Protected family homes for imprisoned mothers, the Cnel gives the green light to the legislative decree
These are facilities outside prison aimed at social and labour reintegration, also an alternative to attenuated custody institutions
Protected family homes, outside the prison, for female prisoners who are mothers in criminal execution, with young children. The Cnel unanimously approved the bill, which aims to create an alternative to detention solutions for mothers and children, including the route of the Institutes with attenuated custody for female prisoners (Icam), established by law 62/2011.
In the knowledge that the protection of the fundamental rights of minors passes through the support of vulnerable mothers, the bill, consisting of one article and several paragraphs, enhances the role of territorial services and social networks. Among the critical issues to be overcome is the poor and uneven spread of family homes, also due to the absence of an obligation for the Ministry of Justice to enter into conventions with local authorities to find facilities.
What the measure provides for
The measure acts on several fronts. The Minister of Justice will have to enter into agreements with local authorities to identify suitable facilities, while local authorities will have to reconvert as a prioritypublicly owned real estate, using available resources. The bill envisages the expansion of the institutional subjects involved in the provision of real estate, including local authorities, provinces, metropolitan cities, unions of municipalities and other territorial entities.
The municipalities, in which the family homes are located, are in charge of ensuring multidisciplinary care of the inmates and their children and of adopting the necessary interventions to foster work and social reintegration at the end of the sentence, with the involvement of the social and territorial services. It will be the External Penal Enforcement Office (Uepe) that will draw up an individual plan for work reintegration in cooperation with employment centres and accredited bodies.
Integrated governance
Then, an integrated governance model was introduced, with the involvement of the regions and local authorities. The connection concerns social and health territorial services and the support network for minors and parenting. An inter-ministerial decree (Justice, Labour and Social Policies, Health) will be entrusted with the updating of organisational and management standards and with the definition of tools for assessing the quality of interventions as well as the outcomes of inclusion pathways.
