Society’s Aid For Prisoners Outlined

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31208, 4 November 1966, Page 2

Society’s Aid For Prisoners Outlined

Walking through prison gates as a “free man” can be the worst feeling in the world. Prisons provide their inmates with a basic security’—somewhere to sleep and three meals a day—but completely deprive them of initiative. When they walk through the prison gates for the last time they are on their own and need help.

Mrs M. S. Finch, secretary of the Canterbury and Westland branch of the Prisoners’ Aid and Rehabilitation Society, described the society’s efforts to rehabilitate prisoners and to help their families, at a meeting of the Canterbury Travel Club yesterday.

Basically, the society aimed to restore prisoners to decent citizenship, said Mrs Finch. By providingaccommodation, food and tools of trade it hoped to give prisoners a new start in life.

Often, men left prison without a home or family in which to go. They re-entered a strange world with a loss of confidence, little self respect and very little money. If a prisoner was not given the opportunity to make good and if no help was offered him, the community would

again suffer at his hands. The main problem the society faced was keeping prisoners out of gaoL Many men aimed to keep out at all costs—a healthy attitude—but others felt more secure “inside,” said Mrs Finch.

By visiting the inmate and his family, women of the society hoped to help towards a constructive view of life. One visitor had seen one inmate throughout his sentence, spending two hours each month with him, said Mrs Finch. "We have to influence the prisoners by suggestion, not by giving advice,” said Mrs Finch, “and that is not easy

for someone who has been a nurse.”

Prison visiting had made a ; very good impact and so far only three visited prisoners had been resentenced. Many found the visits the first individual attention they had received for a long time. Women had a healthy influence in prisons and were generally well received. Prisoners who had been deprived of love, understanding and example in infancy and adolescence found it very difficult to form good relationships with women. Eighty per cent of the prisoners in New Zealand came from bad homes and had bad environments, said Mrs Finch. In Canterbury the society visited Rolleston, Paparua and Addington prisons.

Families of inmates often were left in appalling circumstances. “While the old man was inside getting his three meals a day, the poor woman was often at home with a handful of children and the electricity turned off.” said Mrs Finch.

It was easy to make promises in prison, but after their discharge, inmates had to be accepted by their wives, their children, their neighbours, their workmates ' and most important, by “my wife’s relations.” Prerelease hostels had proved successful. Men worked in the community, but returned to the hostel for board and lodgings. A warden was in the hostel to deal with problems. Mrs Finch said she hoped to see a post-release hostel, to provide a temporary home for prisoners who had nowhere to go, established in Christchurch shortly.

“When the new women’s prison is built at Paparua, we will need more women visitors,” said Mrs Finch. “But we don’t want people who are merely ‘do-gooders.’ “Remember, all that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that men and women of good will do nothing.”