WELFARE to Work, the Government's New Deal Initiative to help young people back into employment, is going to jail in an effort to help Glasgow's young recidivists break the crime circle.
Barlinnie Prison has been chosen to pilot a scheme in which 160 criminals aged 21-24 will be invited on special programmes two months before sentences end. They will receive intensive training in job and life skills, education - and even courses on addiction and anger management.
The Scottish Home Affairs Minister, Henry McLeish, said yesterday: ''We know that a large number of people who end up in prison are unemployed. They have little idea of self-worth, few skills, and very often problems with literacy and numeracy. The broad idea is to equip young men on the inside with the knowledge to do something about their situation on the outside.''
The initial #150,000 cost will come from New Deal funds based on the profits windfall levy on privatised utilities. Prisoners eligible will be those serving at least six months and with three months remaining, during which period they will also be given advice on job prospects and opportunities.
Mr McLeish said the year-long Barlinnie scheme, known as Pathway, would prepare prisoners to enter the Welfare to Work Gateway scheme on release. Other agencies will be involved before prisoners' release dates so they can be absorbed into the Gateway arrangements within 48 hours.
''The assistance they get then to ease the often-difficult transition to the outside world may determine the whole future course of their lives,'' Mr McLeish said.
''I urge as many prisoners as possible to take the opportunity on offer. If this is a success, I envisage the scheme being extended to every other prison in Scotland.''
Barlinnie's governor, Roger Houchin, welcomed the initiative, saying anything which helped people back into work and away from crime was to be commended.
Mr McLeish is also expected today to announce a limited experiment in the introduction of in-cell television, most probably in Cornton Vale Women's Prison, after yesterday's meeting of the Criminal Justice Forum in Edinburgh.
The Forum, created by Michael Forsyth, was chaired by his successor as Scottish Secretary, Donald Dewar, and covered subjects including the in-cell TV scheme - a recommendation in last month's Fairweather-Skinner Report on women's imprisonment.
The Minister was able yesterday to disclose another innovation from the Forum - the extension of a postal citation scheme tried out in Ayr and Kilmarnock to the whole of Glasgow. He was confident, he said, there would be a vast saving in police time, releasing officers to tackle crime. ''The police should not be used to deliver mail. In the past many people said that tackling problems such as this was too difficult, but we have got the leading players involved talking together and we are achieving consensus,'' he said.
In the Ayrshire scheme, witnesses received a postal citation eight weeks before a trial and were given 14 days to return a slip saying they would attend. In Ayr, 85%, and in Kilmarnock, 87%, returned the form, meaning the police had to visit witnesses' homes in only 15% and 13% respectively where in the past they hand-delivered to every house.
Strathclyde Chief Constable John Orr has thrown his weight behind an extension of the scheme to all Glasgow. If the scheme is successful, it will be extended Scotland-wide.
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