Working with Offenders

Offenders have complex needs and often challenging histories and futures. Many have multiple barriers from employment including low skills, low literacy, poor work history as well as behavioural issues and are often separated from family and friends. Compounding these barriers is a wide spread reluctance of employers to hire individuals with criminal records.

We specialise in working with Offenders who are high-risk, high-needs with several and enduring mental illness and personality disorders. Our services include residential and floating (provided off-site at Service User’s own accommodation) services for varying levels of support to end the cycle of offending.

Our programmes are person-centred, tailored to meet individual changing needs and include:

• Pre-release contact
• Contact on day of release
• Accommodation service
• Reintegration through addressing offending behaviour and understanding those triggers
• Aggression management training
• Harm minimisation from substance misuse and help entering appropriate treatment
• Work-related training
• Housing needs assessment and support to move into permanent accommodation
• Training in tenancy sustainment
• Support in improving health and wellbeing

Involving service users and their families wherever possible in service delivery, our recidivism rate is 7.7% compared to a national average of 40% (MOJ, 2010). Our aim is to ensure Penrose service users can lead offence-free, independent lives.

Our BME staff and Service User correlation is 74% and 76% respectively, making us uniquely effective in supporting the needs of the diverse communities in which we operate.

For further information on our services and projects, click one of our projects above or if you would like to speak to one of our dedicated service managers, call us on 020 7697 4200.