The latest stage of this newspaper’s Frontline London campaign takes a bold new leap in helping young criminals turn away from crime.
Previous stages of the campaign have concentrated on helping former gang members get back on the straight and narrow: now we will be working with Isis and Holloway prisons in London to give a chance to some of those still actually serving jail sentences. Ten prisoners and would-be social entrepreneurs have been selected to put forward their business ideas to a Dragon’s Den-style panel of experts. The winning five will get start-up grants and mentoring to make their business ideas a success on leaving prison.
The central aim of Frontline London has been positive solutions to tackle the gang problem. In HMP Isis, a third of prisoners are self-declared as “gang-affiliated”. We also know that gangs are responsible for much crime in the capital: figures released by the Metropolitan Police last year showed that gang members had been responsible for more than 6,600 violent offences in three years, including 24 murders. Such crime demands a tough response from police and prosecutors. Yet more than half of prisoners serving less than 12 months re-offend within a year of release. To break that cycle, we have to invest in positive solutions for those involved in gangs.
Clearly this is just one small project, offering a way out to only five of the many younger people in London’s jails. However, HMP Isis Governor Grahame Hawkings reports that the new scheme has already had a wider impact: “We are essentially trading in hope here.” And that is almost as important as the concrete help the winners will get: the knowledge that it is possible for convicts to turn their lives around, if they have the determination to do so.
Credit for the recovery
THE International Monetary Fund’s praise for Britain’s recovery caps a week of good economic news for the Government, with inflation falling sharply. Speaking at a round-table discussion in Washington during the Prime Minister’s visit to the US, IMF director Christine Lagarde said: “The UK is leading in a very eloquent and convincing way in the European Union… This is exactly the sort of result that we would like to see.” Her comments will be especially sweet since two years ago the IMF poured cold water on the Chancellor’s strategy. In April 2013, IMF chief economist Olivier Blanchard warned that George Osborne was “playing with fire”. Now, while the fruits of the recovery remain stubbornly slow to filter through to earners, Britain is undeniably in far better shape than the rest of the EU, with even the German economy stalling.
There is some irony in Mr Osborne getting such plaudits now: he is also reported today to have conceded that he does not have enough support to mount a leadership bid and is instead ready to serve in a Boris Johnson Cabinet. If true, this would mark a major change of tack for the Chancellor. It would also seem a little unfair, his having achieved what many believed was impossible with the economy. But politics isn’t fair. And for the moment, at least, the IMF’s change of view is good news for the Tories.
OK Glass, forget it
GOOGLE’S decision to abandon its controversial Google Glass wearable technology will be little lamented. There had been angry exchanges between wearers and those who thought they were being filmed, while the odd “OK Glass” command worked patchily unless delivered in an American accent. Perhaps it was ahead of its time: might a baseball cap-mounted device activated by “Oi, Glass!” do better here sometime in the near future?
