Some key facts on re-offending
- Poor skills, low employment (67% of prisoners have no job when sent to prison), drug & alcohol misuse, poor housing and poor family networks lead to offending & re-offending, particularly amongst youth in deprived areas.
- There is a human cost, both to the perpetrators, victims, families and communities when crimes are committed. Violence creates more violence, the cycle is vicious. Everyone wants safer communities to live and work in.
- The financial cost of not addressing crime and our approach to dealing with violence effectively, is crippling. Every time someone is convicted and sent to prison, it costs the UK taxpayer £126,000 (Home Office) and the annual costs of re-offending in the UK are £11 billion. With a national deficit currently sitting at £160billion, we cannot afford to ignore these frightening figures.
- Incarceration is not always effective (with prisons referred to as “colleges of crime”). 67% of offenders re-offend within a 2 year period. For under 18s this increases to 82%! On average, young offenders re-offend up to 3 times before rehabilitation takes place in some form.
Often young offenders join gangs – territory based and the only sense of ‘family’ or ‘belonging’ they know. The sense of invisibility & not being heard, along with a fuelled desire to acquire money and status drives young people to crime and violence. Knife and gun crimes are up 14.2% in the past year. Many of these young people are currently unemployable.
Re-offending rates amongst Khulisa’s participants are reduced by up to 80%