Ms Caron McCaffrey:

We have been inviting employers into our prisons to meet the students and see the level of training available. This has certainly been successful for us at a smaller level. We are also working with the Department of Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science on a bespoke apprenticeship programme or a pathway for people in the criminal justice system. Again, this would work with employers willing to give people a second chance. As I said earlier, people completely transform themselves and are very different when they leave. They are dependent on people in their communities giving them that opportunity to leave their past behind them and have a different way forward. It is very important from our perspective.

With regard to motivation, each year 67% of the people who come to prison come for less than 12 months. They have a lot of complex needs such as addiction, potential co-morbidity with mental illness and low levels of educational attainment. They are more than likely unemployed. Approximately 14% of the population that comes to us are homeless. We need a sufficient length of time when somebody is in our care to help them address the issues that gave rise to their offending. We find that people serving longer sentences are more motivated and stable whereas it is far more difficult to get people serving sentences of two, three, four or five months to engage because they have an eye on the gate and are just doing their time and hoping to get back out. Where we have people for longer sentences we have much more success with addressing the issues that gave rise to the offending in the first place.