Vision wins prisons textiles brief

A LANCASHIRE textile company has won a “significant” contract to supply fabrics to prisons around the country.

Blackburn-based Vision Support Services, a £27m turnover business that also supplies towels and linens to hotels around the world, said the deal with the Ministry of Justice adds to its growing presence in the public sector.

Vision will supply prison workshops with various fabrics, which will be made by the prisoners themselves into items such as towels, clothes and bed sheets.

The prisoners will be trained to measure, sew and finish the garments , building their skills and helping to support the National Offenders Management Service (NOMS) programme, to provide offenders with useful skills which will help improve their chances of employment and reintegration into society upon release.

Laurie Thomas, managing director of Vision Support Services said: “We are delighted to have secured this contract. This win is a credit to the both the commercial capability and the social and ethical values of Vision Group.

“We look forward to a successful association with the Ministry of Justice and with NOMS in support of their prisoner rehabilitation programme and an ultimate reduction in the level of reoffending.”