FFOPS Trustee Report 2022-2023
**The Year again has been challenging yet rewarding. It is with the greatest of pride that we can say a very big thank you to every single person in our Charity who has never lost the vision of FFOPS “to support and be a voice for the Families and Friends of Prisoners”. Our Charity has certainly succeeded through thick and thin despite all the adversities and problems encountered during the Year. - Beverley Poiner (Founder of FFOPS)**
FFOPS manage the booking in/waiting area (cabin) at the entrance to the prison. We are the first point of contact for all visitors, which means making the right first and lasting impression. Getting our families to feel they can confide in us and thereby trust us is paramount. Located at the prison enables us to know, understand and communicate how the prison works, answering queries, providing practical and emotional support, helping with filling in application forms, helping with assisted prison visits, financial information, liaising with schools/social services/ solicitors/mental health services. Many of the visitors have different needs, some visible, some not. Getting to know our families enables us to assess their needs and the needs of their loved ones, and to ensure that they are treated with both dignity and care. It is our role to ensure that the prison booking team is aware of these needs prior to arrival to ensure that the visit is not impinged and the parent/carer does not suffer because of their disability. We believe that no child should suffer as a result of their parent’s actions. We also know that the prison environment can be a scary one, and visiting for a child can be overwhelming, nerve racking and intimidating. Our role is to reduce the impact that this has on the child or the parents, making the visit as relaxing as we possibly can. We do this by interacting, playing and talking to the children beforehand discussing their fears and worries and helping to explain the process.
## (Please see below feedback from the visits department)
My name is Christopher Jones and I have been working as a Visits Booking Clerk at HMP Swansea (MoJ) for nine years.
Visits Booking work closely with Carla to keep the avenues of contact between prisoners and their close friends & families open as best as possible.
We keep FFOPS up-to-date with potentially challenging behaviours which may occur upon arrival, health issues which may require the kindness FFOPS offer arrivals and immediately phone through any cancellations, alterations to bookings or concerns that we have.
In turn, Carla and her team are always welcome to offering us help & assistance in our jobs. FFOPS make Visits Bookings job all the smoother through their professionalism and kind manner. They provide at times assistance the likes of which we would expect from anybody of Officer, Manager or Governor grade within the prison.
Thank you.
Christopher Jones – Domestic & Legal Visits Booking @ HMP Swansea
We have an excellent relationship with the prison attending regular meetings and networking with other agencies where needed. We can reduce the number of queries the prison are dealing with by advising and consoling visitors who are distressed before they go into the visit. We are on hand to explain the routine and we can also walk them in through the search areas and then over into the visits centre to the PACT waiting area, so they have a friendly face with them. It is a priority to ensure children are made to feel welcome and that they are not frightened by the surroundings. Many are unaware that they are visiting a prison as they’ve been told that dad is ‘working away’ or ‘on holiday’.
We engage with the children on arrival and distract them with toys, games and activities, so they do not focus on negatives. Our aim is to encourage regular visits, thus maintaining family bonds. We treat all visitors with the respect and dignity they deserve. We liaise with the prison for disabled and special needs visitors. We can then arrange for people in wheelchairs and with mobility issues to have separate access. We have accompanied children with Autism and ADHD into visits and kept them occupied and involved so the rest of the family do not have their visit disrupted. All of these things make a huge difference to our visitors. We can arrange activities and outings for children to give their parents/grandparents a break, this is especially important when a member of the family needs constant attention, their siblings can feel marginalised and neglected so we try to arrange separate activities so everyone gets attention.
FFOPS are available to entertain the children/families and speak to them if they have any worries. We can speak privately to visitors if they need that time. Working with the support of the Probation sector in the Prison has enabled FFOPS to be able to check with them if we have any service users that we may need some extra support or information on the background of their loved ones needs and any concerns we have we can share with them.
(Please see below feedback from Probation)
I have been liaising with FFOPS with several cases and the support has been amazing from both a partnership perspective and for the sake of the men I supervised in custody and their families. I have attached a copy of the Performance and Recognition referral I made as a result of the support offered by Carla and the team.
JT– supporting his disabled mother with the use of Purple video visits.
MB – supporting his disabled and elderly mother with her adjustments to him being in prison and the impact that this has had on her at home. Also supported his mother in attending prison visits and attending the 12 Steps graduation.
GE – this was a very complex case, where there was a fabricated pregnancy and Carla and the team knew the woman from attending visits and were able to offer vital information to myself, social services, and police to support G through this process.
Domestic Violence – there have been several instances where a victim of DV has been visiting the prison and Carla has liaised accordingly with myself and the probation team in custody and the community.
Eleanor Page-Probation HMP Swansea
(Please see below feedback from the library)
Swansea Prison Library and FFOPs have created an excellent working partnership which is underpinned by the fact that Carla attends the fortnightly Wing Reps meeting along with our Library Orderly. This ensures that any collaborative work is evidenced to and supported by the Governors.
The Library creates and provides Gift Bags of Books for distribution to children visiting their Dads. We also provide magazines. FFOPs advertises children's events happening in Swansea Libraries and will focus on the Summer Reading Challenge during school holidays. Swansea Prison Library will also be running a Summer Reading Challenge for Dads, to run concurrently, to generate enthusiasm for reading and encourage family discussion about books.
When we held a talk on The History of Swansea Prison in April, Carla attended with a colleague and provided refreshments, for which we were extremely grateful.
Valerie Smith-HMP Swansea Library
(Feedback from Custodial Manager at HMP Swansea now HMP Bristol)
During my time at Swansea and managing the 12 step programmes/ISFL unit, I worked closely with FFOPS and Carla. Their dedication and support to the programme and Swansea in general was hugely impressive. The personal approach to supporting families through the visit process was key to the success of Swansea being successful. They offered support over and above what was expected provided catering for graduation days and being a friendly face to support the prison and families. The 12-step program was a very rewarding course. However, it did not come without its struggles. All those individuals who succeeding in passing the course went through some personal trauma and addressing their addiction was not easy for them and their families. Carla and her teams support to provide care and compassion during this programme was accredit to her and a credit to Swansea.
I personally am very grateful for the support shown and feel they were key to the success of the programme and the positive outcomes.
**We have received funding from the following Organisations during April 2022March 2023 :-**
**18/07/2022 TUDOR TRUST £25,000 18/07/2022 TUDOR TRUST £2,000 11/12/2022 ALLEN LANE £4,500**
**16/01/2023 SWANSEA UNIVERSITY £2,000**
**The above Funding contributed to :-**
**Staff salaries (Project manager/volunteer coordinator) FFOPS wellbeing expenses University 10 week internship placement**
FFOPS is an organisation that understands what it is like to feel ostracised and lonely to be the crutch that supports and the glue that helps to hold families together. Our aim is to do this pre, during and post sentencing and following the prisoners release continuing to maintain relationships to try and support whatever we possibly can. Prisoners are aware that in some cases, families could not survive without our support. In certain cases for some it is a harsh reality for prisoners to recognise that their actions do have consequences that do not only impact on themselves: it is this realisation along with working with ourselves through their families.
Case studies.
Family 1
Mother and 3 children aged 3,6 and 13. Dad has been in and out of prison for the last 10 years and looking at a long sentence of a possible 8 years. The younger children think that dad is just working away but due to the nature of his crime and knowledge in the community the eldest has become subject to bullying and refuses to attend school. Mum worries that his behaviour will escalate into possible offending at a young age because he seems to have no concept of consequences to his actions. Mum asked me to talk with the school and explain the issues they were experiencing and he is able to attend on a reduced timetable to assist his mental health and education needs. We also made referrals to the early help hub and gained family support for all. Mum is alot more positive about the future even without her partner at home.
Family 2
Sister of a prisoner visiting 2-3 times a week. Reached out to FFOPS for support for her brother when he is released. We sat with her and their mother and made a list of concerns and questions they had relating to his impending release and conditions. We then spoke with probation and gathered information to give them to enable them to support their loved one at home with his addiction issues.
## Family 3
Family visiting with 2 boys aged 5 and 7 both have behavioural issues. Mum struggles to get them to wait patiently before booking in for their visit which results in them becoming easily over-stimulated and very upset if they are not kept occupied. Mum now lets us know when they are visiting so FFOPS can make sure we have a member of our team ready to play, draw or read with them to ease their checking in experience. This means mum is less stressed and able to enjoy her visit. The familiarity of our team really helps the boys.
## Family 4
Adult visitor with autism and social anxiety requested help from FFOPS to explain the visiting procedures, what to bring and wear and also where to park close to the prison. Two members of the FFOPS team met with her and went through everything she needed and put her mind at ease before her visit.
## Family 5
Family of a prisoner transferred from Swansea to Cardiff Prison, after visiting and having support from FFOPS for 8 months, The mother and her 2 children aged 3 and 9 were worried about having to adjust to a whole new environment again. I spoke with the Cardiff invisible walls team and put them in contact with the family to give information and provide them with information for their prisons family support services. Now FFOPS are attending the prison's family days. We are able to see this family and stay in touch with them along the way. The children are always glad to see us.
Looking forward to the year ahead FFOPS are anticipating the levels of service users to be a lot higher than previous years. This will be a knock-on effect of the of cost-of-living crisis and the rise of financial related crimes. FFOPS will need to make adaptations to some of their services to fit in with the current climate.
We would like to focus on working with families after release and within the community. Many of our families feel there is very little or no support after their loved one is released, and this is when a lot of the families need it the most.
We are able to work with other prisons through the sentence and then into the home settling in period will ensure that families are fully supported all the way through.
Attending family days and events at other Prisons such as Usk, Cardiff and Parc have given FFOPS a great opportunity to meet other families and support them along their journeys.
By working collaboratively with other Prisons, we can make sure families have a point of contact and the correct information for their visits transition. For a lot of our families having been familiar with the process at Swansea the very thought of change to another prison can be really daunting and cause increased stress on top of what they are already going through. If families have any needs, we can speak to the Prison for them and make sure they know beforehand so at least some of the strain is taken off the families.
## **South West Wales Families & Friends of Prisioners**
Registered Charity Number 1054204
**INCOME AND EXPENDITURE ACCOUNT FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 MARCH 2023**
|**South West Wales Families & Friends of Prisioners**
Registered Charity Number 1054204
**INCOME AND EXPENDITURE ACCOUNT**
**FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 MARCH 2023**|**South West Wales Families & Friends of Prisioners**
Registered Charity Number 1054204
**INCOME AND EXPENDITURE ACCOUNT**
**FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 MARCH 2023**|**South West Wales Families & Friends of Prisioners**
Registered Charity Number 1054204
**INCOME AND EXPENDITURE ACCOUNT**
**FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 MARCH 2023**|
|---|---|---|
|Income|2022/23
2021/22
Expenditure
£
£|2022/23
2021/22
£
£|
|**_Grants & Donations_**
Allen Lane Foundation
Austin Bailey
Waterloo Foundation
National Lottery - Awards for All
National Lottery - Community Fund
Tudor Trust (1)
Tudor Trust (2)
Swansea University
**_Other Income_**
Donations
Bank Interest
Deficit of Income|Staff Employment Costs (incl. HMRC, Pensions, Redundancy)
4,500.00
Staff Training
2,500.00
Volunteer Travel, Training & Subsistence
25,460.00
Printing & Stationery
Telephone, Internet & Website
204.00
9,750.00
Insurances
25,000.00
Postage & General Office Costs
2,000.00
Bank Charges
2,000.00
Cleaning
Financial Admin / Independent Examination
Equipment - Play Materials, Educational Toys & Equipment
1,515.00
217.00
Meetings & Room hire
111.35
2.48
Chirstmas Children
Events
IT Software
Family Day
8,626.57
-
Surplus of Income over Expenditure
**43,956.92**
**37,929.48**|30,706.77
22,908.84
2,594.80
933.99
1,898.38
256.03
622.23
528.22
1,763.98
725.62
363.70
345.74
24.05
25.33
61.68
15.44
15.10
-
1,025.00
205.68
550.24
842.65
428.12
-
-
674.44
1,333.88
1,457.65
419.92
19.99
2,149.07
-
-
8,989.86|
|||**43,956.92**
**37,929.48**|
||||
|**BALANCE SHEET AS AT 31 MARCH 2023**|||
||2022/23
2021/22
£
£||
|Fixed Assets at cost
**Current Assets**
Bank
Cash in hand
Debtors
**Current Liabilities**
Loans (L. Byrne & B. Poiner)
Accountancy / Independent Examination
**Net Assets**
_Represented by:_
Accumulated funds b/f
Surplus or Deficit for the year
**Total funds this year**|-
-
22,010.65
32,069.48
30.78
59.20
22,041.43
32,128.68
1,500.00
2,955.00
200.00
205.68
1,700.00
3,160.68
**20,341.43**
**28,968.00**
28,968.00
19,978.14
8,626.57
-
8,989.86
**20,341.43**
**28,968.00**
374.60
264.93
These assets at bank/cash are "unrestricted"||
These accounts have been prepared based on the records provided to show the Charity's position as at 31 March 2023.
## _SA Coates_
**Sheralee Coates**
Chartered Accountant (South Africa) No. 03081932
## **Independent examiner's report on the accounts**
**Section A Independent Examiner’s Report**
|**Report to the trustees**
**On accounts for the year**
**ended**
**Set out on pages**
**Responsibilities and**
**basis of report**|Charity Name
South West Wales Families & Friends of Prisioners|Charity Name
South West Wales Families & Friends of Prisioners|Charity Name
South West Wales Families & Friends of Prisioners|
|---|---|---|---|
|||||
||31 March 2023|**Charity no**
**(if any)**|1054204|
|||||
||(set out on the 48 pages after the third page of this IER)
(remember to include the page numbers of additional sheets)|||
||I report to the trustees on my examination of the accounts of the above
charity (“the Trust”) for the year ended 31 March 2023.
As the charity's trustees, you are responsible for the preparation of the
accounts in accordance with the requirements of the Charities Act 2011
(“the Act”).
I report in respect of my examination of the Trust’s accounts carried out
under section 145 of the 2011 Act and in carrying out my examination, I
have followed all the applicable Directions given by the Charity Commission
under section 145(5)(b) of the Act.|||
**Independent** I have completed my examination. I confirm that no material matters have **examiner's statement** come to my attention in connection with the examination which gives me cause to believe that in, any material respect:
- the accounting records were not kept in accordance with section 130 of the Charities Act; or
- the accounts did not accord with the accounting records; or
- the accounts did not comply with the applicable requirements concerning the form and content of accounts set out in the Charities (Accounts and Reports) Regulations 2008 other than any requirement that the accounts give a ‘true and fair’ view which is not a matter considered as part of an independent examination.
I have no concerns and have come across no other matters in connection with the examination to which attention should be drawn in this report in order to enable a proper understanding of the accounts to be reached.
## **Signed:** _SA Coates_
**Date:** 12 Dec 2023
**Name:** Sheralee Ann Coates **Relevant professional** Chartered Accountant (South Africa) **qualification(s) or body (if any): Address:** 19 Libby Way, Mumbles, SA3 4LB
1
**Oct 2018**
**IER**
## **Section B Disclosure**
Only complete if the examiner needs to highlight material matters of concern (see CC32, Independent examination of charity accounts: directions and guidance for examiners).
**Give here brief details of any items that the examiner wishes to disclose** .
It should be noted that there is some liquidity risk, as mentioned in note 25 of the accounts, which is mainly due to grant funded projects continuing to run while awaiting further funding instalments and is exacerbated by a lack of unrestricted income which would help act as a cushion against these effects.
The fact that the vast majority of the organisation’s income is grant funded with restrictions means that flexibility is very limited. The loan total of £1,500 received from one of the charity’s trustees in a previous year is owed by the charity at financial year end. However, until such time as enough unrestricted income is generated by the charity it will continue to be unable to repay this loan since the charity’s main funding comes from grants with restrictions and objectives placed upon them
2
**Oct 2018**
**IER**