2. Memorandum submitted by Birmingham
Youth Offending Service
1. I am the Deputy Head of the Birmingham
Youth Offending Service, the largest YOT in England and Wales.
We are a multi-agency service, with the aim of preventing offending
by children and young people aged under 18 years, with seconded
professionals from Social Services, Probation, Police, Education,
Health, Connexions and the Young Person's Drug Service. Our statutory
responsibilities are for young people within the criminal justice
system and range from interventions following final warnings to
post custodial licence. The majority of our work is supervising
community penalties.
2. The Birmingham Youth Offending Service
premises its interventions on reducing the research proven risk
factors associated with crime and anti-social behaviour and increasing
those protective factors most likely to support young people to
become more productive members of the community. It is apparent
within our work that there is a clear overlap between crime and
anti-social behaviour, learning the lessons from the Youth Offending
Team, the approach which is likely to be most effective will combine
enforcement and support.
3. Our statutory business places us at the
interface between the community, the victim and the offender and
of necessity requires us to balance the treatment of the offender
with the protection of the public. At the core of all the work
we do with young people there is an emphasis on risk assessment,
victim awareness, offending behaviour programmes and restorative
justice, along with literacy and numeracy, social skills, mental
health and substance misuse work. The service also provides interventions
with parents; both court ordered (Parenting Order) and voluntary
(Parenting contracts). The pooling of knowledge and resources
within the Service is leading to a more effective co-ordinated
approach to reducing youth crime.
4. The majority of young people who are
sentenced by the courts for the first time are referred to Youth
Offender Panels. These are made up of two members of the public
and a YOT officer. It is the panel's job to determine a response
that is both proportionate to the offence and focussed on addressing
the risk/welfare factors for that young person. The victim's views,
either directly or indirectly, inform the outcome of this process.
This system offers individually tailored intervention on the basis
of a thorough assessment early in the young person's offending
career. The involvement of community members has makes these action
plans more accountable to the public whilst promoting greater
community ownership.
5. The Intensive Supervision and Surveillance
Programme is offered to the Court as an alternative to custody
or as an attachment to a custodial licence. The programme requires
25 hours activity per week and is coupled with tagging. Some young
people on the programme have a history of persistent offending,
failing to respond to other interventions and some have been sentenced
previously to a custodial sentence. These young people share a
number of characteristics:
— A history of poor school attendance.
— Low levels of literacy and numeracy.
— Lack of positive male role models.
— Misuse of drugs and alcohol.
— Are members of, or associate with,
gangs.
The programme is both rigorous and challenging,
and provides the balance of punishment and rehabilitation necessary
to promote greater sustainable protection for the public. The
Anti-social Behaviour Act extends this programme to 12 months
for certain young people.
6. Research has identified the link between
low attainment and low attendance at school as a key risk factor
in crime. There are significant numbers of young offenders on
school roll but not attending in addition to those permanently
excluded. We have made progress with these young people by setting
up Education Training and Employment Panels-involving Education,
Connexions, Learning Skills Council and the Youth Offending Service.
This approach has begun to address the barriers to young offenders
achieving full time ETE .We have also created Learning Sites within
the local YOT's with Learning and Skills Council and drugs monies
to employ college tutors and teachers who provide numeracy, literacy,
ICT and vocational training to re-engage with this group with
positive results. However further progress can only be made by
working with Head Teachers, who hold the finances, and by extending
the provision of support services within schools to prevent this
initial disengagement. It is too early to assess the introduction
of penalty notices for non-school attendance. We anticipate that
the proposed changes to provide more vocational routes and apprenticeships,
recommended by Tomlinson, will lead to more young people being
motivated to stay engaged within the educational environment.
7. The link between substance misuse and
crime is well evidenced. The YOS has a drugs worker in each of
its five teams and a partnership with the Young Peoples Drugs
Service ensuring an integrated service. The Youth Justice Board
has recently provided additional funding for young people with
substance abuse problems in preparation for the Criminal Justice
Act 2003. This introduces testing for Class A drugs for all the
young people aged 14 or over arrested for acquisitive crime and
introduces regular testing and treatment as part of a community
sentence. These measures will support the young person in addressing
the causes of their offending and allow the YOS to monitor their
substance misuse.
8. In 2003 I was a member of a secondment
team at the Government Office for the West Midlands that carried
out research on best practice in reducing levels of anti-social
behaviour amongst young people aged 10-17 years. The research
included intensive consultation with Anti-social Behaviour Co-ordinators
within the region. The conclusions are found in the document "Best
Behaviour" and include:
— The need for Crime and Disorder Reduction
Partnership's to have a holistic approach to reducing anti-social
behaviour amongst young people. This holistic approach should
include Preventative, Educative and Enforcement methods of intervention.
— The importance of supportive intervention
programmes for young people and their family's subject of ABC's
and ASBO's.
9. Within the Birmingham YOS our preventative
strategies in the community target those most at risk of anti-social
behaviour and crime. We have worked successfully in partnership
with the Children's Fund, Youth Service and Connexions Service
to commission and/or provide a range of diversionary activities
for the 5-17 age group. We now have four Youth Inclusion Programmes,
each providing structured activities for young people, 14-17 years
identified as being most at risk of offending in the area. We
also work closely with the Safer Schools Partnerships to increase
work in schools to prevent young people becoming either a victim
of crime or a young offender. These approaches have made a real
contribution to lowering crime rates in the city.
10. Birmingham YOS has a developing Youth
Inclusion and Support Programme, funded mainly from the Children's
Fund—central to this are the pilot Youth Inclusion and Support
Panels, with the aim of identifying those 8-13 year olds most
at risk of anti-social behaviour and crime. These panels are made
up of a variety of statutory and voluntary agencies and bring
together enforcement agencies and support services. This has increased
the level of support for young people displaying levels of anti-social
behaviour who are subject to warnings or Acceptable Behaviour
Contracts. They have also resulted in greater ownership of these
issues from the other mainstream public agencies.
11. This co-ordinated approach between the
enforcement and support agencies is less consistent when Anti-social
Behaviour Orders are sought. If the Youth Offending Service already
works with the young person we are able to co-ordinate a response
but it is less clear for other young people. There is no assessment
of the young person by the support agencies at this pre-court
stage. The Criminal Justice Act 2003 introduces the Individual
Support Order to provide specific interventions to address the
young person's anti-social behaviour. However the lack of identified
funding and the lack of clarity surrounding the identification
of the lead agency to implement this order will reduce the effectiveness
of this measure. The ISO would provide young people with interventions
and at the same time give a clear message that they accept this
support and change their behaviour or be breached.
12. The Act also strengthens the Parenting
order. Parenting Contracts and Orders, delivered by a local voluntary
organisation, are well established and well received in this area.
Many parents report less conflict within the home and increased
confidence in their role, especially with younger siblings. All
the Parenting orders have been made in the court following criminal
proceedings and none have been made with an ASBO in the civil
courts. This could be improved by the assessment of parents at
the pre-court hearing stage.
13. The YOS has been involved in the steering
group of the newly formed Anti-social Behaviour Unit in the City.
The appointment of Anti-social Behaviour Officers and the greater
co-ordinated approach between the Police and Local Authority as
a result of the Unit is welcomed. However the responsibility for
consultation and the support arm of the anti-social behaviour
agenda is not as clearly defined. One consequence of this is that
young people not known within the criminal justice system can
be made subject of an ASBO, including young people and families
with multiple risk factors, without any expectation of receiving
an assessment or intervention to assist them and ultimately protect
the community from their behaviour.
14. The Birmingham YOS has agreed to pilot
a family support programme for the Birmingham Anti-social Behaviour
Unit and the Home Office for an 18 month period to deliver interventions
for families most at risk of eviction in the City due to their
children's anti-social behaviour. We have also successfully bid
to the Birmingham Crime and Disorder Partnership to supplement
this support but both sets of funding, whilst positive, are not
universal and are short term.
15. The ideal approach might be that each
young person be assessed in a manner that addresses both the enforcement
and support agenda's prior to action being taken. This might be
delivered through a Panel, similar to the Youth Offender Panel,
attended by the young person and their family. This Panel would
identify a plan of action that maximises the protection of the
public by following a twin track of enforcement and rehabilitation.
At present no funding exists for such an arrangement.
SUMMARY
1. The legislation addressing anti-social
behaviour is welcomed to promote greater community safety and
reduce the number of young people engaging in this behaviour or
being the victims of it.
2. There is a clear overlap between crime
and anti-social behaviour. Earlier identification and interventions
with young people displaying behaviour from nuisance to criminal
should receive both enforcement and supportive interventions proportionate
to their seriousness.
3. A holistic response is more likely to
be effective in reducing crime and anti-social behaviour.
4. Interventions targeted on reducing risk
factors, particularly those providing opportunities for young
people to remain engaged in learning will produce the greatest
outcomes.
5. There are gaps in the interface between,
and the partnership working of, the enforcement and support agencies.
6. Individual Support Orders will not play
a substantial role in the management of anti-social behaviour
without funding and the identification of a lead agency.
7. Consideration could be given to setting
up Anti-social Behaviour Panels that involve young people and
their families in determining action plans and interventions before
court proceedings are initiated.
23 November 2004
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