Jobs agency aiming to help ex-prisoners
A Shropshire businesswoman has set up a specialist employment agency aimed at giving ex-prisoners the chance to get back into work.
Kate Beech from Ludlow, who has more than 20 years' experience in business, has teamed up with HMP Featherstone to launch Chance (2013), giving prisoners the chance of temporary employment on release from their incarceration.
She said the idea came because the level of skill and qualifications of many prisoners was often ignored due to their criminal background.
During their time in prison many of them had developed a strong desire to work and even in some cases start a new career or, for some, return to the jobs they successfully held before being convicted, she added.
Mrs Beech, who has offices in Wolverhampton and at Featherstone, visits the prison regularly to interview the candidates identifying their skills and work desires in order to find suitable work placements on their release.
"The relationship between staff at Chance and prisoners is built up over the final three months of their sentence so we are confident we place them with the appropriate employer and within the right industry," she said.
"I will have spent several hours with the candidates whereas other employment agencies may have only spent half an hour with a candidate before placing them in a job."
