Feel tempted to repost what I wrote this morning at 1am, but I'll spare you all that.
I think Catherine not paying for parking will become significant because their will be a parking ticket but Alison will be named (I'm assuming the truck is registered in her name) and it will lead to some complication about her being recently released. Then Catherine will have another problem to resolve.
No way is Neil TLR's father. Its clear from earlier series that it isn't him.
Neil and Ryan did go into the prison (or whichever building was meant to be the prison), and much as I think Neil is really unpleasant and could have been playing games with Clare by using Ryan, I think the suggestion that he might be being leant on by the gang (sorry cant remember how to spell the name) is more than plausible. And would explain the tiny phone and the message on it. And how they knew about getting visits etc..
Going back to the teacher's wife, I later thought that as a community police woman Catherine would be aware of whether there is a local refuge, or a local council support service, but yet again she is putting herself forward as an individual. And would have thought Sally Wainwright would have like to include info like that. But maybe there's another local funding cut and there is no refuge provision only what is called unregulated housing which is the most dangerous place for vulnerable women and means the local authority are basically putting women in the path of exploiters.
re. James Norton I had never seen him before the first series of this and then saw him in some lavish production of War and Peace where he was equally exploitative and not very nice but in a posh way. But it did make me think this is acting. Although his role in Granchester was just so comedic I couldn't take it seriously, although it touched on quite difficult issues.