The Canadian Press
VANCOUVER—Mo Korchinski remembers what it was like being separated from her three children.
Her struggle with addiction and cycle through B.C.’s corrections system led her to what she calls a state of denial of even having them.
In the decade that she has been out and rebuilding her life, Korchinski has reconnected with her kids, who were raised by their father and other family members.
As an advocate for prisoners, she said she’s seen the life-changing benefits of mother-child programs that allow women to keep their babies.
“If you take a woman’s child away and don’t give them an opportunity, where is the hope?” Korchinski asked.
“But if this person comes out with hope, they have a chance to change their life.”
Korchinski was among the first inmates at Alouette Correctional Centre for Women in Maple Ridge when it opened in 2004 and witnessed her fellow inmates benefit from the mother-child program when it was first developed.
“You bring a baby into a room full of women and it changes everybody≤” she noted.
“It changed the jail. People watched their language.
“People’s behaviour just changes around children,” she added.
The program was shut down in 2008, but a B.C. Supreme Court decision in December, 2013 determined the closure of the facility infringed the rights of women and their children.
Since the mother-child unit reopened in June, 2014, two women have used the program, says the Ministry of Public Safety and Solicitor General.
One of the mothers who participated in the program during her pregnancy was released shortly after giving birth in custody.
The second mother remained in the program with her baby until she was released in March.
“Those babies have had a better chance in their life to start off than they otherwise would have,” said Dr. Ruth Elwood Martin, director of the Collaborating Centre for Prison Health and Education at the University of British Columbia.
Mother-child units offer women access to prenatal and parenting skills programs before the child is born, and appropriate facilities to care for their infants while they serve the remainder of their sentence.
Martin said the units are comparable to a nursery or day-care facility, which are bright, welcoming, and safe for any child.
She added it’s in the best interest of the child to stay with a mother, and have the opportunity to breastfeed and develop a mother-child bond during the newborn stage.
“Once you take that baby away, you can’t go back,” Martin stressed.
The opportunity to keep their children is an incentive for women to turn their lives around, agreed Martin, while losing custody causes hopelessness and despair that can send women back into activities that initially led to their arrest.
National guidelines for mother-child units released in November are designed to priorize a child’s interests, allowing the child to stay with their mothers up to the age of four in the federal system.
They also allow mothers access to health and social programs.
