Dear colleagues,
State of the Sector 2024 is live! Your voice has been heard, and Clinks has captured it for our 2024 report. This year we have taken qualitative approach to our research, listening to the sector via a series of focus groups and interviews with voluntary organisations and funders. Check out our State of the Sector webpage to read the report and find out more information below.
Clinks’ role is to lead, support, inform and collaborate within the criminal justice sector. Our annual State of the Sector research, produced in partnership with NCVO, is a free resource evidencing what our members and the sector are experiencing.
We have compiled this report so all organisations can better understand the current criminal justice voluntary sector climate. The information supplied to Clinks during our research phase provides us with extensive evidence which we present to a wide range of stakeholders, including key decision makers. The report covers the impact of early release schemes, probation changes and initiatives planned or launched by the new government and the ongoing challenge of meeting growing need in the face of shrinking resource.
State of the Sector 2024 key findings
- Concerns about how criminal justice issues are presented in the media.
- The value of coalitions and alliances, and how these might be expanded.
- How the reverberations of the pandemic are continuing to affect the sector.
- Staffing challenges, including recruitment and retention, supporting the mental health of frontline staff.
- Vetting and challenges around lived experience engagement.
- How funders and others can support the sector over the coming year.
We have summarised key findings relevant to you
Meeting needs
- Many organisations described increased complexity of need amongst their service user groups, including mental health and substance use needs.
- A few organisations noted a perceived inadequacy or lack of availability of mental health services, and there being unmet mental health needs amongst their service users as a result.
- Organisations described the intersecting needs of women, including their mental health and substance use needs, and the failure of short prison sentences in addressing them.
Staffing
- Many organisations talked about the demanding nature of the work that staff were undertaking, particularly frontline staff, and the effect this was having on them.
- Several organisations said they had introduced or extended clinical supervision, in-house counselling, or trauma-informed training to help staff cope with their work with service users with complex needs.
- Some organisations also discussed introducing health insurance packages to support staff and help them financially.
- However, some organisations said they lost staff to the public sector, including the NHS.
Clinks’ Health and Wellbeing work
Clinks’ Health and Wellbeing work has been pursued through its membership of the VCSE Health and Wellbeing Alliance, a group of 18 voluntary sector organisations, including Clinks, representing communities with protected characteristics or that experience health inequalities. This work is managed by the Department for Health and Social Care, NHS England and the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA). Originally due to conclude at the end of March 2025, this project will now continue for the next financial year.
Find out more about our Health and Wellbeing work and get involved.
Our pledge to you
The sector’s voice is one of its key strengths, and Clinks will continue working to make sure it is heard. As the infrastructure organisation for the criminal justice voluntary sector, we want to continue to support organisations. Over the coming year, we will continue to advocate for the sector. We will share learning and offer opportunities for connection, providing a platform for the sector to come together to highlight issues that matter to organisations and the people they work with.
View the 2024 report here
Download the executive summary here
Share State of the Sector on Twitter and LinkedIn
Best wishes,
Sam
Sam Julius
Director of National Influencing & Networks
Clinks
07779579830
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