Our Story

During this time, the pair noticed that prison leavers who came into the freshly decorated building were more open and forthcoming to them, than they appeared to be with established services. Many of those newly released people were inquisitive of how the ex-offenders had turned a new leaf to become productive members of society. From these conversations came the idea of Release Mates, a pretty simple concept based on the theory that if prison leavers were greeted by those who had become pro-social ex-offenders, they would believe that change is possible and may learn a few things. It became clear that the project is most effective when working with prison leavers who have served a short sentence, those who have not spent enough time in prison to engage with other services.