Mike Williams: Call to fund training for ex-prisoners and offenders to secure trucking jobs

Published: Nov. 16, 2020, 9:23 p.m.

The Howard League for Penal Reform is helping ex-offenders earn a drivers licence - to keep the trucking industry moving.
It claims the cost of imprisoning a person for a year can fund training for 100 people in Class 2 to 5 licences.
That includes learning how to operate heavy-vehicles, road works, farm machinery and forklifts.
Chief Executive Mike Williams told Mike Hosking just about anyone can get work with such a licence.
“There’s a shortage of truck drivers, which was filled for years by immigration, but of course there’s no immigration at the moment because of Covid-19.”
Williams says they would jump at the chance of a job,  rather than go on the dole.
He says those who go out looking for jobs want to go straight and don't want to lapse back into crime.
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