BRITISH political life in the current moment appears filled with storybook villains and villainesses: a parade of self-interested pantomime dames and asset-strippers.

Thankfully, though, in places people know little about, heroes and heroines also exist, working tirelessly for others.

One such hero is Arthur Furness. Along with accompanying heroines Megan Knowleden and Emma Tustin, Furness, a lecturer at South Gloucestershire and Stroud College, set out to find out why rates of reoffending are so high, why those who have been incarcerated often end up back in the same place. They’ve come up with a solution.

They had the idea to actually go into prisons to ask the people concerned what they thought the problem is and then acted on their responses.

The problem is that when people are released they are straight back into the milieu of little hope that led them to offend in the first place: nothing whatsoever has changed and reoffending becomes almost inevitable.

Much of prison life is centred around the gym, and this is a place where offenders pick up competencies and abilities that they might be able to use in outside life.

But before Furness, Knowleden and Tustin, no-one seems to have noticed this. They decided to set up a programme with the aid of the college management which sought to develop these competencies and to give attendees on a new course qualifications as personal trainers.

It’s brilliant. Trainees, sourced from local prisons in south-west England and referred by the CFO Activity Hub (a body supporting reintegration) work their way to a level two qualification as fitness instructors, which means they’re qualified to work in gyms, then a level three qualification which allows them to work as personal trainers who take on clients.

The course has been running for 18 months, and the results have been astonishing. Of the 24 attendees drawn from a range of punitive settings, not a single one has reoffended.

The men I met were universal in their praise. Kyle who, as a result of the course, has gone from prison to paid employment in a gym, reports he now feels good about himself, and that, “if you feel good about yourself, good things happen.”

Jay adds that he now has a future; Jason has left the course and is at Leeds University; John took the time to record a video message in which he said that after 21 years of addiction, in and out of prison, he now has a purpose, as he’s “seen something from start to finish.”

This project is changing the lives of some of the most vulnerable people in society. It is unbelievably cost-effective too.

Last year, the average cost to the taxpayer of a single year in prison for a single offender was £46,700.

The potential savings of a national rollout of this project are mind-blowing, and its originators are heroes more deserving of some form of honour than the phalanx of lickspittles currently being clad in ermine.

The management of the college should be congratulated too for their far-sightedness.

Ultimately, my visit to the project gave me something that has been lacking over the last decade — that thing is hope. There is hope to be found in the actions and activism of people who see solutions, and there is hope to be found in the good nature and human spirit of those who not only care but care enough to do something about injustice.

Should this project be rolled out across the country? Obviously. Will it be? Well, all the time that people like this exist, so does hope itself.

Phil Beadle is a teacher and author who has written extensively on literacy, social capital and white working-class achievement (www.philbeadle.com).