Developing the Offenders’ Learning and Skills Service: the Prospectus

The LSC has published Developing the Offenders’ Learning and Skills Service: the Prospectus. This sets out the LSC’s proposals for developing and reforming the learning and skills service to offenders held in English public sector prisons and to those under supervision in the community in England. The document responds to a number of recommendations as set out in Reducing Re-Offending Through Skills and Employment: Next Steps, and invites comments from key stakeholders and partners.

The key proposals can be summarised as follows:

• developing and reforming the way in which learning provision for offenders in custody is planned, organised, delivered and funded. We will work with NOMS and other commissioners to move away from historical arrangements by prioritising the availability and range based on personalised learner and employer need.  The principal focus will be on skills for employment and employability
• widening the scope, range and availability of learning provision for offenders in the community
• for all offenders, ensuring that the learning offer is explicitly linked and aligned to other services and interventions, in particular by developing strong joint commissioning arrangements with NOMS commissioners, and
• by supporting improvements in the quality of provision, ensuring that all offenders are able to benefit from existing provision and developments within the wider post-16 sector.

To support the release of the document, the LSC held nine regional events from mid September into early October to present the proposals and to seek initial feedback from stakeholders.

Details of those events are as follows: