PACE, IASIO and Le Chéile Mentoring are leading organisations with over 100 years’ experience between us working with people who come in contact with the criminal justice system from youth at risk of offending to those leaving prison after serving life sentences.
Our work aims to reduce offending, and re-offending. We help people at risk of offending, and those with criminal convictions, to build sustainable futures and contribute to safer communities.
We are deeply concerned about overcrowding in prison, its impact on our clients and the under-resourcing of our services.
Housing, mental health and addiction services – all essential for successful rehabilitation and reintegration – are severely under-resourced and require increased attention in policy implementation and coordination of services. We are calling on the next government to enhance funding for our organisations so that we can provide effective, quality services.
We are calling on the next government to significantly increase funding for community organisations in the criminal justice sector which are funded by the Department of Justice, so that we can provide effective, quality services.
Our services range from volunteer mentoring and family support to training and employment for people in prison and on probation. We work in partnership with the Probation Service, the Irish Prison Service and An Garda Siochana. (More details on our organisations are provided on the next page).
Urgent Need for Action on Funding Our Sector
Providing quality services on our current budgets is becoming unfeasible, due to under-funding of our sector and the rising number of people in prison.
Our work is evidence-based and well proven and yet, since 2008, we have been struggling with extreme underfunding. Our models of delivery have been endorsed as providing.
excellent value for money. We have demonstrated better outcomes for individuals, their families and communities.
We are joining forces to call on the next government to urgently address the severe financial pressure on our organisations. We need significantly increased funding to meet the higher numbers of people leaving prison, many at short notice. We are also calling for a multi-annual funding framework to support our organisations’ sustained and impactful service provision.
Value for money/ impact:
PACE: in 2023, we worked with more than 200 probation service clients. Our interventions led to significant improvements in clients’ long-term life skills including motivation, taking responsibility, their relationships and social networks – all these skills have led to desistance from crime.
IASIO: since our foundation, we have supported almost 25,000 people to find places in training and education as well as employment. The social return on investment on one of our education programmes was calculated at €22: €1. This evaluation judged the programme to be highly effective, bringing about substantial positive changes for participants and government departments.
Le Chéile Mentoring: over 2,000 mentoring sessions undertaken with young people during the course of 2023 led to reduced offending behaviour, positive use of time, better relationships with family and better mental health and well-being.
Time For Greater Commitment To Rehabilitation and Reintegration
Rehabilitation has been named as a priority across the strategies of the Irish Prison Service and the Probation Service. We are calling for greater action in practice to provide timely access for our clients to rehabilitation, resettlement and reintegration services while also addressing severe gaps in areas such as mental health, housing and addiction. All of these services are critical to help direct people away from offending behaviour.
Successful reintegration of our clients into communities can only take place if and when access to jobs, housing, addiction and mental health support are coordinated. Coordination has been called for by inter-agency groups from within the sector. Only whole-of-Government, coordinated services will increase success rates in stabilising the lives of people with criminal convictions. Such a coordinated response requires leadership from the next government.
We are calling on the next government to make rehabilitation and reintegration a priority – this is critical to ensure prison numbers do not rise even further by preventing people from offending and supporting them to desist from offending after prison.
Thematic Areas Requiring Urgent Attention:
We are highlighting the following areas of concern that require urgent action from the next government:
HOUSING: Ireland signed up to the Lisbon Declaration in June 2021 which committed to an offer of appropriate housing to anyone discharged from prison by 2030. We must make this commitment a reality in the lifetime of the next government, along with Criminal Justice Housing First.
MENTAL HEALTH AND ADDICTION SERVICES: it is estimated that 27% of men serving sentences and 60% of women serving sentences have a mental illness. Mental health needs are amongst the increasingly complex needs presented by our clients and waiting lists in prison far outnumber places in treatment. Urgent action is needed to invest in recruiting staff to respond to mental health needs in prison.
As of September 2024, there were 888 people on the waiting list for addiction services in prison. Progress has been made on reducing waiting times for these services but the increasing prison numbers is putting extra pressure on these services which need further investment, as per Irish Prison Service’s Drugs Policy, and in coordination with the High Level Task Force on Mental Health, Addiction and Prisons. Ensuring addiction services are provided in the community must also be a priority.
EARLY INTERVENTION: The expansion of mentoring services for young people to a nationwide network which supports them to divert from crime.
ESSENTIAL NEEDS: education, preparing people for employment, support to set up businesses, employment opportunities and training.
Background to our organisations
Le Cheile Mentoring
Our vision is that every child and young person that Le Chéile Mentoring works with, will be supported and empowered to realise their hopes and dreams. Le Chéile Mentoring is a national, volunteer mentoring, restorative justice and family support service, which supports children, young people and their families, where the child or young person is involved in or at risk of offending. We provide tailored supports, in partnership with other organisations, working along-side children, young people and their families, to enable them to reach their potential now and into the future.
Pace
PACE supports people who have criminal convictions for a wide range of criminal offences by providing accommodation, training, employment and prevention services (for people convicted of sexual offences). PACE’s aim is to support people to move away from offending behaviour and to enhance community wellbeing by reducing offending. At PACE, we take a strengths-based approach to meet the diverse needs of people with convictions and create safer communities by preventing further harm. PACE works inclusively with people who have criminal convictions, have complex needs and are categorised as medium to high-risk to support their safe integration into the community.
IASIO
IASIO works with people with criminal convictions with the aim of breaking the cycle of offending behaviour. We strive to change mindsets, transform lives and influence societal and systemic change. Our model has a focus on rehabilitation and reintegration and includes life-course counselling, career guidance, training, employment and resettlement supports. We are proud to have found placements for more than 15,000 people in education and training and to have helped more than 10,000 people to find work. IASIO has also supported almost 11,000 people access housing, medical support, and social welfare.