Meeting at Exeter Cathedral
Thursday, November 12th 2009
Meeting at Exeter Cathedral Education Centre
on Thursday 5th November 2009 at 7.30pm
In November and December the Adult Education Group are using their meetings to discuss the work of Prison Welfare and the Justice System.
For the November meeting they kindly invited ACOOP members to promote the work that we are doing in relation to older offenders.
The talk was led by Liz Davis, the ACOOP Manager, with participation from Ken Humphrey, a former ACOOP ‘user’ and now a volunteer. Unfortunately Liz Ropschitz was unable to attend, due to illness.
Liz Davis outlined the aims and objectives of ACOOP. She supplied detailed information and pamphlets relating to the older prisoner population in the South West and the special problems that arise within this age group, both within the prison community and on their release. Ken Humphrey backed this up with details of personal experiences he himself had encountered.
The Meeting was attended by about 20 members of the Adult Education Group many of whom confirmed that they had been inside a prison (visiting purposes only!!) and seen the grim conditions that existed.
Liz Davis explained some of the simple things that volunteers were doing to assist the prisoners and to make their life more bearable. i.e., book club sessions, chair exercises, quizzes, bridge lessons etc., and invited those present to offer any help that they thought they could give to ACOOP.
Questions and discussions followed on various subjects arising from the presentation and a great deal of interest was shown.
The meeting closed at 9.00pm with a vote of thanks from the Chair.