Scots prisoners handed £900-a-week for Tesco shop

FEMALE prisoners are being handed more than £900-a-week to spend on a Tesco shop.

Inmates at the Lilias Centre in Maryhill. Glasgow – which opened in 2022 and is home to 24 inmates – are allowed to spend £38.50 each on goodies from the supermarket.

Jail staff ask them what they want from the store – like food, toiletries and various other items – and then order it online for them, costing £924-a-week when the jail is full.

Plans had been make to allow inmates out of the facility – which has en-suite bathrooms and 24 ‘flats’ in four ‘houses’ – to go to the nearby Tesco store, just an eight-minute walk away, themselves.

These plans, however, were scrapped soon after the jail – which includes six women serving life sentences – opened after chiefs decided against it at the last minute.

A recent report out into the jail by the Chief Inspector of Prisons for Scotland stated that it was ‘disappointing’ that women weren’t allowed to go to the shops themselves.

It also said that staff should ‘monitor’ what kinds of food inmates were buying more closely – after it was found that many were dodging ‘healthy items’.

The report states: “The women were provided with £38.50 for their weekly shop and staff facilitated online shopping from Tesco for them.

“While the ability to shop and cook for themselves was helpful in preparing the women for independent living outside, it was disappointing that the women were not allowed to go out to shop for themselves.”

It stated that it had been the ‘original intention’ to allow women to go to Tesco when the centre was being planned.

The report added: “Personal officers checked whether the women were ordering enough food and attempted to encourage healthy eating habits.

“All shopping sheets were also sent to the catering manager at HMP Stirling for assurance that they were making well balanced choices.

“Despite this, some of the shopping lists observed by inspectors did not look particularly healthy and further encouragement to eat healthily should be given.”

A recommendation in the report states: “The Lilias Centre should make greater efforts to check whether the women are picking healthy options for their shopping list.”

The report said women could wear their own clothes and were ‘free to move around, so had access to fresh air throughout the day’.

It said a place called ‘The Hub’ provided a ‘bright and relaxed setting for activities and visits’, adding: “The Hub was a lovely therapeutic area to sit and relax in or walk round.

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“The women got the opportunity for supervised longer walks around the internal perimeter of Lilias twice a week.

“There were good quality rain jackets provided. for those wishing to get fresh air in poorer weather.”

Among the activities on offer at the jail, include arts and crafts, meditation, mindfulness sessions, theatrical work – as well as therapy dogs coming into the jail to be patted and stroked by offenders.

The report also found that many inmates had complained that they weren’t allowed out of jail to attend church on Sundays.

It said: “The HMIPS pre-inspection survey indicated that some women were frustrated at not being able to attend a local church at the weekend due to security restrictions.

“(This) demonstrates the tensions that Lilias has faced daily when balancing opportunities against risk.”

The Scottish Prison Service (SPS) say the Lilias Centre is home to ‘low supervision women’ and are designed to provide ‘safe and secure accommodation’.

It states: “Women will be supported to live independently in accommodation based on a ‘shared house’ principle to develop a range of independent living skills, which are reflective of real life.

“Each house is fitted with a shared kitchen and living area, as well as individual, en-suite bedrooms.”

It comes after Britain’s first women’s community custody unit – a small-scale detention centre – was opened in Dundee in August 2022.

The 16-space Bella Centre has a focus on “custody in the community” and helps inmates near the end of their sentence to be supported to live independently.

The building, which is the middle of the city’s Hilltown ward, is surrounded by residential properties and has been designed to blend into its surroundings.

The experimental centre comes with a hefty price tag of around £11.6million to set up – and can only accommodate 16 women at a time.