There but for the grace of God…

There we were, on safari in Botswana hundreds of miles from anywhere, when a new group walked into camp.

They looked odd. Everyone else we met on the tour appeared to have spent a fortune on the right gear but this lot weren’t dressed right.

One guy wore a black Armani suit and trendy shades; others wore the wrong sort of casual clothes. It turned out they were Christian millionaires from a church in Knightsbridge - they’d been giving away money in Rwanda and decided on a few days safari.

One guy looked different. Tough, with a lived-in face. It turned out he was their tour leader and an ex-soldier, ex-prisoner, ex-bad boy who found God and become a vicar.

I liked him and his life story was enthralling. His focus now is helping prisoners create a new life after release. I’m a lock them up and throw away the key sort of person - particularly with shoplifters - but I was amazed at what he told me.

A prisoner on release might have served five or 10 years. It’s difficult to readjust anyway but, chances are, when he walks out of the gate he has nowhere to live, no family and no job. He’s clutching all his possessions in a clear prison-issue bin bag.

Help is at hand though: he gets £45 and a rail warrant to where he was arrested. Not to where he actually wants to go, just to where he was arrested. If he applies for benefits they take six weeks to come through. So who’s surprised that the reoffender rate is 78%?

My new friend Paul the vicar has created a volunteer network who work in prisons and help those who want to lead a better life. They are met at the gate on release and fall into a support network that helps them find somewhere to live and keep on the straight and narrow.

It works. Their reoffending rate is 20%. The problem is these people can’t get a job and the self-respect that brings. If they could, it would help drive their reoffending rate even lower.

Instead, they can look forward to a life on benefits. We don’t employ anyone with a criminal record and I guess most other companies don’t either. “I can give them a job,” I heard myself saying.

Ironically, a couple of weeks after I got home the News of The World discovered that one of our contractors uses an open prison as a base to transfer boxes between vehicles. Instead of praising us for providing work for prisoners they decided some of them were probably drug users, so the angle was to “expose” us for hypocrisy after our little fall-out with Kerry Katona.

Well, at the risk of more bad press, Iceland is setting up a scheme with my vicar friend to offer ex-offenders placements.

During the past two years Iceland has raised more than £2m for charity - mainly Alder Hey Children’s Hospital. In a way, that’s an easy thing to do - conventional, respectable and laudable. Offering jobs to ex-offenders is more challenging and open to setbacks.

I actually feel quite good about this. Maybe we can help to change some people’s lives. Everyone deserves a second chance and I’m looking forward to the challenge that brings. Any of you want to join in?