Adjusting from the camaraderie of the armed forces to the sometimes isolated ‘Civvy Street’ life can be a hard task for many in the armed forces.
And that’s one reason given for the rising numbers of military veterans currently serving time behind bars in Scotland and carrying out community service on our streets.
But working alongside them is a team whose sole focus is helping ex-servicepeople get the support they need and deserve.
Sacro’s Veterans Mentoring Service is helping dozens of former soldiers, Royal Navy and RAF members who have fallen into or on the periphery of crime.
Crucially, the seven-strong team working in prisons and communities from Aberdeen to Elgin and Glasgow to Edinburgh, are all veterans themselves.
What is Sacro’s Veterans Mentoring Service?
Scott Muir, the service’s team leader, said: “With veterans, it’s very hard to get them to trust you unless you have been in that position yourself. Unless you are a veteran.
“It’s very easy for us to get that trust but it’s also very easy for us to lose it too.
“We work with them, build a relationship, identify their needs, get the expert specialist help they need to support them. Then, hopefully, that allows them to move on with their lives and stop committing crimes.”
The service’s only criteria is that the veteran needs to either be involved in or on the periphery of criminal activity.
“They may have a historical offence they are still dealing with, they may be coming through the court process or they may have attitudes or issues that, if not nipped in the bud, will see them involved in criminal activities,” Scott explained.
“We aren’t experts in mental health or addictions or housing or whatever their issue is … but we know people who are. We identify their need and refer them to the most appropriate service.”
Inmates from military on the up
The most recent figures show the average daily prison population for 2019-20 was almost 8,200 and veterans or serving military folk accounted for 3.2%.
That an increase on 2017-18, when the 7,500 prison population had 3% of inmates with a forces background.
“We generally get involved if someone has been sentenced, handed a community payback order and they have a supervising social worker,” Scott added. “That’s when they’re engaged with and it becomes clear they’re a veteran.”
Some veterans won’t initially identify themselves as being ex-military due to embarrassment or a fear of how it will affect their family, work or standing with their former unit.
“It has an impact on their family life, their colleagues and it can change things … especially if it’s quite a serious offence,” Shirley Findlay, community justice services manager at Sacro, said.
“But with us, there’s no holds barred. There’s an equality of access, it doesn’t matter what you’ve done. People are entitled to help and we always say whether it’s the first time or the 21st time. That’s one of our unique selling points.”
Transition from war to peace
In the forces, servicemen and women are drilled in the skills of combat, endurance, resilience and how to survive in the most hostile territories.
But the transition from war to peace is not always an easy one, and can often be the cause of veterans turning to crime.
Shirley added: “People offend not necessarily because they want to but because they’ve experienced trauma and it’s a reaction to a situation and maybe not having the skills within themselves to deal with that.
“Sometimes people are very socially isolated after they come out of the camaraderie of the services and move on.
“They’re struggling to cope with whatever is going on in their life, be it issues with employability, finance, housing, relationships or their mental health from previous experiences.”
Team seeing positive results
The service, set up in 2014, was initially expected to see around 30 referrals in its first year but achieved that in its first month. It’s since helped more than 150 veterans.
The latest statistics show that 72% of veterans who have sought its help have increased their understanding of offending behaviour and its consequences.
Similarly, 61% say they’ve increased confidence in their ability to change while 47% have reduced “risky behaviour”.
Of the 152 helped to date, 126 have kept up sustained engagement with their mentors and 85 who had trouble with substance misuse have tackled that problem.
‘No crime we won’t work with’
The team understands that sometimes the things needed to be a good soldier aren’t what’s needed out of uniform and in civilian life.
But it places huge importance on veterans choosing and taking ownership of their own solutions.
“The court looks at their offence from a risk point of view – but focus on their support needs rather than the offending,” Scott added.
“There’s no crime we won’t work with. Whether it’s a low end or high end offence, we will still work with them and give them the exact same support.”
Speaking from experience
Scott signed up for military service when he was 16 and recalled the first thing he was taught was “don’t trust civvies”.
“You’re being told you can’t trust anyone not in green – only trust those you live with and work with, who would die for you and who you’d die for.
“You’re 16 or 17 and that’s programmed into you. I understand the reason it’s programmed into you but it’s hard to then un-programme when you leave the military.”
‘Cold War Warriors’ struggle to adapt
Often it’s older soldiers – the so-called ‘Cold War Warriors’ – who struggle to settle back after spending so long based abroad.
“They’re the ones that spent a lot of time in Germany, maybe did tours of Bosnia or Northern Ireland but were before the times of Afghanistan or Iraq. They’re the ones who we support most,” Scott added.
“A lot of the time they struggle with the transition as they’ve not been used to the UK society as such.
“They’re not used to how to budget, how to run a house or pay a phone bill, how to do a shop because everything was done for them.
“They’re the ones that really struggle.”
That’s why the Veterans Mentoring Service – funded by Poppy Scotland, McRoberts Trust and Big Lottery Fund – is keen to stress it’s a national support network, led by those with lived experience, and not an intervention.
Shirley added: “We are walking alongside that person on that journey and that’s really important. It’s not an intervention looking at someone’s offending behaviour. The VMS is looking at all the other needs that person has.”
For more information about the VMS visit the Sacro website.