Some 600,000 offences were committed in 2012 by people who had previously committed a crime.
Reducing this rate of reoffending is central to the Government’s Transforming Rehabilitation proposals. This report analyses the Government’s reforms and makes three principal points. First, it calculates the costs of reoffending to the public purse and to society and it argues that the Government should seek to be much more ambitious in the level of investment. Second, it recommends that other government schemes – such as the Work Programme and prison services – should be rolled into the rehabilitation reforms. Finally, the report provides new analysis showing that a principal rationale for the reforms – that expertise from charities and social enterprises can be brought in to help turn around the lives of offenders – is in danger of misfiring if additional safeguards are not put in place.