3 Helping increase employability
as a means of reducing re-offending
16. The LSC acknowledges that the courses offered
across all prisons during the early stages of OLASS were not those
it would wish to see provided in future. However, delivery partners
do not have sufficient information to enable them to give guidance
to learning providers about the courses that should be delivered,
because they do not measure the impact OLASS provision has on
employability or re-offending.[19]
17. The LSC has begun to collect data on what
sorts of learning offenders in custody are participating in and
what qualifications they are achieving. There are difficulties,
however, with tracking offenders into employment to measure the
effectiveness of the Service at increasing employability. Offenders
are under no obligation to report their employment history once
their sentences are complete. The Probation Service already measures
whether offenders secure employment as one of its performance
standards, but the LSC does not currently use these data to measure
employment outcomes. It is working on its own system to track
offenders' progress when they come out of prison. For those prisoners
who are not released into the supervision of the Probation Service,
research on a sample basis will be the only practical option for
examining what mix of learning and skills provision is most effective
at increasing offenders' employability.[20]
18. Measuring the impact that learning and skills
provision has on re-offending outcomes is also difficult. Disaggregating
the effect of learning and skills provision from the other factors
such as offending behaviour courses or drug treatment programmes
that impact on re-offending is complicated. Nevertheless, without
such research the delivery partners cannot hope to understand,
even imperfectly, what progress they are making towards their
policy objectives.[21]
19. The National Offender Management Service
is seeking to understand better the factors that impact on re-offending
by following up a large tranche of offenders over a number of
years. This longitudinal study is due to produce its final results
in 2012 and will provide better information on what is more effective.
In the meantime, smaller research projects continue to confirm
that getting a job reduces the likelihood of re-offending.[22]
20. There are local good practice examples where
employers have been involved in the design and delivery of learning
and skills provision to increase the chances of offenders securing
employment on release. Aligning learning and skills provision
with local job opportunities not only increases offenders' chances
of getting employment on release, but can also help motivate prisoners
if they see that there will be a "payback" for participating.
In HMP Hull, for example, the governor is working with a local
employers' forum, the local authority and the Regional Development
Agency, Yorkshire Forward, to identify skills gaps in the labour
market which prisoners could fill.[23]
Elsewhere, the voluntary sector, for example, has been developing
opportunities for offenders to work for profit-making enterprises
that operate inside prisons. Such enterprises have been good for
prisoners in providing them with marketable skills and real experiences
of work.,[24]
19 Qq 2-4, 12; C&AG's Report, para 2.22 Back
20
Q 3; C&AG's Report, Figure 5 Back
21
Q 2 Back
22
Qq 45-46 Back
23
Qq 38-42 Back
24
Qq 72-76; Ev 15 Back
|
