Directory

SIFA Fireside is a dynamic Birmingham based charity which works to tackle homelessness and alcohol misuse. We also deliver restorative justice and assist ex-offenders and other marginalised groups to access employment, education and volunteering. We are based in Digbeth, and work with people aged 18 and over with no upper age limit. The Drop In is open Monday-Friday from 9am until 1pm. Breakfast is served from 9am-10am, and lunch is served from 12pm until 12.45pm. We run a shorter session on Saturday and Sunday from 10.30am-11.30am. No food is served at weekends but tea, coffee and biscuits are on offer. Restorative justice aims to repair the harm caused by offending. This service is open to anyone over 18, victim or offender. The only exclusions are serious offences (murder, sex crimes and domestic violence). The Changing Lives team work with ex-offenders, providing support to find work, training or volunteer placements. We also offer a job club and outreach support

Sing Inside takes day long singing workshops into prisons around the country, working with groups of student volunteers and creating a larger choir with participants from within the prisons we visit. We teach a series of songs by ear to everyone at the same time, avoiding distancing prison volunteers from external volunteers, and everyone performs together at a short concert in the afternoon. our workshops aim to encourage self-confidence and self-worth, and a belief in the positive impact prison residents can have on group activities, by allowing them a liberating creative and social space in which to work towards a goal. Sing Inside utilises the power of group singing to draw together a community quickly, improving relationships between residents and external volunteers, as well as including prison staff. Our workshops encourage faith in supportive external communities and hope for positive contribution to group activities upon release through group singing.

Sixty-One is a Bristol-based charity that supports people with a criminal conviction to lead meaningful lives away from crime. We also equip individuals, churches, charities and businesses to provide the relational and community-based support that can empower someone with a conviction to live free from crime.

MentorMe is our biggest project and pairs rigorously-trained volunteer mentors from over 40 local Christian congregations, with men or women with a criminal conviction who are:

- Resident in Bristol

- Ready to move away from criminal activity

- Motivated to work on positive identified goals

Mentoring is non-faith based and is open to people of all faiths and none.

MentorMe receives referrals from statutory and voluntary-sector agencies within prison and in the community.

We also have a strong network of churches across our area that host mid-week welcoming spaces for people with a criminal conviction.

Skillsmax aims to assist those furthest from the local community by providing relevant and effective activities, which strengthen the individual's social life and employability skills.

Skillsmax's vision is to:
• Equip individuals with knowledge and skills to make better informed decisions
• Strengthen individuals' ability to manage changes in their lives
• Increase individuals' passion for learning
• Maximise individuals' ability to engage in activities which are rewarding
• Promote individuals’ strengths to local employers with growth plans

Our 4 main business activities are:
• Services to local job seekers
• Services to local employers
• A central hub for support agencies to refer individuals
• A central hub to provide a signposting service for those who require specialist assistance

We support people of all backgrounds, cultures and ages, through a variety of country-wide running programmes.

Small Woods is a national charity, working with woodland owners and managers to bring their woodlands into management. We run training programmes in coppicing, sustainable woodland management, coppice crafts and other woodland skills, and social forestry, as well as a coppice apprenticeship scheme; we also run projects in coppice restoration. Small Woods is an OCN-accredited training establishment, developing social enterprise. Past projects include the Tick Wood project, mainly involving male probationers, and the Amazon Woman project, working with female probationers.

SMART have been developing and delivering innovative drug and alcohol services since 1996 when we launched an Arrest Referral Service in Oxford. We have grown to become one of the most trusted providers of recovery services in the South East.

We believe everyone has the ability to change. True innovation starts with listening to the people we work with. Our client is instrumental in designing, implementing and evaluating their own recovery journey; in collaboration with their family, their community, our workers and partners.

Reaching and maintaining recovery requires much more than absence of drugs or alcohol; we are experienced in meeting the many challenges that people face; such as access to secure housing, education and employment opportunities, and a supportive community.

Smart Works Charity dresses and trains unemployed women for success at their job interview. Every woman who comes to Smart Works receives a complete outfit of clothes and accessories (hers to keep) and one to one interview coaching. This works - in the last 12 months, 60% of the women we could contact went on to succeed at interview. Once a woman has a job, we also invite her back to give her a working wardrobe for her return to work.

All the clothes in our beautiful wardrobe are donated from individuals or retailers, and all our service is delivered by skilled volunteers who regularly give up their time to help style and coach our clients.

This year we will help over 3000 women from our 7 locations across the UK - North and West London, Manchester, Birmingham, Edinburgh, Reading and Newcastle. It is out mission to take this fantastic service to as many women as possible, whilst maintaining the impact and quality of our service.

Social Enterprise Acumen CIC is a specialist social enterprise support agency. It supports entrepreneurs to establish trading businesses that address social needs. It offers charities, community organisations and social enterprises expertise in bid writing, public procurement and capacity building.
It is the lead partner, coordinating the NOMS CFO-funded Social Enterprise Consortia Building Programme in the North East.

We provide technical support to people and organisations setting up work integration social enterprises and social firms to increase employment opportunities for people facing the most barriers to the labour market. This includes offenders, people with mental health problems and/or learning disabilities and people with drug or alcohol habits.

The Social Interest Group (SIG) was formed as a charity in 2014. Its sole aim is to be a vehicle to develop and strengthen the charities that are within it, so they in turn thrive and do social good. Our members include Penrose Options and Equinox Care.

As a Tier 2 provider for London CRC, we currently deliver the following high-performing services:

• Resettlement support to 6,000 men per year in 4 male prisons
• Community supervision of 2,500 men sentenced to less than 12 months, with our Responsible Officers based in every London borough
• Job Fairs that bring together a range of employers and trainers, providing service users a one-stop shop of live opportunities, CV and disclosure workshops and interview technique classes

Outside of our probation work, we deliver a wide range of residential and floating support services across London, Brighton and Bedfordshire, with a particular focus on mental health (including forensic), substance misuse and complex needs.

Social Justice Solutions (SJS) is passionate about challenging poverty and inequality. We work with like-minded organisations to create innovative solutions to social problems. We provide consultancy, business support, training and research that reduces crime and social exclusion. We share the values of the voluntary sector and support Clinks' aims. We have successfully supported many small voluntary organisations to secure grant funding by targeting appropriate funding sources and writing strong funding applications. We are interested in helping to develop an evidence base showing the impact of voluntary sector work to reduce crime and we do this in partnership with research specialists, such as the Hallam Centre for Community Justice at Sheffield Hallam University. We are currently involved in a number of evaluation projects commissioned by the Ministry of Justice and others.

Society Matters cic is a community interest company, formed in 2012 to help finance and support the work and services of Citizens Advice Gateshead. Citizens Advice Gateshead is an independent charity offering free, independent, impartial, and confidential advice to everyone who lives or works in Gateshead.

Society Matters cic strives for a fair society for all by designing and delivering unique programmes and services for society to organisations across all sectors, who want to ‘make their mark.’ This includes training on social welfare benefits, guidance on making your corporate social responsibility policy a reality, and a renowned, low cost, comprehensive legal advice for all aspects of working life, including case work and representation service.

An award winning Leicestershire charity, established in 1986, we use arts, media and music activities to make positive life changes for disadvantaged young people by supporting them to develop creative, social and employability skills. For young people who lack opportunities or have challenges in their lives it can be hard to look forward to a positive future. Our projects help them get back on track when have gone wrong, build the confidence and resilience to change negative or risky behaviours, and progress to lead more fulfilling lives. Different agencies refer young people to our projects and our work responds to and tackles local and national issues such as anti-social behaviour and unhealthy lifestyles. We believe creativity gives young people more positive choices in their lives. We know it works because we have seen it happen.

Sole Survivor is a trauma-informed Community Interest Company providing PTSD recovery support, neurodiversity coaching and peer-led rehabilitation pathways for people moving through trauma, adversity, and the criminal justice system.

We specialise in working with high-risk, hard-to-engage individuals, including those affected by ADHD, PTSD, addiction, homelessness, ACEs, and justice involvement, offering a safe space for change where traditional services often struggle to maintain engagement.

Since 2018, Sole Survivor has facilitated over 1,000 hours of community-based trauma support, delivering peer groups, 1:1 support, and interventions grounded in lived experience, safeguarding awareness and professional training.

We are Enhanced MoJ security vetted and Enhanced DBS cleared, supporting individuals pre-release and post-release through stabilisation, trauma reduction (Rewind + IEMT), and coaching for behavioural change and post-traumatic growth.

Our model reduces emotional volatility, increases resilience, and improves stability, with a focus on empowerment rather than dependency.

We are building a neurodiversity-aware pathway, specialising in ADHD + PTSD comorbidity, supporting clients to move from crisis and survival into regulation, purpose and community reintegration.

Our work is outcomes-focused, ethical, boundary-held, and rooted in social impact — ensuring people don’t just survive trauma, but start to live instead of exist.

Solo Housing has been working with single people to find housing solutions since 1985.
We help a range of people, from those who simply need a roof over their head, to those who need regular help to overcome problems that they may be experiencing. At Solo we believe in people and our intention is to provide opportunities for those who pass through our door to improve their lives.

We are funded by a number of different agencies, as well as by voluntary donation, to provide support, advice, information and practical help to achieve this.

The South Derbyshire Citizens Advice Bureau aims to promote any charitable purpose for the benefit of South Derbyshire, by encouraging empowerment, the promotion and preservation of health and the relief of poverty, sickness and distress. We are able to achieve this by providing free, independent, confidential, and impartial advice to everyone living in South Derbyshire. We provide advice around a wide range of topics, which include specialist debt, financial literacy, welfare benefits and employment advice as well as general advice on a number of topic areas.

We are a mental health charity. One of our projects is supported accommodation for ex-offenders with mental health problems coming out of detention.
Other projects are post-traumatic stress disorder counselling, improving access to mental health for ethnic minority communities, counselling for eating disorders, Therapy for You, and community supported accommodation, general counselling and mental health training.

South West Community Chaplaincy is a mentoring organisation providing through the gate support to people seeking to make a new start after leaving prison. We support people returning to Cornwall, Devon and West Somerset.

We’re a community development organisation, which brings people together to build strong communities. Since 1988, we’ve been working with people of all ages to help them live happy, healthy lives.

Spark Inside runs coaching programmes in prisons across London and the South East, to encourage rehabilitation and reduce reoffending. We offer two coaching programmes;
The Conversation is our systems coaching programme that brings together large groups of prison staff and prisoners in a facilitated group coaching process to enhance their relationships, improve empathy, and support sustained, positive cultural change on prison wings.
Hero’s Journey is our structured life coaching programme for young people aged 15-25, in prison and through-the-gates, building their motivation to change, decreasing in-prison violence and creating a pro-social identity away from crime to reduce reoffending.
Our expert coaches are qualified and trained professionals.