STORYBOOK Dads, the charity that helps imprisoned parents to keep in touch with their children, celebrated its 10th anniversary last month.

Patron of the charity Terry Waite visited the charity's base at Dartmoor Prison to join the celebrations and even dressed as Father Christmas for a couple of the Christmas DVDs which will be sent out to prisoners' children.

Storybook Dads headquarters and production centre is based at Dartmoor Prison, where digital technology is used to record, edit and enhance stories that are read by imprisoned parents for their children.

The stories are then sent to the children on a CD or DVD. As well as providing comfort to the children, research has shown that maintaining these links helps to reduce re-offending.

Chief executive of the charity Sharon Berry said: 'The link we provide between parents and their children can be a lifeline to many of the 200,000 children who experience the imprisonment of a parent each year in the UK.

'We have grown so much since we became a charity ten years ago and in January we will be opening another editing and production centre at Channings Wood prison near Newton Abbot.'

The charity has won a string of national awards for its work in prisons and it has disseminated the scheme into more than one hundred prisons nationwide, including women's prisons, and the scheme has been replicated in Poland, Denmark, Hungary, USA, Japan and Australia. In addition, Storybook Dads provides the training required for the armed forces to copy its model.