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Themes

• Working With Offenders
  • Cognitive-Behavioural Approaches
  • Community Based Court Disposals
  • Crime Prevention
  • Diversion
  • Early Intervention
  • Education/Schools
  • Employment / Work / Training
  • Family Therapy / Support
  • Housing / Accommodation
  • Leisure / Sport / Art
  • Mentoring
  • Partnerships
  • Prison
  • Restorative Justice
  • Secure Care
  • Throughcare/After Care
  • What Works?
• Types of Offending / Delinquency
• Types of Offender
• Children & Young People
• The Criminal Justice System

Throughcare/After Care

Throughcare, sometimes called ‘transitional care’, refers to a range of social work and other support services to prisoners from the point of sentence or remand, during their period of imprisonment and subsequent release into the community. It consists of two elements: work with offenders in prison to help them address and change their criminal behaviour, and work in the community designed to re-integrate them back into mainstream society.

Research has shown that practitioners, such as social workers and prison officers, believe that ‘continuity of care’ – that is a continuum of experiences throughout the process – is the defining characteristic of throughcare. Although often used interchangeably with the term throughcare, aftercare generally refers to services available to offenders in their first year of release from custody, such as advice, support and alcohol/drugs rehabilitation.  

In Scotland, local authorities have a statutory responsibility to provide throughcare services to offenders sentenced to prison terms of over 4 years and for those sentenced to Supervised Release Orders and Extended Sentences. Local authorities also have statutory responsibility to offer voluntary aftercare to other prisoners in the first 12 months of their release from prison. The Scottish Government published National Objectives and Standards for Social Work Services in the Criminal Justice System in 2004, which outline the responsibilities of local authority social work departments in respect of imprisonment and preparation for release of offenders.  

The Throughcare Map, produced by the Centre, provides a comprehensive overview of the throughcare process in Scotland. Aimed specifically at practitioners working with offenders in the provision of a throughcare service, it provides detailed information on each stage of the process and links to relevant documents, resources and case studies.

A briefing paper on throughcare, published by the Centre, is available here.  

The Scottish Government website also provides some useful background information on throughcare and aftercare.