Keystage Housing recognised for contribution to ‘Outstanding’ offender management programme

Keystage Housing is delighted to be recognised for its work with Bedfordshire Police on its Integrated Offender Management (IOM) programme which has been rated as ‘Outstanding’.

The College of Policing inspected the IOM programme run by Bedfordshire Police and acknowledged the contributions by Keystage Housing in helping to make the programme a success.

In a report on its findings, the College of Policing described the programme as “highly effective”.

The report was published to “understand and share outstanding practice” and give “insight into Bedfordshire’s success”.

It highlighted the work by Keystage Housing with prison leavers, funding by Housing Benefit and Ministry of Justice.

The report said: “Keystage act as the tenant for local authority housing and as such take ownership for client management. They work across partners, securing pathways of support, focused on reduced offending, with a goal to move them towards long-term accommodation solutions.

“Keystage work directly with those being released from HMP, who otherwise would struggle to secure accommodation.

“Keystage work with their tenants, they seek to develop skills for employment, offer learning access, and support around mental health and wellbeing.”

Laurence Allen, Offenders’ Locality Manager for Keystage Housing, works with prolific offenders involved in crimes such as car theft, street robbery, and burglary.

Explaining how the programme works, he said: “Instead of giving them a lengthy prison sentence they work with us and, providing they stick to the terms, they stay out of prison.

“We have been really successful in the last five years of running this programme.”

Laurence was invited to speak to The College of Policing about the IOM work and said: “They invited us to Luton police station and asked us about how we manage the risk and how it is so successful.”

The College of Policing now hopes to roll the programme out nationwide with support from Keystage Housing.

The report recognised the “true partnership” between Bedfordshire Police and its partners to deliver the programme, adding: “The focus is changing behaviour of the individual, not on tackling crime types. This partnership approach is strength based, it seeks to build on the positive attributes of the individual, achieved through recognising the complexities and diversity of each individual.

“The partners, working together, sharing vision and strategy, understand interdependencies, the need for all issues to be addressed to enable behaviour change. We were impressed that every officer we spoke with, spoke in positive and constructive terms about offenders with whom they were working. We felt the approach to diversity was outstanding.”

Laurence praised the whole team at Keystage Housing for its contributions to the success of the programme, adding: “It’s a team effort. I’ve never missed one Integrated Offender Management (IOM) meeting in five years. Lots of them have kept in contact and are now settled and in work. It makes this job worthwhile knowing we’ve helped them along their journey.”