SIR – The Howard League for Penal Reform is looking for the country’s most successful and innovative community programmes in the criminal justice sector, to battle it out for one of our coveted 2012 Community Programme Awards.

We want to hear about outstanding schemes working up and down the country. Do you know of any community programmes, which you think we should be considering?

The annual Community Programmes Awards aim to encourage public and Government support for successful community sentences, as well as encourage and foster good practice.

The awards are a wonderful opportunity to highlight all the outstanding work going on around the country to make our neighbourhoods safer. Community sentences are proven to reduce reoffending and allow people to make amends for what they have done and live law abiding lives.

The most outstanding community programmes will be invited to a celebratory event in the summer of 2012. The work of the winning schemes will be publicised locally and nationally. Deadline for nominations is Friday, April 27. For more information and how to enter, please look at our website howardleague.org/community-programme-awards or contact thomasin.pritchard@ howardleague.org.

Thomasin Pritchard, the Howard League for Penal Reform