PRI wins President’s Award at the 2017 ICPA conference

Executive Director Alison Hannah with the President’s Award

The International Corrections & Prisons Association (ICPA) held its 19^th AGM and conference in London from 22–27 October. With a theme of ‘Innovation in Rehabilitation: Building Better Futures’, it gathered over 600 prisons and corrections experts from around the world to exchange information about innovatory initiatives and good practice.

PRI presented its 2017 Global Prisons Trend report at a breakfast session, and Olivia Rope, PRI’s Policy and Programme Manager, took part in a plenary session on innovations on gendered rehabilitation, chaired by Dr Kittipong (from the Thailand Institute of Justice) and with Lady Edwina Grosvenor as discussant. Olivia spoke about the experience and lessons learnt from PRI’s gender-sensitive community service project in Kenya, in delivering community sentences that meet women’s gender-specific needs and its potential for adapting to other country contexts.

At its Correctional Excellence Awards Ceremony, ICPA presented PRI with the President’s Award for its longstanding work and initiatives in the correctional sphere. The annual President’s Award recognises an individual or an organisation who has made an outstanding contribution to corrections and/or criminal justice and who exemplifies the values of the ICPA. In receiving the award, Alison Hannah, PRI’s Executive Director, thanked ICPA for its recognition of the part NGOs can play in corrections policy, the crucial role of penitentiary staff and management, and the importance of the international standards – particularly the Nelson Mandela Rules and Bangkok Rules – in establishing humane and effective prison services.