Key facts
Area: Wales
Grant recipient: HMP and YOI Parc Prison
Project: Invisible Walls
Programme: Replication and innovation
Date of award: January 2012
Amount awarded: £3,137,466
HMP and YOI Parc Prison, Bridgend, received more than £3.1 million from the Big Lottery Fund to run its Invisible Walls project, which aims to work with offenders and their families during their sentence and after release to prevent reoffending and address other multiple and complex social issues.
Gavin Williams, a former inmate of Parc Prison, Bridgend, spent 15 years in and out of custody and his spiralling substance abuse left his relationship with his family in tatters. But after receiving support from the prison’s Family Interventions Programme and the Invisible Walls project, Gavin is clean, has rebuilt bridges with his family and has even set up his own freelance art business.
“When I first entered the prison I had never picked up a paintbrush in my life, but when I started to draw for my children as part of the programme, I discovered I had a talent for it,” says Gavin.
“My paintings and murals are dotted all over the walls of the prison. As well as the project helping me find a new talent, continual support also helped me reconnect with my family. The team at Parc went out of their way to organise visits for me and talked to my family to tell them how well I was doing. They opened up a Family Intervention Unit with a family area and the visits were made possible for families to come into a less formal environment to talk to you.”
“While in prison, I managed to secure a range of qualifications which is something I thought I would never do. I put my name forward for every course going and completed them all. The qualifications I got out of that was great to help me in what I wanted to do.
“The Parc team helped me get involved with the Prince’s Trust when I left the prison which in turn enabled me to set up as a self-employed painter. I was up and running as a freelance artist in no time - business has been really good and I’ve had non-stop help from Parc since the day I was released.”