Women in custody are some of the most marginalised in our communities. It’s time to put some real alternatives and genuine recovery pathways in place, says Rachael Clegg.
International Women’s Day this month is a time to celebrate progress, but also to face hard truths. One of those truths is this – some of the most vulnerable women in our society are still more likely to go to prison than into treatment. More likely to be separated from their children than supported to recover alongside them. More likely to experience systems as punitive rather than protective.
Women in custody are among the most marginalised in our communities. Many live with trauma, poor mental health, poverty, homelessness and substance use. Many have experienced domestic abuse or sexual violence. Many are primary caregivers. Almost all have faced significant adversity long before they enter the criminal justice system. And yet, for some women, prison is the first place they experience stability, the first time substance use stops, the first time there’s routine, the first time there’s a bed of their own.
Prison should not be the safest place a woman knows. If we’re serious about fairness and prevention, we must strengthen real alternatives to custody and create clear, gender-specific pathways from custody into residential rehabilitation. Treatment should not be a last-minute option at crisis point. It should be considered early – before custody, instead of custody, and directly from custody when appropriate.
Women leaving prison or facing court are often trying to navigate probation, social care, housing, safeguarding and mental health services all at once. These systems are complicated even for professionals. For women with histories of trauma – especially those who’ve felt judged or harmed before – they can feel overwhelming and unsafe.
If we want women to engage, we have to do more than offer a placement. We must walk alongside them. That means making safeguarding processes transparent, ensuring agencies communicate clearly with one another, providing practical support to attend appointments and hearings, and building trust through consistent, relational approaches rather than reinforcing fear.
Real alternatives
Alternatives to custody are not about avoiding accountability. They are about responding to the realities of women’s lives – trauma, motherhood, coercion and poverty – with structured, intensive, trauma-informed treatment options that include residential services and protect both women and their children.
Gender-specific residential services, such as Phoenix’s National Specialist Family Service based in Sheffield and Ophelia House in Oxford, provide psychologically and physically safe environments where women can begin to recover. They offer structured therapeutic programmes and trauma-responsive care, alongside parenting support delivered within treatment rather than separately from it. Safeguarding processes are transparent and proportionate, helping women understand what’s happening and why. Support is integrated across housing, domestic abuse services, healthcare and the criminal justice system so women are not left trying to coordinate everything alone.
Our recent internal review of family-centred residential provision showed measurable improvements in women’s recovery outcomes alongside significant gains in children’s safety, stability and wellbeing. This is whole-family recovery in practice.
Importantly, these services are not soft options. They are structured, accountable and risk aware. They give courts and probation confidence that women are engaging in intensive interventions designed to reduce harm and reoffending.
Treatment is not enough
Many women involved in the criminal justice system have experienced services as fragmented or frightening. Safeguarding can feel threatening. Court can feel overwhelming. Housing systems can feel impossible to navigate. Disclosure can feel unsafe.
We cannot simply expect traumatised women to ‘engage better’. Advocacy and coordination are essential. Women need support to understand processes, prepare for meetings, attend appointments and rebuild trust in systems that may have previously let them down. This relational work is not an optional extra – it’s central to sustainable recovery and reduced reoffending.
To make real alternatives standard practice, women who would benefit from residential rehabilitation treatment need to be identified earlier. Funding pathways must be clear and accessible. Referral routes between courts, prisons, probation and treatment providers need to be strong and straightforward. Cross-agency women’s panels can support timely, informed decision-making. Sentencers need confidence that residential rehabilitation is a credible and effective alternative to custody. And recovery cannot end at discharge – long-term aftercare planning must be built in from the start.
Rehabilitation should not feel like a ‘golden ticket’ available only when risk escalates to crisis. It should be part of a clear continuum of care that prevents harm rather than simply responding to it.
Call for change
As a society, we often expect the most from the women who have the least support. We ask them to stop using substances, comply with probation, attend court, secure housing, engage with safeguarding and parent under scrutiny, all while managing trauma and fear.
Women in custody do not lack resilience. What they need are accessible, gender-specific, trauma-informed alternatives that recognise both risk and potential. When we create real alternatives to custody and clear pathways into residential rehabilitation, we do more than reduce reoffending. We prevent babies being born into instability. We keep families safely together. We interrupt cycles of trauma.
Recovery for women, whether alone or alongside their children, should not be rare. It should be expected. And together, across justice, health and social care, we can build a system where that expectation becomes reality.
Rachael Clegg is head of operations for women and families at Phoenix Futures