It's Time For Change - In Law

Posted Yesterday 8:07 PM (GMT +1)

The Facts - Listen Up Employers

">Most people commit a crime but are not caught. One estimate is that only three per cent of crimes result in convictions.

>Home Office research shows that one in three males has a criminal conviction. Drawing on the same research, the report on the Review of the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act, Breaking the Circle, indicates that overall 25% of the population of working age has a conviction.

>More recent research has indicated that 17% of the population between the ages of 18 and 52 have a conviction.

>Half of male offenders and three quarters of female offenders have just one conviction.

>55% of men and 80% of women convicted have an offending history, which last’s less than a year.

>By the age of 25, 43% of men who had offended were classified as ‘desistors’ meaning that they had not offended for five years.

>Research by Working Links confirms this, showing that over 80% of employers who have employed ex-offenders say that they have ‘settled into work well with colleagues performed well’ and have ‘proved to be reliable’.

>60% of employers said ex-offenders ‘perform as well or better than those with no conviction’

>CRB checks have soared from around 1.4million in 2002-3 to over 3.8 million in 2008-9. Since the inception of the bureau, 19 million checks have been completed.

>An estimated 11% of CRB disclosure checks are technically unlawful.

>A 2009 study from the Chartered Institute of Personnel Development found 36.6% of employers would exclude all ex-offenders from their recruitment process. [much worse for 'sex offenders']

>58% of women and 53% of men in prison identified unemployment and lack of skills as issues contributing to their offending.

I would like all those employers that have doubt's about employing ex-offenders to read the information above, it's time for change !"

http://forum.unlock.org.uk/default.aspx?f=33&m=21400