The SNP said Airborne was effective in targeting youth crime

The Airborne Initiative was axed more than two years ago after it featured in a BBC TV documentary, Chancers.

The scheme, based at Braidwood House in Carluke, Lanarkshire, closed after the Scottish Executive withdrew its �600,000 funding.

The SNP branded that a mistake and promised they would reinstate the project as an alternative to prison for hardcore offenders.

Kenny MacAskill, SNP justice spokesman, said the "burgeoning prison population and high reoffending rates" showed action must be taken.

He said: "Airborne is a last-chance saloon, it does work and it does so in a cost-effective manner that's been proven.

"An SNP administration will immediately take steps to restore the Airborne initiative."

Cycle of offending

The Lothians MSP said the decision to stop funding the scheme - which mixed lessons and outdoor work for young male offenders - was both shameful and wrong.

He said evidence showed Airborne had helped to break the ongoing cycle of repeat offending.

He said the reoffending rate for youngsters who took part in the nine-week long programme was just 21%, compared to 79% for prison.

He added it was a cheaper alternative to custody, saying, when it had shut, a place at Airborne cost �116 a week compared to �574 for a prison place.

The project opened in 1994 to provide residential courses for repeat offenders aged 18 to 25 but closed in 2004 with the loss of 26 jobs.

Mr MacAskill added: "Airborne was effective and it was also substantially cheaper than prison."

"We are not talking about choirboys and therefore if any television programme showed people who had serious problems in education, language, drink and drug dependency, rather than be shocked, we should accept that's the reality of what they were trying to deal with."

Airborne 'struggled'

The Nationalist also claimed the executive had failed to keep its promises to use the funding for other alternative projects.

A Scottish Executive spokesman said: "Much effort has been devoted to developing a general offending programme, Constructs, for use with male offenders aged 18 and over.

"It will be rolled out across Scotland in a phased manner under a three-year programme currently underway.

"When national coverage is achieved it will have potential to deal with up to 5,000 offenders per year - compared with the 96 places per year available at Airborne.

"Airborne struggled in its later years to deal with the greater number of offenders with a drugs problem."

He added: "We have now all but completed Scotland-wide coverage of Drug Treatment and Testing Orders, which have been found to impact positively on levels of crime and associated criminal behaviour."