Individual advocacy
Client groups
Our three client groups - detainees, ex-detainees and dependents - require distinctly different approaches to advocacy.
Detainees
With detainees we start with a group advocacy approach, as this is both easier and more pragmatic when factoring in the restriction that is deprivation of liberty. Many detainees though require a personalised approach - most especially those on who we find credible evidence of severe ill-treatment that could be said to amount to torture.
Ex-detainees & Dependents
By definition, ex-detainees and the dependents of detainees are not restricted through deprivation of liberty. So it is easier to take an individual approach, right from the start of our advocacy for them…
Expert witness
Many detainees, and some ex-detainees, require documentation and assessment of their severe ill-treatment of a nature and degree that could be said to amount to torture. We supply these reports to their lawyers, if they can get one. Sometimes we have to intervene directly in their cases. And if necessary, we can go to court to give evidence.
Dependent care
A police detainee’s child, found living on a trash dump in highly dangerous circumstances, before we removed her to the care of another NGO
Many police detainees, especially female ones, worry about those left at home when they got arrested. Young children and elderly parents need care. Whenever we become aware of such a problem, we make investigations and try to get the appropriate public services involved. Alternatively, we enlist the help of other local non-government organizations who have a focus on the care of children.
Job-seeking
Frequently, newly released ex-detainees need a bit of help with personal grooming - a hair cut and a new set of clothes. We can provide voluntary work experience, help with CV/resume writing, and signpost them towards suitable job opportunities.
Sponsorship
Sponsoring those less fortunate than ourselves is a popular method of giving. And so we have developed Patient to Prisoner (P2P)…
Long-term conditions
Diabetes is extremely poorly managed within many places of detention
Millions of patients in high-income countries (HICs) have long-term conditions such as diabetes, epilepsy and hypertension. High quality treatment is often extremely cheap or even free at the point of delivery. Even behind bars, good treatment is usually available; in the UK for example, all prisoners get completely free healthcare, thanks to the British National Health Service. Yet in low-and-middle-income countries (LMICs), it's often a different tale: countless prisoners lack even basic treatment for their long-term conditions.
Patient to Prisoner
P2P is our sponsorship scheme
The adequate treatment of long-term conditions is a large problem within places of detention. P2P facilitates a HIC patient with a certain long-term condition sponsoring an LMIC prisoner with the same health challenge: for example, a British diabetic sponsors a Filipino prisoner’s diabetes treatment. That said, you are free to sponsor someone with a different illness to the one you have, and of course we also welcome healthy sponsors!
Conditions & cost
We welcome enquiries about sponsoring prisoners with less common complaints, but here are the basic costs in the Philippines of treating the following common conditions for a year:
£25 buys enough amlodipine to treat a hypertensive patient
£50 buys enough pain medicine to treat an osteoarthritic patient
£75 buys enough medicine to treat a woman with very heavy, painful bleeding
£100 buys enough metformin & gliclazide to treat a non-insulin dependent diabetic
£250 buys enough seizure medicine to treat an epileptic patient
Please ask us if you have another condition for which you would like to sponsor treatment. Unless you choose to sponsor a prisoner on an ongoing basis, our sponsorship scheme is a simple one-off donation to cover a single year's treatment.
Certificates
We issued certificates detailing the sponsored detainee’s illness and country of detention. We can also issue certificates in the name of someone else: so, if there's a special person in your life with a particular long-term condition, why not mark their birthday by sponsoring a prisoner with the same condition?
Correspondence
We are happy to pass on anonymised print outs of greetings between you and your sponsored prisoner.
Sponsor
Email us your particulars, and donate the appropriate amount of money.
Other ways
Individuals are, well, individual. And we are always coming up with new ways to help particular clients who have more unusual needs. The key is to maintain our client-centred approach.
Defend the weak and the fatherless;
uphold the cause of the poor and the oppressed.
Psalm 82:3
