Mothers on trial

Having worked as a criminal and family barrister, Shona Minson has seen the effect on women and their children when a mother is sentenced to prison for committing a crime. Her essay considers the 1989 Children Act and what she sees as contradictory approaches to motherhood in British law. Dr Shona Minson is a New Generation Thinker on the scheme run by the Arts and Humanities Research Council and the BBC to put academic research on radio. She is based at the University of Oxford, has researched the sentencing of women and has written a book Maternal Sentencing and the Rights of the Child. She has also been appointed to the newly created government advisory body the Women’s Justice Board. Producer: Lisa Jenkinson

You can listen to Mothers on trial online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

Mothers on trial is an episode from The Essay by BBC.

This episode is 13:42 long.

This episode was published on Mar 31, 2025.

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