Unlocking Potential
There is some amazing work being done to give ex-offenders the help they need to integrate back into society, as Olivia Greenway discovers.
VERY few of us will have any personal experience of prison life, even through our extended network of family, colleagues and neighbours.
So perhaps it’s not surprising that we may have a stereotypical view of what offenders may be like.
Television often depicts them as self-assured career criminals who habitually reoffend.
But in reality there are many who are determined to make something of their lives back outside, for both themselves and their families.
But it’s hard to get work if you have a prison record, despite best intentions, and nearly 75% of ex-offenders remain unemployed a year after their release.
Like all of us, what they need most is hope, and there are a number of organisations offering a lifeline to those who have strayed from the path.
When Tanjit Dosanjh, as a young man, first visited his father in prison in 2003, he noticed there were very few vocational opportunities for those incarcerated – not encouraging if you had a long sentence to serve, as his dad did.
Tanjit graduated in optometry in 2008 and, inspired by stories of training programmes in Californian prisons, he first approached the UK prison service in 2010 with an idea.
Although the prison service did show interest in the idea of training offenders in optical services, the existing optical contracts still had some years to run.
Undeterred, Tanjit self-funded a pilot project in Standford Hill Prison and worked there for two days a week, training offenders.
In 2014, he knew the scheme worked and had the confidence to bid for proper funding.
By 2015 he had grants from three charities and set up a trust, eventually to be known as the Prison Opticians Trust.
The organisation is now the largest provider of optometry services to prisons in England and Wales.
More than 40 prisoners have now been trained, and 50,000 pairs of glasses made.
Their latest development is the newly launched Just Specs, where customers can buy prescription