Memorandum submitted by the Youth Justice
Board for England and Wales (YJB)
INTRODUCTION
1. The Youth Justice Board for England and
Wales (YJB) welcomes the inquiry and the opportunity to submit
written evidence. This note provides brief background on the role
of the YJB before outlining some key issues in relation to Looked
after children and the youth justice system. The YJB would be
pleased to provide any further information that would be of assistance
to the Committee.
2. The role of the YJB is to oversee the
youth justice system in England and Wales. It works to prevent
offending and reoffending by children and young people under the
age of 18, and to ensure that custody for them is safe, secure,
and addresses the causes of their offending behaviour. The statutory
responsibilities of the YJB include:
— advising Ministers on the operation
of, and standards for, the youth justice system;
— monitoring the performance of the
youth justice system;
— purchasing places for, and placing,
children and young people remanded or sentenced to custody;
— identifying and promoting effective
practice;
— making grants to local authorities
and other bodies to support the development of effective practice;
and
— commissioning research and publishing
information.
3. While the YJB is responsible for overseeing
the performance of youth justice services including multi-agency
Youth Offending Teams and secure estate providers it does not
directly manage any of the services.
OVERVIEW
4. Policy and practice in relation to Looked-after
children is important to the YJB for a number of reasons.
— Disproportionate representation in
the youth justice system.
— While children in care are a relatively
diverse group of children, overall they are disproportionately
likely to be brought into contact with the youth justice system
and to enter into custody. Care Matters: Transforming the Lives
of Children and Young People in Care reported that while a
small overall proportion of children in care were involved in
the youth justice system they were still around three times more
likely than other children to be cautioned or convicted of an
offence while in care. Looked-after children are more likely to
be exposed to the risk factors established in research as associated
with the onset of youth offending than the general population
of children. These factors include issues such as lack of parental
support, poor attendance at school, emotional and behavioural
problems, drug and substance misuse. While it is not established
that being Looked-after by itself puts children at risk of involvement,
other aspects in children's lives that can be associated with
being Looked-after can increase risk levels. There is no automatic
relationship between risk and actual involvement in offending
but as noted higher prevalence of risk factors in general for
this diverse group of children is likely to increase overall levels
of involvement in the youth justice system.
— Behaviour management and increased
risk of criminalisation in relation to residential care
As well as the prevalence of risk factors associated
with the onset of offending, another reason why there may be disproportionate
involvement in the youth justice system relates to the management
of challenging behaviour in residential homes. Magistrates have
told us that they are concerned that relatively minor poor behaviour
in residential homes may be more likely to result in formal proceedings
and referral to the police than it would if it happened in the
family home for children not in the care system.
— Implications for management of YJS
and impact on offending behaviour from out of area placements
The placement of looked after children into "out
of area" residential care placements raises issues for local
youth justice services that need to manage children brought into
the criminal justice system. There are issues about the adequacy
of information flows between services and the level of shared
understanding about continuing responsibilities of the placing
authority if young people placed out of area do offend. There
is also concern that out of area placements and instability of
placements can impact on a young person's behaviour making offending
behaviour more likely.
— Specific issues in relation to custody
and post custodial support
Looked-after children in custody may have specific
and complex needs and it is important that the level of involvement
from the home local authority continues both during and after
custody in order to ensure continuity of care.
POLICY DEVELOPMENTS
AND CURRENT
ISSUES RELATED
TO YOUTH
JUSTICE
5. The YJB strongly welcomed the publication
of both Care Matters: Transforming the Lives of Children and
Young People in Care and Care Matters: Time for Change
and fully supports the objectives of both papers to improve
outcomes for children and young people in care. Meeting the objectives
set out in these two publications would not only improve the quality
of life for these children but could help contribute to reducing
levels of offending and reoffending by the minority of children
in care who are brought into contact with the youth justice system.
Some children in care can exhibit challenging behaviour which
itself can be a reaction to the difficult circumstances which
led them into care. The YJB agrees that improving strategies including
improving the ability and skills of staff and arrangements to
manage challenging behaviour can be an important element in improving
life chances for children in care and preventing their contact
with the criminal justice system and the consequences that can
follow from that involvement.
Multi-agency protocols for managing behaviour
and avoiding criminalisation
6. The Care Matters Green Paper,
published in October 2006, included a commitment to develop a
protocol on how children's homes should work with local police
and Youth Offending Teams in order to address the issue of managing
difficult behaviour while avoiding criminalisation where possible.
Protocols between the relevant agencies have been operating in
some areas since 2001. There are some indications that they can
affect significant reductions in the number of recorded offences
by Looked-after children where implemented alongside other measures
such as training for residential staff in managing behaviour including
the use of restorative justice approaches. Wiltshire social services
and Wiltshire Constabulary introduced their protocol in 2001,
at that time overall figures show the number of offences committed
by Wiltshire Looked-after children was 184. By 2004 this figure
had fallen to 22 and we understand the figure rose slightly in
2006 to 35. It should be noted that the protocol was part of a
wider package of measures including training for residential staff
in restorative justice, the introduction of remand foster care
scheme and the introduction of a mentoring scheme. As well as
the benefits for individual children and the management of residential
homes, improved responses can have real benefits for the police
and courts through reduced demands on their resources. To take
forward the commitment to develop the multi-agency approach further
a cross government working group led by the Ministry of Justice
is currently working to establish a common template by which all
areas can develop protocols and to encourage as many local areas
as possible to sign up to operating them. YJB is also working
with the ACPO Youth Issues group who are looking to establish
best practice guidance for forces and develop new proposals on
crime recording standards in Children's Homes along similar lines
to those established for schools.
The impact of out of area placements for youth
justice services
7. The YJB welcomes proposals announced
aimed at increasing placement stability and agrees that instability
can lead to underachievement in education and in other areas of
children's lives, which in turn can be associated with the onset
and escalation of offending behaviour. YJB is aware that there
can be significant management issues for Youth Offending Teams
due to the number of out of area placements that can be made.
Youth Offending Teams have not always been made aware of young
people being placed in their area even when they have had some
offending history. Data and information exchange between Youth
Offending Teams can be patchy with the locations of placements
being unknown. The implications can be particularly significant
for smaller, including rural areas, some of which have significant
numbers of private residential care homes in their areas. This
can put a strain on YOT resources and raise difficulties where
they may not have as good access to specialist services such as
CAMHS or educational psychologists as they would have in larger
YOT areas. The YJB has undertaken some initial work investigating
the impact of out of area placements on the management of the
system and is now working with DCSF to look at how best this can
be addressed including the role of guidance and protocols across
relevant departments and agencies on the appropriate delivery
of youth justice services for those children in care who are placed
out of area and who offend.
Importance of joint work between schools and Youth
Offending Teams
8. YJB welcomes the measures set out by
the Government to improve the education experience of children
in care. There is a strong relationship between engagement and
achievement in education and protection against involvement in
offending behaviour. We would particularly welcome better support
in schools to help prevent exclusions of children in care given
the links between absence from school and offending. Better working
relationships between schools and Youth Offending Teams could
help develop approaches to prevent new exclusions and ensure through
information sharing that emerging problems are identified early.
On a related but separate point YJB would also welcome consideration
being given to how approaches to improve educational outcomes
for children in care could be applied to other groups including
children and young people who offend and have been disengaged
from education.
9. The Safer Schools Partnerships (SSP)
programme has been developed to enable local agencies to address
significant behavioural and crime-related issues in and around
a school and while not focused on Looked-after children it can
help with educational engagement and behaviour management in general
terms. A result of the YJB's proposal to develop a new policing
model for schools, the Safer Schools Partnership programme was
launched as a pilot in September 2002, and brought into mainstream
policy in March 2006. There are now over 400 such partnerships.
Custodial issues
10. There are particular issues for Looked-after
children who enter custody. It is important that local authorities
continue to take an active involvement in the lives of children
in care who do enter custody. We welcome commitments made to help
ensure this happens and to ensure that those children in care
on a voluntary basis are explicitly included in the arrangements.
11. In order to address concerns about lack
of social work provision in Young Offender Institutions the YJB
has funded specific posts in each institution over the last three
years. The DCSF has recently announced transitional funding to
continue the posts in 2008-09 with the expectation that local
authorities will take over funding in future years. The introduction
of social work posts in YOIs has been subject to an independent
evaluation which is due to be published shortly. The evaluation
indicates that the social worker provision can be an important
specialist service contributing to looked after children and care
leaver needs that had previously not been attended to. Additionally,
the specialist nature of the service indicates that this provision
could not be filled by other posts within prison service establishments.
12. The YJB welcomes the measures in the
Children and Young Persons Bill currently being considered by
Parliament that seek to ensure that Looked-after children receive
appropriate visits by local authorities including in custody.
The YJB understands that guidance is expected to make clear that
this responsibility for visits should not rest with the Youth
Offending Team itself but with children's social services. While
it is important that Youth Offending Teams, secure establishments
and social services work closely together, the involvement of
the social services department is important to maintain continuity
of contact and ensure there is effective planning for after the
end of the sentence and contact with the Youth Offending Team.
It is the YJB's view that these visits to looked after children
in custody should be conducted by qualified social workers from
children's services departments of local authorities.
13. We additionally support the principle
that children in care who enter custody receive the full range
of leaving care services that they are entitled to. Leaving custody
can be a critical time of vulnerability when young people will
benefit from intensive support. YJB welcomes the proposals in
Care Matters to increase the range of supported accommodation
for young people making the transition from care. Young people
leaving care and those looked after by local authorities can have
high levels of housing needs. Research into the accommodation
needs of young offenders indicated that children who have had
or are in care represent 30% of those in housing need. It is estimated
that around 40% of young people in custody have had some experience
of the care system and can experience particular difficulties
in accessing suitable accommodation on their release from custody—undermining
resettlement and risking reoffending and a return to custody.
On a related but separate point the YJB was supportive of the
statement by the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and
Families in his speech to the Youth Justice Annual Convention
in 2007 that consideration needs to be given as to whether all
young people who leave custody should have the same kind of support
as children leaving care in order to aid their resettlement and
reduce the likelihood of their reoffending. The Government subsequently
announced in the Children's Plan that there will be a Green Paper
on Resettlement in the youth justice system in 2008 that will
include examining what can be learnt from the support offered
to young people leaving care. The YJB is working with government
departments on the development of the Green Paper.
14. Secure Children's Homes are used both
for welfare based placements and for criminal justice placements
made by the YJB and therefore there is an interdependence between
the sectors with changes of use on one side potentially affecting
the other. Alongside YJB commissioning processes for the secure
estate, the DCSF is currently undertaking research looking at
the future market for welfare places in Secure Children's Homes.
As well as the very specific connection in relation to Secure
Children's Homes, in general there are interdependencies in the
provision of secure and semi-secure accommodation for the three
categories of children that come into state secure care—via
criminal justice, welfare and mental health routes. The evidence
suggests that there is a considerable overlap between the profiles
of the children that can be held in these different types of secure
setting. We believe there should be a more consistent approach
to all three groups than at present.
Intensive fostering in youth justice system
15. The Youth Justice Board Intensive Fostering
programme is a relatively small project providing intensive fostering
arrangements as an alternative to a custodial sentence. The evidence
based model used is Multi-dimensional Treatment Foster Care which
has shown success in working with children within the juvenile
justice population in the USA. There are three Intensive Fostering
pilot sites funded by the YJB providing individual foster placements
and a clinical team that work with both the child and the family
to improve the child's social skills and emotional control, while
in parallel working with parents or carers, on improving their
parenting skills.
16. The pilot is for the three years from
March 2005. So far 39 children have received Intensive Fostering
as part of their sentence with 19 children having completed the
programme to date. Intensive Fostering is being evaluated by the
University of York. The interim report in June 2007 showed a promising
start albeit noting the small sample size. YJB welcomes that the
Government's Children Plan noted that there will be further work
looking at alternatives to custody including intensive fostering.
Evaluating the reforms
17. The wide ranging reforms to children's
services and the specific measures being put in place for Looked-after
children are welcomed by the YJB. Given the indication of a disproportionate
relationship between being in care and involvement in the criminal
justice system, YJB would welcome where possible that evaluations
of the reforms measure the extent to which they are impacting
on the involvement of offending as well as improving wider outcomes.
To undertake the evaluation this may require further work establishing
the full nature of relationship.
18. There is in general terms a strong case
that children in care who come into contact with the youth justice
system require a greater need for adequate long term support to
improve their outcomes and prevent an escalation in offending
behaviour. Short term custodial sentences can be very disruptive
and destabilising and can particularly impact on this group and
there is a pressing need to ensure the care system works effectively
to intervene early and provide alternative interventions that
avoid the need for custody and reduce the risk of offending and
reoffending.
February 2008
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