New plans for hard labour and job hunting for out of work criminals

Jobless criminals will have to do a five-day week of hard work, including one day hunting for a job, under new proposals for community sentences announced today.

Prisons and probation minister Crispin Blunt said unemployed offenders will be forced to work a minimum of 28 hours over four days, with the fifth day spent looking for full-time work.

Previously Community Payback programmes could be spread out over 12 months, with some offenders working for just six hours a week.

Speaking at a programme in Croydon, south London, Mr Blunt said the measures would make for more intensive unpaid work and help rehabilitate offenders.

Community Payback will also be more immediate, imposed within seven days of sentence rather than two weeks.

"If you are unemployed and on Community Payback you shouldn't be sitting idle at home watching daytime television or hanging about with your mates on a street corner, you should be out paying back to your community through hard, honest work," Mr Blunt said.

"The public want to see offenders giving something back to their communities but they are rightly not satisfied with seeing only a handful of hours a week dished out.

"Decent, law-abiding people can work a full five-day week and so should offenders.

"If we are to reduce the scandalous reoffending rates, it is essential that we help turn offenders into ex-offenders.

"The introduction of regular, meaningful hard work is proven to help break the cycle of crime and encourage a law-abiding life.

"This means fewer criminals, fewer victims of crime and much reduced costs for the taxpayer - a wholly positive result for society."

The proposals are part of the Government's plans to reform sentencing and tackle the root causes of offending.

Despite coming just two weeks after riots, Mr Blunt said the plans were not a response to the disorder but part of proposals already set out in the Green Paper consultation Breaking The Cycle.

Around 100,000 people are sentenced to Community Payback each year across England and Wales with more than 8.8 million hours of unpaid work completed last year, according to the Ministry of Justice.

Work, which can also be nominated by the public, can include hard manual labour, clearing up litter, cleaning graffiti and maintaining parks and green spaces.

The minister visited eight offenders who were repainting a graffiti-covered fence at Croydon Arena. The project was recommended to the London Probation Trust after local residents complained to police and asked for a clean-up of the area.
He said changes to Community Payback would help rehabilitate people and get them into the "routine of work".

The Ministry of Justice said courts will continue to decide on the total hours of Community Payback an offender must complete, but local managers will decide how many they do each week.

"Obviously, employed and unemployed people are equally sentenced to Community Payback," Mr Blunt said.

"If you are employed, you will do it at the weekend or between shifts.

"For unemployed people, we want to take the opportunity to get them into a job of work, and if we can, get them into the habit of working. We think it will have a decent rehabilitative effect on them and help them."

But one offender working on the project in Croydon said one day of jobhunting a week was not enough.

The unemployed 21-year-old, from Croydon, said he had completed 10 hours of 150 hours of Community Payback handed to him about a month and a half ago for keeping three illegal dogs in his one-bedroom flat.

"You can't look for a job for one day. You can't have one day of looking nine till five, you won't get nowhere," he said.

"You need about three days a week to look for a job and get a job in this current climate."

Harry Fletcher, assistant general secretary of probation union Napo, said: "Community Payback, or community service as it used to be called, is a probation success story and wholly unsuitable for privatisation.

"Previous attempts to have offenders doing payback all week have failed because they would have lost their Jobseeker's Allowance as they would have been unavailable to seek work.

"This proposal gets round that problem; however, the scheme will only be viable if it is properly resourced, if it doesn't put council workers out of work and that the offenders are fit to carry out the tasks."

Paul McDowell, chief executive of crime reduction charity Nacro, welcomed the proposals.

He said: "These proposals must strike the right balance between punishment and public protection.

Offenders must give something back to the
community and, crucially, stop offending."