A consortium of major charities in the North of England has been formed to bid for prisoner rehabilitation contracts following the Justice Secretary's rehabilitation reforms announced in the Queen's speech on Wednesday (8 May).

The Northern Inclusion Consortium is comprised of homelessness charity the Cyrenians; sustainable communities organisation Groundwork North East and Cumbria, and social support charity Disc. The three organisations represent a significant force in the North, together boasting a turnover of £40m and employing almost 800 staff.

Mark Weeding, Disc’s chief executive said: “Our members have substantial experience of supervising and supporting offenders and want to ensure that if this work is to be contracted out we are ready to make a significant contribution.

“As leading members in this field Disc, the Cyrenians and Groundwork will look to ensure that the consortium can play a key role in these changes in the North.”

Parliamentary debate

Yesterday Parliament debated Justice Secretary Chris Grayling’s 'Transforming Rehabilitation' strategy for reform that is set to provide over 70 per cent of the nation’s rehabilitation services through voluntary and private sector organisations.

Under the current system around half of all people released from prison will offend again within a year and last year 600,000 crimes were committed by repeat offenders. The new strategy aims to provide a year of support for every offender, regardless of the amount of time spent behind bars, upon their release from prison. It hopes to boost support by 20 per cent, without increasing spending.

Labour MP Andy Slaughter questioned during the debate whether this was a feasible objective: “Can [Grayling] explain to the House whether that is an uncosted demand for more reseource or whether existing money will be spread much more thinly?” he asked.  “Who will fund the army of mentors, and who will vet them to ensure that the right people mentor offenders?”

Grayling responded by advising that probation officers’ time would be managed more effectively, rather than “throwing money” at the problem.

MPs also put pressure on the Justice Secretary to ensure that the charity sector is not elbowed out of service delivery by the private sector under the payment-by-results model, which many in the sector believe could be the case, particularly for smaller organisations. The sector's concern on this matter was fuelled by Grayling's recent assertion that charities need to be more "commercially savvy" to deliver the new contracts.

During the debate Liberal Democrat MP Sir Alan Beith said: “If this reform can be carried through in such difficult financial circumstances, it will be one of the most valuable and important things this government does. Does the Lord Chancellor agree that the system must be tailored so that charities and voluntary organisations can viably play their full part, and that the creation of a national probation service must not be allowed to undermine the local co-operation between agencies, which is vital to reducing reoffending?”

The partners of the newly-formed consortium take the importance of the charity sector’s involvement further, by saying that they “don’t believe that this vital area of work should be left to the private sector, which often has limited experience and knowledge of the realities of delivering effective offender resettlement, supervision and community inclusion”. The new proposals also risk ignoring the “key contribution to community safety over many years” by local probation services, they added, saying they would welcome working with the government to ensure the participation of the sector as leaders in the delivery of services.

Related to this story:

Probation services to move to private and voluntary sector

Probation consultation pledges £500,000 support for charity bidders

Transforming rehabilitation and the Philosophy of Brian

It is time charities are taken seriously, says St Giles Trust chief executive

Want access to all civilsociety.co.uk content? Subscribers gain access to all expert advice, analysis, surveys, special reports and the full archive of content from as little as £43.20 per year. Find out more...