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NLGN today welcomed the interim report from the Commission on English Prisons chaired by Cherie Booth which recommended giving local communities more power and responsibility in managing prisons.
Deputy Director Anna Turley said: “It is clear that a top-down, national approach to offender management is falling short and is over-stretched. Local authorities are best placed to take a leading role in managing penal policy and resettling offenders.
“Punishment and rehabilitation should be in the context of local community expectations of justice. The justice system needs to encourage reparation and contrition in proximity to the neighbourhoods where the offending occurs.
“The public want to see that justice is done, but they also want the system to ensure that prisoners do not go on to reoffend. All the evidence shows that proximity to families and neighbourhoods, decent support with housing and employment, and close provision of mental health support reduce reoffending rates. Locally accountable partners, rooted in their communities, are better placed to do this than remote national criminal justice agencies.
“What’s more, evidence from the US shows that local, targeted investment is far more effective in reducing the social and economic cost of reoffending than a system that ships offenders around the country at great expense and does little to enable them to turn their lives around.”