How does Ban the Box help my business?
Signing up to Ban the Box has many business benefits:
- Address skills shortages – there are 12 million people in England and Wales with a conviction (Unlock, 2022), most of whom haven’t been to prison and the majority of which (67%) committed a non-violent crime (Ministry of Justice, 2019). Making your jobs accessible to people with experience of the criminal justice system will significantly increase your talent pool, ensuring you don’t miss out on the perfect candidate simply because of something unrelated to the job.
- Increase diversity – excluding people from work based on prior convictions disproportionately affects people from ethnically diverse communities (Lammy Review, 2017). By signing up to Ban the Box, you will make it easier to recruit a diverse workforce.
- Improve customer reputation – four-fifths of people think that businesses employing people with convictions make a positive contribution to society (Ministry of Justice, 2019).