = the criminal justice system feels so far from our lives. Of course, it’s not – it’s far closer than most of us realise. Around 1 in 15 children (≈ 7%) will experience a parent’s imprisonment at some point during their school years. When one person goes to prison, their whole family receives a sentence.
As I leave the prison, I think of Alfie. When he walks out in a few weeks’ time, I hope that it’s forever.
