As the number of unpaid work sentences handed to convicts in Perthshire plummets, people serving community payback orders have spent the autumn carrying out “much needed” upgrades at the region’s base.
Community payback resumed in August but at a significantly reduced level due to Covid restrictions and redeployment of staff, the team at Perth’s Westbank Project say.
As a result, very few new referrals have been accepted and management say it looks like this will continue to be the case for some time.
Unpaid work teams continue to operate where and when they can, often walking to jobs because of social distancing issues with transport.
Recent arrangements with other partners have resulted in teams being dedicated to Perth city centre to deal with graffiti, litter, painting and clearing overgrown areas.
This has only been running for a few weeks but bosses say progress has been good and improvements are obvious.
Training opportunities at the Jeanfield Road hub have been limited, but Road Traffic Industry Training Board courses on the forklift and telehandler have been running.
The centre began offering free training for clients on both machines this year and have used the quieter period to prepare for rolling out training at full capacity when possible.
Management say the reduced level of operation has allowed them to make some much required improvements to the site which, including the creation of a telehandler training area in the allotment, refurbishing a storage room as a training room, major alterations in our workshop to create a vehicle maintenance training area.
Neil Campbell, development officer at Westbank said: “Community payback delivers important benefits to the community as well as those on the scheme.
“Our scheme resumed in August but at a reduced level due to Covid-19 restrictions.
“Nevertheless, teams continue to work where and when they can. We will be putting up nativity scenes next to Perth Concert Hall and St Ninian’s Cathedral.
“We have also been able to make improvements to our training site. These improvements will help those on Community Payback Orders learn new skills that will help them find jobs in the future.”
