A North East Inter Faith Forum, titled ‘Faith Communities Can Change Lives’ was held in Newcastle on 4th March. Participants included representatives of faith communities in the North East, the Prison and Probation Service, other statutory bodies and faith related voluntary organisations. The Forum, one of the first of its kind, came together to look at ways faith communities in the region can engage with returning offenders.

This new initiative came from Fr Patrick Cope, North East Regional Prison Chaplain, and Paul Southgate, Chair of the Churches Regional Commission.

Many offenders are trapped in a cycle of re-offending and alienated from society. They often feel powerless to change and that, for them, there is no way back into mainstream society. Members of faith communities know, often by experience, the power of non-judgmental acceptance to change lives. The Forum examined this complex issue and encouraged new ways of faith communities engaging with ex-offenders, so reducing re-offending, aiding resettlement and leading to safer communities.

The Conference was opened by Mr Phil Copple, Director of Offender Management for the North East. He gave full support to the importance of faith communities being involved by the National Offender Management Service to work with them in the resettlement of offenders. He said this commitment had already been shown in the appointment of Fr Patrick Cope as the North East Regional Chaplain for the Prison Service and NOMS North East. His role was partly to be the key figure on behalf of NOMS North East in engaging with faith communities and developing ways of working together and partnerships.

Mr Muhammed Aslam spoke of his work as Director of the Himmat Project in West Yorkshire. This is a project for young Muslim offenders and aims to help them address their offending behaviour within the context of their Muslim faith and culture.

The Forum also had a series of snapshot case studies giving examples of existing good practice within the North East. These included a community project for offenders based on the Meadowell estate, Open Gate mentoring project and Community chaplaincy based at Low Newton women’s prison, description of prisoners from Kirklevington Grange resettlement prison, visiting a mosque, church and Gurudwara during the recent National Inter Faith week and a young Muslim Chaplain based at Deerbolt Young Offenders Institution talking of his work in a multi faith context.