PRISONER PASSPORT PILOT PROJECT
FINAL REPORT
MARCH 2000
This report is based on a pilot study, jointly funded by
the Cabinet Office and The Prison Service. The learning lab was part of
the work of the Cleveland and Durham Quality Network and the researcher
was from the University of Sunderland.
The researcher John Harrison is now based at the
University of Teeside and any contact can be made as follows:
John Harrison
Lecturer in Criminology
University of Teesside
School of Social Sciences
Middlesbrough
TS1 3BA
Phone 01642 342339
email j.d.harrison@tees.ac.uk
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY:
Background:
The quality and accessibility of the public services
used by prisoners on release affects their resettlement back into the
community. Delays in finding housing, employment or making a claim for
benefit, can increase the likelihood of re-offending. Members of the
Cleveland and Durham Quality Network, which includes representatives from
a range of local public services, identified that there was considerable
scope for improving current service provision through enhanced pre-release
courses and better co-ordination of services. The production of a
‘personalised’ passport into local public services for prisoners would
be a key element.
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Methodology:
A Learning Lab was constituted to develop the pilot
project, with input from a University of Sunderland researcher. A steering
group comprising representatives from the Prison Service, Cabinet Office,
Benefits Agency, Employment Services and Probation Service oversaw the
project. Additional expert advice was provided by a working party of the
key agencies involved (most of the organisations above plus Inland
Revenue, Local Authorities, and the Post Office).
The course and draft passport was piloted at five
prisons in the North East: Kirklevington Grange, Holme House, Durham, Low
Newton and Deerbolt. Courses were run separately from existing provision
because of the timescales, but in future they should be integrated
wherever possible. This led to the development of a model course
framework, setting out the key areas which pre-release courses need to
cover. Copies of the course programme and the five framework prisoners’
passports are at Annexes 2 and 3 respectively.
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Key findings:
 |
Quality networks provide a useful mechanism for
bringing together local service providers and sharing ideas. The
Learning Lab model proved to be an effective way of building on this
and bringing people together, developing ideas, encouraging innovative
thinking and delivering real improvements; |
|
Up-to-date information on important issues (e.g.
entitlement to benefits upon release and how to make a claim)
affecting the chances of a released prisoner successfully
re-integrating into the community is often not available at present.
The course framework and passport could be an effective way of meeting
this need; |
|
Preliminary evaluation suggests that prisoners
welcomed the approach and that it helped the resettlement process.
Indeed one prisoner who was due to be released on the Monday after
taking the course on the previous Friday realised the extent of the
contacts he needed to make. During the course he was able to make
appointments and prepare claims and felt much more able to face his
release, especially as he was moving to a new area where he had not
previously lived; |
|
The main barriers to closer working between the
public services were the wide range of agencies involved; the
complexity of their rules and procedures; and a strong sense of
individual ownership of particular services combined with fears about
resource implications and job security; |
|
Barriers to closer working can be overcome if
agencies recognise the benefits in relation to staff morale and
customer satisfaction, and focus on their shared aim (i.e. to meet the
needs of a specific user group) rather than functional differences; |
|
Effective liaison between service providers has a
positive impact on the provision of up to date information to users
and the notification of policy changes and their implications; |
|
Front-line staff are well placed to identify the
changes which will lead to better service provision; |
|
Information provided to users must not be so
generalised as to make it irrelevant for their particular
circumstances; |
|
Expert advice must be immediately available to
course providers to ensure that information is up to date and
accurate; |
