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Rehabilitation of Prisoners

: She certainly ran the team—that was obvious. She was older than the others, and she kept them in their place in an impressive way. I heard something interesting from a Transco foreman that made me think that perhaps we should not be paying for Transco's training programme. The foreman said, ““We want more of these people because, unlike most teenage boys, these ones get up and arrive on time.”” Why is that? Because we send them there with prison officers; let us be clear about that. They get up and arrive on time. They are carefully selected, of course, and that is perfectly reasonable. One result is that it means that other offenders want to get into the selection band, too, and that is an important tool if we are to affect behaviour. It is true that the scheme is not as widespread as we would like. It was in place in five prisons at the time of the report; now, it is in place in 15 prisons in England and Wales, and in one, I think, in Scotland. However, the scheme is not the only card in the pack. Later, I shall speak about our ambition to create a set of alliances with civic society, employers and others. Transco is working with some 50 other employers to look at ways in which its model can act as a pioneer, as it were, for more work with employers, and we want to be able to work with those employers. There is, of course, an issue of scale, and that is one of the reasons why we must make sure that the activity that prisons need to deliver includes qualifications.