The results of a recent data sharing exercise by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP),Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC) and the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) suggest that over 20% of out of work benefits claims are made by ex-offenders.

In response Justice Minister, Jeremy Wright, acknowledged: 'Employment can make the vital difference between an offender coming out of prison and committing more crime, or coming out and going straight.'

At Procure Plus, this is something that we’ve been striving towards for a number of years, working with probation programmes such as Achieve North West, to help former offenders secure the final piece of the jigsaw - stable employment.

From our experience we know that creating employment opportunities and helping people take full advantage of them is absolutely crucial to breaking the cycle of offending. Itenables ex-offenders to improve their lives and, in turn, the lives of those around them.

This can be achieved in a number of ways. One great example is by creating social enterprises such as Cleanstart– an initiative we helped our housing provider member, Trafford Housing Trust, to set up in 2008. The initiative offers former offenders employment within a property clearing and clean-up scheme, as well as access to learning and development programmes designed to help them secure permanent employment in the future.

Cleanstart has proved a huge success, developing into a thriving business offering a variety of clean up and maintenance services to a number of housing providers, private businesses and homeowners. It’s directly helped numerousex-offenders to date, and has had a huge positive social impact by improving local community spaces.

We’ve also been involved with helping former offenders set up their own social enterprises, and have helped other housing associations such asSalford’s Salix Homes set up schemes to get ex-offenders back into work and engaged with their communities.

The positive impact full-time employment can have cannot be underestimated, and now that it has beenpublically acknowledged by the Government, we hope more will be done to encourage businesses across the UK to provide long-term opportunities for former offenders.

Ann-Marie Hopkins is diversity and inclusion manager at Procure Plus