President Marie-Louise Coleiro Preca has called for the setting up of a Family Intervention Unit at at the prisons to act as a bridge between prisoners and their families, including children’.

Speaking at a public lecture of engaging offenders with their children and families, organised by Fondazzjoni mid-Dlam għad-Dawl, the President spoke about the difficulties offenders encounter when they re-enter society. Such difficulties are made worse in Malta, a relatively small community  where offenders are well known and therefore marginalised at the outset.

As a result, many find it difficult to get a job, education and decent housing, all of which lead to poverty, and subsequently they find themselves returning to crime.

All this leads to 75% of the prisoners being repeat offenders.

“In the meantime, children and families of offenders continue to suffer unnecessarily, not only from the stigma associated with imprisonment of a family member, but even more through the consequences this has on the whole family”, the President said.

She said that a Family Intervention Unit would need to be manned by professionals from the social and psychology fields, family relations officers and family therapists. 

President Coleiro Preca also called for adequate sentence planning “that focuses on incarcerated persons being active during their time spent inside the prison”, whilst she also remarked that offenders need to be given the possibility to have work opportunities and adequate training.

With 200 foreign nationals at Corradino Correctional Facility, the President suggested that there should be the possibility of use of electronic communications for these prisoners to have access to communication with their families in other countries.