Periods in prison or in refuges from domestic violence left gaps in the working pasts of a group of Canberra women - so potential employers spent less than a nano-second before pressing delete on their job applications.

But rather than wilt and accept failure, they decided to do something about it. They took their futures in their own hands.

The driving force, Joan Andersson, set up a company after applying for about 50 jobs and getting nowhere. "I couldn't even get an interview. They just saw gaps in my resume."

She had spent 19 months behind bars for conspiring to import cocaine and a further three-and-a half years in a refuge for victims of domestic violence. The youngest of her three children was born in the refuge. So deep was her trouble, that her children were taken off her by Child and Youth Protection Service.

But she has fought back and remade herself.

Five months ago, she set up her own company offering building maintenance and gardening. She is now training and employing others who were in a similar dire plight because of the pasts they were trying to escape.

The order book is full.

For her business, she chose the name "Women Get it Done" and used Gumtree to advertise the site (there is an unconnected American group of the same name but they are activists while the Canberra version offers more prosaic services like clearing a garden or drilling holes in walls).

One of the employees is Rhiannon Wilson who is remaking her life after a past of prison for theft and drugs.

"It's changed my life dramatically. "I'm out there doing something that I enjoy. I'm not on Centrelink and it makes me feel better about myself.

"It's the best opportunity I could ever have."

Her big motivation is to get the son who was taken from her back. She thinks she will.

The sentiment is echoed by Tabatha Knees who is learning how to use power tools and the other skills she needs to work. She is about to start a proper job with the company.

She was out of the labour market for many years because of drugs but is now clean. "I applied for many, many jobs," she said.

Company founder Joan Andersson has a lot of past to recover from.

She grew up in the cult known as "Children of God" and was taken into state care for a short period at the age of twelve.

Apart from prison and domestic violence refuge, her children were taken from her by the Child and Youth Protection Services.

But putting her life back together hasn't been easy. Even when her criminal past wasn't disclosed on the resume, the inexplicable gaps put employers off.

She found her experience wasn't unique among the women she talked to.

"All of us were looking for work. We all wanted to get off Centrelink. We had applied for so many jobs but because there were so many gaps in our resumes we didn't even get interviews.

"So we talked to family and friends. I had experience landscaping with my dad and liked getting out in the sun.

"I borrowed money off my family and bought a little wooden trailer and basic tools and we started working.

"Within a week, we were booked out."

She said they haven't taken any public money - she feels that she wants to speak out and once a group is beholden to the government, they learn to keep their anger and provocative thoughts to themselves. "We would like to be able to speak up very loudly," she said.

She does speak very loudly about the need to rehabilitate the fallen (whether through their own crime or the violence of others or drugs) benefits all. "Across the community, that there has to be a realisation that for women and men, long term rehabilitation means a safer community."

She said that her business trained and employed only women because the women she knew felt more comfortable talking about their problems to each other. Losing children to state care seems a common theme among them.

"Women have personal goals. For some, it's repairing relationships with children or with their parents. For some, it's getting off Centrelink and becoming independent. For some, it's changing their lives and becoming independent."

Both Tabatha Knees and Rhiannon Wilson, the two trainees who became workers, said that not working meant "just staring at a wall".

The group has been supported by the Snow Foundation in Canberra which was set up in 1991 by the brothers, Terry Snow and George Snow, to help people who were struggling in the Australian capital.

Lifeline Canberra which helps people in serious crisis named Ms Andersson as its "2019 Woman of Spirit" for her work.