National Offender Management Service (NOMS) has had a voluntary sector grants programme for some time, focussed on nurturing innovation in the voluntary sector. In this funding round the £1.7 million grants programme gives the sector an opportunity to work in the six 'early adopter' prison sites (the reform prisons) to test new approaches. I originally posted a blog about the launching of the grants programme back in August. Some of the previous grant projects have developed into successful programmes and have been embedded as part of the NOMS strategic approach. Examples include:
- The Prison Listener Scheme, run by Samaritans accross the prison esate
- Unlock, who supported prisoners to open bank accounts, which was then rolled out
- Family engagement workers which now deliver accross the prison estate
- Mentoring schemes
- National Prison Radio which broadcasts to many of the prisons in England and Wales.
Many government departments have shut down grants programmes, or diverted the funds into commissioned services. Grants from the public sector now make up only 5.5% of voluntary sector income, a decline of over 60% since 2004 (NCVO, Civil Society Almanac 2015). Clinks commends the Ministry of Justice and NOMS for still making grants available to the sector to make change happen. Clinks members tell us that grants remain a vital source of funding, and in many cases voluntary organisations are reliant upon them to do their work. We will work alongside the government to advise on the best possible approach to grant funding and push for best practice to be adopted where it isn't - and be maintained where it is. Clinks remains a supporter of the Grants for Good campaign hosted by the Directory for Social Change, calling for the greater use of grants and pointing out the great results they can achieve.
The latest projects that have been awarded grant-funding cover a wide range of topics, from developing in-cell workout models, art projects for fathers and their children, community food growing enterprises and healthy living courses. They are listed below.
The 23 new NOMS grants for 2016/17
| Organisation | Project | Prison |
| Actes Trust | Coaching people back to work Practical, employability, enterprise and leadership skills for learners improving their job readiness. |
HMP Holme House HMP Kirklevington Grange |
| Bounce Back Foundation | Individualised training/support equipping participants with the tools required to enter sustainable employment; Improve the prison environment; Improve offenders’ communication and relationships with their families by developing shared responsibility and collective goal setting. | HMP High Down |
Cell workout enterprise |
Fitness and motivational work to develop and pilot an in cell workout model. | HMP Wandsworth |
| Centre for entrepreneur Ltd | Development of a Prison Entrepreneurship Programme (PEP) that will help prisoners prepare for business start-up | HMP Ranby |
| Centrepoint | Providing enterprise-style challenges to develop the key skills that employers would be looking for in job entrants. | HMP Holme House HMP Kirklevington Grange |
| Clinks | Co-ordinate and grow partnerships with the voluntary sector to enable greater involvement of voluntary and community sector organisations: | HMP Ranby |
| Co-operative and Mutual Solutions | A feasibility project to design and establish a cleaning business social enterprise model | HMP Coldingley |
| Food Matters |
Development of a healthy eating prison environment | HMP Wandsworth |
| HOMES 4 Yorkshire Ltd | Building timber frames for affordable housing. Purpose of grant is to see if this is feasible, design and test a manufacturing approach. | HMP Ranby |
| Kingston & District welcome association | Support for children and families. Work with both parents to reduce family breakdown and to develop strategies that allow them to parent better together. | HMP Wandsworth |
| Koestler | ART IN A BOX ‘pop-up’ 3 hour art workshops flexible approach to delivering art and creative workshops in prison. | HMP Wandsworth |
NEPACS |
Resource pack produced with artists and offenders for use with their children |
HMP Kirklevington Grange HMP Holme House |
| Principles in Finance |
Teach participants how to become social entrepreneurs | HMP Wandsworth |
| Prosper 4 Business CIC | Self-employment & Entrepreneurship | HMP Holme House HMP Kirklevington Grange |
| Rise Mutual CIC | Grow emotional resilience improve relationships | HMP High Down |
| Stand Alone | Support for prisoners who are (and need to remain) estranged from their families | HMP Coldingley |
| St Giles Trust programmes |
Peer support by creating peer teaching assistants to motivate prisoners to engage in education | HMP High Down |
| Tees Valley Arts Grange |
Arts to achieve positive change | HMP Holme House HMP Kirklevington |
| The Big Red Food Shed | Community food growing social enterprise | HMP Ranby |
| The Conservation Foundation | Develop offenders skills, employability and wellbeing through horticulture and seek to improve establishment environment and relationships with the wider community | HMP Wandsworth |
| The Involve Foundation | Improve effective Community Engagement | HMP Holme House HMP Kirklevington Grange |
| The Junction 42 Foundation | 1. Entrepreneurial training combining practical and theoretical enterprise skills 2. Music based creative arts course that will focus on urban music, using rap, lyric-writing and music production to increase self-confidence, sense of achievement and engagement in wider prison activities. |
HMP Holme House |
| The Mitie Foundation | Employment & Self-employment working with offenders and local business community | HMP Coldingley HMP High Down HMP Holme House HMP Ranby |
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