UnLockaHome Pitch

Vision

To provide constant, safe, affordable, two-way vetted one room accommodation for single male prisoners with no family support on release

Mission

To run a pilot to identify 20-30 landlords (renting one room only) and place 20-30 vetted male ex-prisoners.

The need

A large number of prisoners who are not deemed a risk will not qualify for hostel accommodation upon release.  Some may have families, but they refuse to host; others have no one.  Overstretched staff and shortage of accommodation often mean that with the best of intentions, there is nothing.  They end up sofa surfing which puts them at risk of returning to drug and alcohol use just to be seen as being sociable.  Most prisoners would like to be placed away from old haunts, but they don’t know how or where to start looking and can be self-conscious and ashamed of their past.

What would be the benefit to landlord hosts

They would be housing men about whom they have a verified history.  We anticipate the men submitting both their CV and disclosure letter.

As the landlord lives on site only one month notice is necessary.

They are eligible for single room tax relief currently c£7k

Candidates would be vetted.  It is felt this is not a suitable project for sex offenders.

We would ask the landlords to commit to one year with the potential to continue if both sides agree.

We debated about the lodgers being visited monthly by a paid worker / volunteer in addition to probation but we haven’t discussed what this person would do yet (monitoring & evaluation/ support to get and keep work?) and this would add a cost to the project.

Which prisoners would be eligible for selection

Those who

• Have regular enhanced status
• Have engaged with education or work
• Have a CV and realistic plan for work / job offer
• Due for release with no place to stay/ no support from family
• People skills to be able to live in shared accommodation
• Prepared to commit for a minimum of a year

What practical things the landlord needs to offer

• Be prepared to be vetted by the police (any known criminal activity at your property), social services (any vulnerable adults on site?) and probation (is the accommodation suitable?  Any other criteria pertaining to the former prisoner?) Have a property within access of local probation
• A philanthropic mindset that will assure confidentiality and no ongoing judgement
• Provide furniture – bed, table, chair, wardrobe or equivalent, chest of drawers, clothes stand for drying and ideally a TV as most released prisoners have no laptop.
• Provide shared TV license & internet
• Access to kitchen, bathroom and sufficient cooking utensils (not necessary to provide a shared living room)
• Provide new bed linen
• Prepare photos / small video of facilities and written description as per spareroom.com
• Be prepared to meet with potential lodger to make final decision.

What the service would need from landlords

N.B. this is not a suitable project for HMO landlords.  Ex-prisoners need to be placed as one lodger in a household so they have chance to blend into the locality and not be grouped together with the potential to fire each other up.

This is not about giving prisoners all the love and affection they may have been missing out on in their earlier lives.  We are not looking for parental replacements.  You are not friends or confidantes.

We are looking for people capable of keeping professional boundaries but providing essential consistency.  You will need agreed household rules about what cupboards and utensils they can use in the kitchen, what bathroom they use and who cleans it, what shelf in the fridge, whether they can have women or male friends staying overnight, rules about heaters in the room, where they can park their car/ keep their bike, anything else that is important to you.

Don’t expect them to be grateful although they may be years down the line.  They may feel resentful that you have a house and they don’t.  It will help if you are offering the going rate and they see you are not capitalising on them.  (We didn’t all agree on this.  Some of the group felt landlords should be offered a premium as per fostering etc, but we knew this would require a policy decision that would take time.)  Don’t expect them to be sociable and pour out their life story.  It’s quite likely they will be very quiet and abhor noise, possibly be on medication for depression and have OCD about cleanliness from too much institutional living.

How would we find the landlords?

A social media campaign with animated prisoner stories.

Word of mouth

Role of the self-help Business Group

They have steered the project from its inception to the current state of play.

Benefits to the Business Group

The kudos of working through and setting up such a project would be priceless for their self-esteem and could act as a springboard for the credibility of their personal business plans if seeking funding or support.

Benefits to prison system

Could be proven to have positive impact on rates of reoffending

Supports the most vulnerable prisoners

Has the potential to be replicated across the country if a pilot is successful

Could reap huge credibility as a ‘thinking outside the box’ humanitarian project