Key facts
Area: West Midlands
Grant recipient: English Province of Our Lady of Charity
Project: Anawim
Programme: Reaching Communities
Date of award: April 2011
Amount awarded: £397,505
The Anawim Project works with vulnerable women across Birmingham, including women engaged in and around prostitution, drug addictions, offending behaviour and domestic violence.
The project has a Reaching Communities grant of £397, 505 to support the programme’s outreach and prison team.
Anawim’s staff go to where the women are: on the streets of Birmingham, in women’s prisons, court and bail hostels. Women are often referred by the courts after committing offences such as benefit fraud, child neglect or theft. Back at the project’s all-female centre, the women receive one-to-one support on the full range of issues which affect them following an offence. They have access to a range of courses and activities, opportunities to socialise and relax, practical help with clothes and food provisions and a crèche facility. Only 3 percent of women referred to the centre go on to reoffend.
One of the women who have made improvements to her life with the help of Anawim’s programme is Alison*. A mother to a four year old son, she had been plagued by alcoholism, mental health issues and domestic violence. Alison received a three-year sentence for arson after she tried to take her own life by setting fire to her home.
Alison made numerous attempts at taking her own life. “In a way, the arson has ended up saving her,” says Gina Stokes, Outreach and Prison Support Worker at the Anawim Project.
Both her progress in prison and her previous mental health issues led to her sentence being reduced. After 17 months, Alison was ready to transfer to a Probation bail hostel, where over four weeks her plans were set with her case worker at Anawim. She was referred and moved to a therapeutic rehabilitation centre to underpin her recovery. During this time Anawim provided help with accessing benefits, support with finding permanent housing, health advice and emotional support.
Following this and, drawing on an existing partnership between Anawim and the housing association Midland Heart, Alison is in permanent housing and has full-time custody of her son.
Looking back, Alison said: “I would never have got my son back if it hadn’t been for Anawim and their prison outreach programme; I couldn’t have had better support. I hate to think what my life would have been like without this support ... they are always there for me and my son”
*Alison’s name has been changed.