Our latest eBulletin, sent out to subscribers on Friday, 29 May 2026
You don’t need to be a prisons expert to understand why housing male and female prisoners together is a bad idea.
Separate prisons for men and women have been the default assumption since at least 1823, when the Gaols Act established the principle of sex-segregated provision.
The 2007 Corston Report made the modern case for distinct provision for women. The 2018 Female Offender Strategy took separate male and female prisons for granted. This year’s Women’s Justice Board report was crystal clear on the distinctive needs of women
“Women are a minority in the criminal justice system… comprising just 4% of the prison population and 17% of those serving community sentences. The case for a gendered approach to women in, or at risk of, contact with the CJS – different to that in use for the male majority – is well documented.”
At the same time, some male prisoners who identify as women have, for many years, been housed in women’s prisons. Female prisoners who identify as men are rarely, if ever, placed in men’s prisons, for reasons that hardly need spelling out.
Following last year’s Supreme Court Judgment on the meaning in law of “woman” and “man”, this policy no longer appears legally sound. The Court was clear that, for a service to qualify as women-only (or men-only), it has to be operated on the basis of birth/biological sex. In setting this out, the Court did not create new law. It clarified the law as it is.
The specific implications for women’s prisons are set out in an Opinion by Ben Cooper KC, one of the most respected lawyers in equality law, and Myles Grandison, an expert in public law, which we published last week. In line with the Supreme Court Judgment, the Opinion concludes that women’s prisons can only lawfully operate as single-sex services if they exclude all male prisoners.
To do otherwise leaves the Prison Service open to unlawful sex discrimination claims from several directions: from male prisoners who might prefer to be placed in women’s prisons because it would be safer for them — former prison and police officers, for instance — and from female prisoners who experience anxiety, distress or loss of privacy through the presence of male prisoners, regardless of how they identify.
Some of the thinking behind the current policy comes from a good place: a wish to accommodate male prisoners who may have concerns about being housed alongside other males. For others, it is a question of recognition of a person’s gender identity.
Whatever one’s personal view on this sensitive area, this is where the law currently is. The Prison Service faces a complex task in both addressing that sensitivity and operating in line with the law.
I hope the Opinion is received as intended: as a helpful contribution to that end.
Richard Garside
Director
Upcoming events from CCJS
ALL TALK, NO ACTION? | 3 June
First up, on Wednesday 3 June, we host All talk, no action? — an in-person and online event on the continued marginalisation of race and racism in prisons, criminal justice research and wider policy debate.
On the panel: Dr Jason Warr, Khatuna Tsintsadze and Dr Angela Charles.
They’ll ask why racism in the justice system persists despite decades of scrutiny, what’s blocking meaningful change, and what “progress” would actually look like in practice.
Details and registration via the event page.
BJC ANNUAL LECTURE | 17 June
Then on Wednesday 17 June, the British Journal of Criminology holds its inaugural Annual Lecture in Oxford.
We’re delighted to welcome Professor Robert Sampson, from Harvard University, who will discuss the relationship between social change and patterns of crime, justice, and inequality. It promises to be a thought-provoking session for academics, practitioners, and anyone interested in understanding the complex interplay between society, crime and criminal justice.
This is an in-person only event and we only have a few places left.
Full details via the event page.
New footage: experts reflect on joint enterprise and prospects for reform
The Centre put one of criminal justice's most contested doctrines under the microscope last month, and the footage is now out.
Joint Enterprise in the Balance? brought together leading voices from law, research and advocacy: Dame Vera Baird KC, Felicity Gerry KC, Charlotte Henry and Dr Patrick Williams, with Helen Mills from the Centre chairing. The conversation was, in short, worth watching.
What came out of it: No easy answers, but that was rather the point. Speakers wrestled with why joint enterprise continues to generate concern despite decades of scrutiny, what the legal and practical barriers to reform actually look like, and whether the current wave of legal challenges, reviews and campaigning work amounts to genuine momentum or just noise.
There was broad agreement that the conversation needs to continue, between lawyers, researchers, campaigners and, crucially, those who've lived it.
The full recording is on the website and YouTube. You can watch it here.
Want the longer read? The Centre's most recent report on joint enterprise can be found here.
Working paper: The ‘best interests’ of children with imprisoned mothers: intentions and realities across three jurisdictions
Three countries, one principle, and very different results in practice.
This month we published a new working paper, The ‘best interests’ of children with imprisoned mothers: intentions and realities across three jurisdictions.
The authors, Natalie Booth, Rebecca Foster, Cara Jardine, Isla Masson and Francesca Pilotto, looked at Italy, Scotland and England & Wales, comparing how each system claims to put the child's "best interests" first (as required under the Bangkok Rules) against what actually happens on the ground.
The uncomfortable finding threading through the paper: the same principle, applied in three different penal and policy contexts, produces markedly different outcomes, particularly around Mother and Baby Units and the fraught question of when and whether to separate mother and child.
You can read the full working paper is here.
What’s what in The British Journal of Criminology?
For more than sixty years, The British Journal of Criminology (BJC) has published some of the most significant research in the field.
A number of open-access articles were published this month:
- Graham Ellison shows how a “harm reduction” policing model for sex work was reshaped back into established enforcement practices, revealing how reform is absorbed and reworked within institutional systems.
- Ciara Molloy highlights how a new edited volume centres imperialism in historical criminology, tracing colonial legacies in crime and punishment and challenging Global North–focused perspectives.
- Hannah Dickson and colleagues use linked administrative data from nearly 1.5 million people in England and Wales to identify five distinct offending trajectories across the life course.
Prison Service Journal archive
We are in the process of digitising and uploading the entire back catalogue of Prison Service Journal, from the first edition in 1960. A complete run from 1960 to 1995 is currently available, alongside a complete run from July 2010 to the present day.
This month, the editors have highlighted articles from editions 31, 32 and 33.
Edition 31
Alcoholics and Alcoholics Anonymous in Prison by F.C. discusses the first Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) group in a British prison, established at Wakefield in 1958. This historical article highlights how AA helps prisoners recognise the dangers of drinking and the importance of staying sober to avoid returning to prison.
Edition 32
This edition marked the centenary of the 'modern' Prison Service, which entered its 101st year in 1978. In this publication, Philip Bean’s Alternatives to Rehabilitation explores the decline of rehabilitation as the dominant penal philosophy. Rehabilitation, central in the 1960s, aimed to tailor punishment to people’ needs and viewed crime as a symptom of deeper problems. Bean argues it never functioned in a pure form and was weakened by practical limits, judicial resistance, and research showing little effect on reoffending. By the mid-1970s, these failures led to loss of morale and political support. Bean suggests this collapse created a vacuum in penal thinking and proposed alternatives, particularly a justice-based model emphasising fixed, proportionate sentences, reduced executive power, and voluntary rather than coercive treatment.
Edition 33
Writing in 1979, Sheila Lochhead reflects in Prison Visiting on the long tradition of voluntary prison visiting in England and Wales, arguing that – despite growing professionalisation within the prison system – independent visitors still provide an irreplaceable human link to the outside world by offering friendship, normal social contact, and reassurance to those isolated in custody. She emphasises that this informal, non-authoritarian role had become all the more important amid the social and penal tensions of the late 1970s, when prisons were under pressure and public attitudes were shifting.
Ground Floor Office Space Available
Looking for a bright, office in central London? We have a great ground floor office available now.
- 650 sq ft with excellent natural light.
- Raised floors, modern lighting, and air-conditioning.
- Less than five minutes from Vauxhall train, underground, and bus station.
What is more, you also get free use of a separate board meeting room at no additional cost.
All this from just £34 per sq ft—hard to beat in central London.
Find out more here or contact Jeanie Reid at info@crimeandjustice.org.uk.
Support our work
In the last 12 months, around one pound in every ten we received in income came from individual donations. We are so appreciative of the vital support we receive from our donors and supporters.
If you like what we do, and can afford to make a donation to support our important work, we would be very grateful.
You can also spread the word about our work by forwarding this bulletin to others and encouraging them to sign up.
