Prisoners making benches for Herm’s Mermaid Tavern

Prisoners at Les Nicolles involved in the Creative Learning in Prison project have been commissioned to make benches for Herm’s refurbished Mermaid Tavern.

Left to right, prison governor John De Carteret, Deputy Rob Prow, prison officers Birkett and Mel Fletcher, Deputy Sue Aldwell, Dave Le Feuvre, prison head of education, training & regimes, Michelle Watson Bunn and Christopher Jones from law firm Ogier, on one of the benches that have been made for Herm Island. (Picture by Sophie Rabey, 34024836)

The first batch of the 30 benches is ready to be sent over, as the Mermaid approaches its relaunch and opening later this month.

Thc Clip charity was approached about the project at the end of last year.

‘We try and get a bit of a production line in terms of cutting the wood and putting them together,’ said Dave Le Feuvre, head of education training and regimes at the prison.

‘Any money that comes from projects like this gets reinvested back into the charity, which provides other kinds of educational courses and things offered to the prisoners.’

About 99% of people in the prison get involved due to Les Nicolles being a working prison.

The only inmates who do not have to work are those beyond retirement age and people who are on remand waiting to be sentenced, but most choose to work anyway.

‘Everybody has a job. They work their way up, generally when they come in they get allocated a job as a wing cleaner or cleaning the corridors, and then coming to work here is a trusted position,’ said Mr Le Feuvre.

‘They can work their way up to demonstrate they have a good work ethic and they can be trusted working with tools and machinery. For the most part, people respond really well to the fact they have opportunities that they may not have had otherwise.’

Clip was set up more than a decade ago and has received national recognition. Law firm Ogier has been involved with Clip for more than two years offering admin support, governance and legal and technical assistance.

‘We thought it was such a great charity to get involved with. We are a very small part of it,’ said Chris Jones of Ogier.

‘We’ve got so many people in our business who actually want to help more and so are looking of more opportunities to help.’

Home Affairs president Rob Prow said that the prison's relationship with Clip was a fantastic concept, encouraged by the committee.

‘We think it’s massively important for the prison population to be able to get involved and use the facilities provided, which is underpinned by the educational philosophy where prisoners can get qualifications to put them in a good place for returning to society,’ he said.

‘We have a really good record of preventing reoffending through the offender management programme and work with probation and I think that is reflected by Clip's work.’