• Ukrainian Ambassador to the UK Vadym Prystaiko and Refugees Minister Lord Harrington will send letters to sponsors and families this week thanking them for their generosity and goodwill
• Since March, more than 104,000 Ukrainians have arrived under the Ukraine Family Scheme and Homes for Ukraine Scheme
• The Homes for Ukraine Scheme recently expanded further to consider new applications from children not travelling with or joining their parent or guardian, provided they have parental consent

The Ukrainian and UK governments this week will send thank you letters to sponsors and families across the UK who have welcomed Ukrainians into their homes and communities.

Signed by Ukrainian Ambassador Vadym Prystaiko and Refugees Minister Lord Harrington, the letters will praise the collective national effort that has driven the scheme forward,.

They are expected to say: “Together you and your fellow hosts, and the Ukrainian diaspora community, have given 104,000 people safe refuge across the UK. You have saved lives, given hope, and offered sanctuary to people in desperate need. This represents the UK’s largest offer of help to people fleeing war since 1945.”

Since March more than 104,000 Ukrainians have arrived in the UK under the Ukraine Family Scheme and Homes for Ukraine Scheme, showcasing the best of British hospitality and compassion, continuing the country’s proud history of stepping forward in the hour of need. Families and hosts do not just provide housing but welcoming homes, warm friendship and local advice for planting roots in an unfamiliar community.

Ukrainian Ambassador Vadym Prystaiko said:

As Russian tanks started rolling over Ukrainian borders and the first cities were bombarded, tens of thousands of British families have offered their homes to Ukrainians.

I know it is not easy to host displaced people from a different culture, an unfamiliar background, speaking a foreign language and most importantly deeply troubled and hurt. Yes, we are different in so many ways but we have in common an acute sense of injustice and readiness to stand up against evil. We are fighting fearlessly until our land is free but with the same intensity, we are remembering kindness and friendship. As Ukrainians return back to rebuild our nation they will cherish this chance to learn about your culture, your way of living, even your cuisine. Although here I guess both sides will be able to enrich each other.

The ties between our nations, our governments have never been closer. This is because of each and everyone of you, your generosity, patience, kindness.

I am humbled and honoured to serve for the goodness of both of our people.

Refugees Minister Lord Harrington said:

I cannot thank the British public enough for their steadfast goodwill opening their doors to people from Ukraine and integrating them into their local communities.

Families are having to make difficult decisions to leave their homes and we understand behind 104,000 arrivals are stories of pain. From the moment the first tanks rolled across the border into Ukraine, this Government promised to do all we could to help people. And thanks to the limitless generosity and compassion of the public, we are delivering on that promise.

As the war rages on longer than anyone would have hoped, the governments of Ukraine and the UK have united to thank all those for giving people sanctuary in their time of need. The letters will praise sponsors and families for their “continuing efforts…making a difference, and that [they] have our heartfelt thanks and the thanks of the people of Ukraine.”

From day one, Ukrainians have the right to work and to access benefits and public services, including education and healthcare, on the same-footing as UK nationals. This will continue to be the case for those who wish to remain in the UK.

The deployment follows the UK’s joint security declaration with Finland signed in May.

More than 750 troops from the UK, USA and Finland gathered this week in Niinisalo, western Finland, to participate in the four-day high-readiness exercise. Partner nations practised interoperability between air and land forces ahead of Finland’s accession to NATO. This type of international training is critical in preparing allies to operate alongside one another should NATO need to deploy in the future.

Minister for the Armed Forces James Heappey MP said:

Exercise Vigilant Fox has demonstrated the strength and interoperability of our Armed Forces with our US and Finnish allies and reaffirms our commitment to the defence and security of the Baltic Sea region.

British troops based in Estonia as part of Project Unified Stance swooped into Finland in Royal Air Force Chinook helicopters. The troops from C Company, 2 Rifles Battlegroup, were inserted into Niinisalo to join Finland’s high readiness forces from the Jaegar, Karelian and Pori Brigades. The exercise also included soldiers, armoured fighting vehicles and helicopters from the US 3rd Armoured Brigade Combat Team (The Iron Brigade).

Units from all three nations undertook a series of demanding training events, conducting offensive and defensive operations including helicopter assaults, covert landings and short-notice raids using American Black Hawks, Finnish NH-90s and UK Chinooks.

Such training improves integration between air and land forces, as well as interoperability between partner nations, and is crucial to ensuring that NATO forces can work together effectively on operations and in war.

As well as air-land integration, the exercise focused on developing command and control procedures and tactical drills using a combination of live and blank firing drills and urban operations.

Colonel Jukka Nurmi, Deputy Chief of Training, Defence Command Finland, said:

Training events like Vigilant Fox are a great opportunity to learn from each other and Finland is most grateful for participation of international partners. For Finland, the exercise is an effective way to demonstrate the competence of our conscripts and to verify and develop the international compatibility of our own troops. The training and exercise activities carried out with close partners, such as the United Kingdom, are a continuation of long-term close cooperation.

Wing Commander Stephen Boyle, Defence Attaché, British Embassy Finland, said:

Our soldiers, sailors and aviators have received a warm welcome in Finland over the last few months.  Exercise Vigilant Fox is the latest activity in an ongoing series of events across the domains.  As Finland moves towards full NATO Membership, we will continue to seek opportunities like this to show solidarity with Finland, learn from each other and improve our ability to operate together.

This exercise comes just two weeks after RAF fighter aircraft deployed to Finland and Sweden for joint training.

The school – based on the site of the now closed Medway Secure Training Centre in Kent – will see young offenders go straight from the courtroom to the classroom, with every single pupil enrolled in formal education or training and encouraged into further learning or employment on release.

It will be run by education provider Oasis Restore rather than the Prison Service, and inside it will be laid out like a school inside the prison walls. Staff will be trained to offer a broad curriculum and offer one-to-one learning support, and they will set challenging targets in core academic subjects such as English and mathematics. Ofsted inspectors will hold the establishment to the same standards as all other schools nationwide – ensuring the education on offer is of the best possible standard.

Young people will also participate in a weekly programme of rigorous physical education and have the opportunity to work towards sports and leisure qualifications. This will teach important life skills and provide an invaluable asset towards independence and employability.

Since 2012 the number of children in custody has fallen from around 2,000 in 2012 to around 500. These young offenders are around 50 percent more likely to reoffend than adult offenders.

Though wider youth reoffending rates for children who received custodial or community sentences have fallen from 38 percent in 2012 to 34 percent in 2022 they stubbornly remain nearly 9 percentage points higher than adult reoffending.

They are also much more likely to have had a disrupted a disrupted education. 60 percent are not engaged in education before entering custody due to truancy, suspension, or expulsion, meaning they have lost out on months’ or years’ worth of learning which would have given them the opportunities to steer clear of a life of crime.

Around eight in 10 prolific adult offenders begin committing crimes as children, with the estimated cost to the taxpayer around £17 billion per year.

Deputy Prime Minister, Lord Chancellor & Secretary of State for Justice, Dominic Raab MP, said:

This secure school is a first. It’s effectively a school with prison walls around it that will give the stubborn hard core of young offenders, who need to be in custody, the tailored curriculum and mental health support they need to turn away from crime and get into training and work.

It’s the right thing to do for them and the public, driving down reoffending, and making our streets safer.

The design of the new school is based on international, peer-reviewed research which shows that smaller settings, high-quality education and healthcare provision, and a specialised workforce of teachers and youth workers are vital to successfully rehabilitating young people in custody.

The old prison-style features at Medway have been stripped out and the finished site will look like a residential school rather than a custodial facility, within secure prison walls.

It will house 49 children when full, and will include state-of-the-art, bar-less windows as well as the latest secure in-room technology which will allow children to continue homework and projects in their rooms, organise their routines and contact their families in a safe and secure way.

Construction work will continue until autumn 2023 when the site will be handed over to specialist education provider and operator Oasis Restore, with the first pupils expected to arrive in 2024.

The Rev Steve Chalke MBE, Founder of Oasis, said:

For too long society has bought into the idea that punishing young people will somehow benefit them. All the research shows this does not work. You can’t help a child by harming them. You can’t take children who have been wounded psychological and somehow hope that punishment will heal them. Then, when you release them, wonder why so many reoffend.

Oasis is not trying to ignore a young person’s crime, or to minimise the pain of their victim and family. But, it’s time for a revolution in youth justice. And, we’re excited that Oasis Restore – the country’s first secure school – with an emphasis on therapeutic care, education and positive settlement into life beyond our gates, which enables them to thrive – will be that revolution.

The school’s core focus on getting troubled young people into jobs or further education is part of the Government’s ambitious plan to further drive down reoffending – following a five per cent fall over the last decade.

The construction of the new school builds on the Government’s commitments under the Prison Strategy White Paper to drive up standards of adult education in custody, while also tackling drug and alcohol addiction and ensuring offenders are ready for work on release.

Notes to editors

• Read more about the Prisons Strategy White Paper
• Since 2012 reoffending rates have decreased from 30.9% to 25.6%.
• Reoffending among children has fallen by around 4 percentage points (from 38.3% to 34.2%).
• The number of under-18s in custody has gone down from 1,966 in the year ending March 2012 to 454 in the year ending March 2022.
• The latest annual figures from 2019/20 show that young people have a 63.7% risk of reoffending when they leave custody compared to 42% of adult prisoners.
• Learn more about Oasis Restore by visiting www.oasisrestore.org or via Twitter at www.twitter.com/OasisRestore
• Apply to become a teacher or youth worker at Oasis Restore

Kenya’s Ministry of Energy, the British High Commission Nairobi, and Strathmore University have jointly launched the Kenya Carbon Emission Reduction Tool (KCERT 2050), a bespoke energy and emissions model to assist Kenya in achieving its climate goals.

The interactive energy model – the first in East Africa – was delivered under the UK Government’s international 2050 Calculator programme, which is funded by the UK’s International Climate Finance, and led by global engineering, management and development consultancy Mott MacDonald, and a consortium which includes Imperial College London, Climact and Ricardo.

KCERT 2050 allows users to trial options for reducing climate change-inducing carbon emissions at a faster rate and to build a pathway that meets long-term emission targets to 2050 and beyond. It can be used to support policy-making to allow governments to increase national action on climate change and strengthen ambition in line with the 2015 Paris Agreement.

KCERT 2050 will play a key role in helping policy-makers, energy producers and consumers, including the public, in Kenya to understand the energy and emissions related choices they are making. It also provides a platform for engaging in dialogues on the challenges and opportunities of the future energy system and the responses to climate change. The project gives Kenya the opportunity to pioneer climate mitigation approaches across the East African region.

H.E Jane Marriott British High Commissioner to Kenya said:

As part of strengthening our UK-Kenya Strategic Partnership on climate action, the British High Commission welcomes the launch of the Kenya Carbon Emissions Reduction Tool 2050. This tool, which is a first in East Africa, will support government departments in Kenya to design and deliver evidence based, inclusive policies on emissions reductions, energy access, and matching energy supply and demand. I look forward to Kenya acting as a pioneer in championing the use of this innovative tool that will provide options for implementing Kenya’s emission reduction strategies and achieving net-zero development pathways by 2050.

In his remarks, the Principal Secretary Ministry of Energy, Maj. Gen (Rtd). Dr. Gordon Kihalangwa noted;

Energy is about security, about development, but if we use it badly it will affect us negatively. Kenya has complied with the Paris Agreement by submitting a revised NDC. A country like this is privileged to use renewables, and the tool will help us work out how we will get to net-zero by 2050.  This KCERT 2050 will be used to support the reduction of emissions and create resilience to climate change in the energy sector in Kenya

Dr John Olukuru, Head of Data Science and Analytics at Strathmore University and Lead KCERT Modeller said:

The Kenya Carbon Emission Reduction Tool (KCERT) 2050 is an important data driven policy making tool in climate change. It will help every Kenyan, expert or non-expert, to engage in a well-informed climate change debate. The calculator considers all sectors, stakeholders’ input and various scenarios that provide enormous volume of data and hence sets a foundation to applying AI and machine learning to monitor and decrease carbon emissions, streamline operations to empower every policy maker to recognize that climate action provides an opportunity to create value by tapping into new markets and meeting growing demand for low-carbon plus greener services.

David Orr, Emerging Markets Trade and Investment Lead for Mott MacDonald and Programme Country Manager for Kenya, noted:

It has been such a pleasure working with the team to build the KCERT 2050 tool. Over the coming years, the tool will play a core role in advancing Kenya’s net zero transition, inspiring policy-makers across East Africa.

Dr Onesmus Mwabonje, a Research Fellow at Imperial College London’s Centre for Environmental Policy and core member of the Consortium team for Kenya, added:

KCERT will support and stimulate the decarbonisation debate in Kenya, helping to break down silos and generate the consensus across government departments needed to effectively combat, mitigate and adapt to climate change. The decision support capacity that the International 2050 Calculator programme has developed on the modelling of complex transitions and technological options will have a lasting impact in the country and beyond.

The KCERT is available at http://kcert.ilabafrica.ac.ke/

Further information

Background to the 2050 Calculator programme in Kenya

• KCERT 2050 is an integrated model of energy demand and supply, emissions, and land use in Kenya. It aims to identify energy secure pathways for energy demand and supply between 2015 and 2050. It is developed on the framework of the UK 2050 Calculator and was built in Kenya, by Kenyans, for Kenya.
• In 2010, the UK Government developed the original 2050 Calculator for the UK; although it has a very flexible structure which can be (and has been) adapted and updated to integrate and suit different economies. Since 2012, UK International Climate Finance has supported the creation of 19 national and 6 regional energy models, which have been used to develop NDCs and action plans, raise awareness and inform long-term energy strategies. In 2020, BEIS launched an updated 2050 Calculator, the MacKay Carbon Calculator.
• It is a uniquely open, transparent and interactive energy model that allows users to explore options for reducing emissions in a city, region or country, develop evidence-based policies and build pathways to meet long-term emission targets. It sets out a range of four trajectories for the types of changes that might occur, ranging from business as usual to high ambition. These trajectories are intended to reflect the whole range of potential future scenarios that might be seen in that particular sector.
• The 2050 Calculator and other UK ICF programmes play a critical role in enabling countries to set, plan for, and ratchet ambitious climate targets to act with the urgency that we need today.

Objectives of the KCERT 2050

• To help users (government, businesses, academia and individuals) to understand the wide range of possible energy pathways available to the country as Kenya develops its green growth transition.
• To provide quantities of energy demand, supply, emissions, and potential implications for key sectors in Kenya on issues such as import dependence and land requirement.
• To offer a platform to facilitate policy debate about the possible future pathways for the Kenyan energy sector and enable potential policy interventions for deeper analysis.
• To help planning to meet Kenya’s updated NDC, which commits to abate GHG emissions by 32% compared to the business-as-usual scenario in 2030. To help attain this target, the Calculator will support Kenya to undertake sophisticated multisectoral planning.

Benefits to Kenya

• The KCERT 2050 will increase capacity of departments across the Government of Kenya to carry out strengthened energy systems analysis. The tool allows planners, decision-makers to answer important questions, such as how much greenhouse gas emissions can be reduced and how energy demand can be met, with four different levels of effort and respective emissions levels over years.
• The tool also allows users to verify the viability of long-term goals, encouraging the participation of disparate opinions, facts, and scientific analysis.
• It can engage Kenya energy experts and non-experts alike in debate around policy-making towards a more secure, sustainable, and affordable energy future for the country; improving inclusivity of energy policy assessment, policy formulation, and energy planning. The tool also allows users to verify the viability of long-term goals, encouraging the participation of disparate opinions, facts, and scientific analysis.

References