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Work Experience: Industrial Health and Safety

Mr. Laws: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families whether schools are required to conduct health and safety assessments in workplaces agreeing to take pupils on work experience placements; and if he will make a statement. [214077]


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Jim Knight: Schools have the primary duty of care for their students and must ensure that health and safety risk assessments are carried out for work experience placements. Assessments are frequently carried out on schools' behalf by education business partnership organisations. Employers are responsible for the health and safety of everyone on their premises. 95 per cent. of young people participate in work experience, amounting to over half a million placements each year within which the track record of health and safety is excellent reflecting the care that schools and employers take to keep young people safe and to maximise the benefits of work experience.

Young Offenders: Administration of Justice

Mr. Drew: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families what assessment has been made of the effectiveness of the youth justice reforms introduced in 1998. [211552]

Beverley Hughes: The Youth Justice Board and local multi-agency youth offending teams were established in 1998 under the Crime and Disorder Act. A key role of the Youth Justice Board is to monitor the performance of, and standards for, the youth justice system. Its work is a key driver for the improvements the system has seen since the reforms introduced in 1998, and its ongoing assessment of the effectiveness of the system continues to influence policy on tackling youth crime and bringing about further improvements.

Youth offending teams were described by the Audit Commission in Youth Justice 2004 as

In general, the new youth justice arrangements were described by the Audit Commission as

The Audit Commission also identified that following the reforms to the youth justice system young offenders are more likely to receive an intervention, young offenders are dealt with more quickly, young offenders are more likely to make amends for their wrong-doing, and magistrates are very satisfied with the service they receive from Youth offending teams.

Notable examples of improvements to the youth justice system are:

Figures for 2005-06 and 2006-07 show that the number of first time entrants to the criminal justice system has reduced from 97,329 in 2005-06 to 93,730 in 2006-07.

Self-reported youth offending levels are relatively stable, with about 25 per cent. of young people admitting to offending in the previous year although only a minority of this is serious and/or persistent.

The national statistics published in May 2008 showed a reduction of 17.4 per cent. in the frequency rate of re-offending between 2000 and 2005. The results also show that the percentage of offenders who re-offended over a one year period fell from 40.2 per cent. in 2000 to 38.4 per cent. in 2005.


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Youth in Action Programme

Mr. Hayes: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families which projects in the UK are funded under the Youth in Action programme of the European Union. [214168]

Beverley Hughes: The list shows those organisations so far approved in 2008 to receive funding from the UK National Agency under the European Union’s Youth in Action programme by action type. An organisation appears in the list more than once where it has been approved for funding for more than one project.

Records are not held by the UK for projects under this programme that are funded directly from the European Commission. These projects are therefore excluded from the list.

Action 1, Youth for Europe

Applicant :


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Action 2, European Voluntary Service


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