The Goldsmiths’ Company Charity announces five new partnerships to support prisoner rehabilitation
Image courtesy of The Shannon Trust. Photographer: Andy Aitchison.
The Goldsmiths’ Company Charity has pledged over £400,000 to five key prisoner rehabilitation organisations to cover staff and core costs over the next three years.
Prisoner rehabilitation and resettlement has been identified as a vital target area for the Goldsmiths’ Company Charity as it continues to champion organisations who endeavour to break the reoffending cycle.
The chosen grantees span multiple different focus areas: from family relationship building, educational training, creative learning, and the specific targeting of women prisoners who have been through the immigration system. Find out more below.
Thursday 16 February 2023 - The Goldsmiths’ Company Charity is delighted to announce its new charitable partnerships for the new year. Focusing on the rehabilitation and resettlement of prisoners, these organisations either provide support inside prisons, or offer rehabilitation initiatives to those who have left incarceration.
Michelle O’Brien, Head of Charitable Partnerships at the Goldsmiths’ Company Charity said:
“The Goldsmiths’ Company Charity is really pleased to be adding these five new charities to an already strong and diverse portfolio of funded partners. Social progress starts with helping those furthest behind and it is important for us to work with charities that make rehabilitation possible. The grants awarded focus on literacy and numeracy, employability, rehabilitation through creative expression and women and their families who have experienced the criminal justice system.”
The organisations have been named as Not Beyond Redemption, Shannon Trust, LandWorks, 2makeit, and Hibiscus for Social Justice. All awarded grants have been awarded to aid both staff and core costs across all five organisations.
Not Beyond Redemption
Not Beyond Redemption offers free family law advice and representation to mothers in prison to help them gain access to their children whilst in custody and upon release. Established over two years ago by leading family lawyer Camilla Baldwin, she and her firm’s lawyers are operating in five women’s prisons including HMPs Send, Downview, Peterborough, Eastwood Park and East Sutton Park on a pro bono basis to offer support.
The Goldsmiths’ Company Charity is providing NBR with £30,000 a year over the next three years to support a Trainee Solicitor and Supervising Lawyer as well as other core costs.
https://www.notbeyondredemption.co.uk/
Shannon Trust
The Shannon Trust aims to inspire and train prisoners who can read to pass on their skills to those who cannot. Their Turning Pages Programme benefits thousands of prisoners each year by equipping them with crucial literacy skills in order to make a positive difference for both themselves and their families. By gaining such fundamental skills, the Shannon Trust intends to help them to move into employment and out of the negative cycle of reoffending.
The Goldsmiths’ Company Charity is providing the Shannon Trust with £30,000 a year over the next three years to support their core costs.
https://www.shannontrust.org.uk
LandWorks
LandWorks works with people in prison and those at risk of ending up in custody. LandWorks teaches transferable skills on an intensive 1-2-1 basis that follows the disciplined structure of a working day. This organisation intends to provide clients with the opportunity to develop a crime-free identity in order to move away from reoffending and into meaningful employment. They have a proven track record of breaking the prison-release-prison cycle by enabling their clients to gain work experience predominantly through their landscaping projects and outdoor programmes.
The Goldsmiths’ Company Charity is providing LandWorks with £30,000 a year over the next three years to support their core costs.
2makeit
Guided by expert musicians, artists and writers, 2makeit is a charity that helps rehabilitate prisoners and ex-prisoners through giving them the tools to explore their own creative expression. Through its social enterprise partner, the charity helps to develop entrepreneurial skills and sell works of art created by its clients. 2makeit intends to inspire those in custody whilst also encouraging them to live positive lives outside of prison, in order to break the harmful cycle of reoffending.
The Goldsmiths’ Company Charity is providing 2makeit with £15,000 a year over the next three years to support their Community Rehabilitation Coordinator.
Hibiscus for Social Justice
Hibiscus is the UK’s leading organisation for supporting Black, minority ethnic and refugee women and families who are at the intersection of the immigration and criminal justice systems. Hibiscus has been delivering its vital work for over three decades and its remit covers prisons, community, international resettlement and human trafficking. Their multiple initiatives include, but are not limited to, welfare and mentoring in prisons, assistance with reintegration for those in detention or recently released from immigration centres, community resettlement for ex-offenders, and identifying potential victims of trafficking.
The Goldsmiths’ Company Charity is providing Hibiscus with £30,000 a year over the next three years to support their core costs.
https://hibiscusinitiatives.org.uk/
About the Goldsmiths’ Company Charity
The Goldsmiths’ Company Charity is a grant funder that was founded in the late nineteenth century with investment income on assets given by the Goldsmiths’ Company over the centuries. Its Board of Trustees is made up of members of the Goldsmiths’ Company’s Court of Assistants (equivalent to a board of non-executive directors).
The Goldsmiths’ Company Charity is focused on improving the life chances of people and communities. Today it does thisby awarding grants across four priority areas - support for our trade & craft; support for development of technical and vocational skills; support for activities in the City of London and at national institutions; support for activities that improve life chances, currently in the criminal justice sector, and through literacy, numeracy and oracy interventions at early years and primary age.