Cutting crime: the case for justice reinvestment - Justice Committee Contents


Annex 2

YJB CHANGE PROGRAMMES

SECURE ACCOMMODATION CAPITAL DEVELOPMENT

  This is an on-going 10-year plan to deliver the principles set out in the YJB's Strategy for the Secure Estate for Children and Young People. To view the strategy, visit http://www.yjb.gov.uk/publications/Scripts/prodView.asp?idproduct=324&eP

The programme is designed to improve or reconfigure the built environment by redeveloping or developing new establishments. Aims include:

    (i) a single-site population of under-18s, with separate facilities from adults;

    (ii) small flexible living units comprising no more than 40 beds;

    (iii) young people being located as close as possible to their home community, enabling stronger ties and accessibility; and

    (iv) safer environments that better meet the needs of young people.

SECURE ACCOMMODATION REGIME DEVELOPMENT

  The objective of this on-going programme is also to deliver the principles set out in the YJB's Strategy for the Secure Estate for Children and Young People, in this case, by introducing, evaluating and further developing services that significantly contribute to the regime in secure establishments for young people. Aims include:

    —  development of a child- and young person-focused culture;

    —  regimes fundamentally geared to the individual young offender's health, education, training, recreational, cultural and personal development needs;

    —  establishments run by staff who have completed nationally approved training, and are committed to working with children and young people; and

    —  minimising the likelihood of harm to young people through integrated and rigorous safeguarding measures, including well-developed self-harm, suicide and bullying prevention programmes.

WIRING UP YOUTH JUSTICE

  This on-going programme is being delivered in stages up to 2010 subject to sufficient funding being provided, with the aim of achieving a more integrated youth justice system. Aims include:

    —  ensuring that all youth justice system practitioners have a case management system capable of exchanging information between YOTs, the YJB and secure estate providers—the initial focus is reducing the risk of harm to young people, as they move from the community to custody (Module 1);

    —  enhancing community-based prevention activities by improving the flow of information from the police, and ensuring that youth justice practitioners are integrated with children's services practitioners locally and nationally (Module 2); and

    —  improving the flow of information between youth justice practitioners and the wider criminal justice system—in particular the National Offender Management Service, the police, the courts and the Crown Prosecution Service (Module 3).

  For further information, visit the Wiring Up Youth Justice website www.wiringupyouthjustice.info

YOUTH JUSTICE: THE SCALED APPROACH

  Youth Justice: the Scaled Approach is a two-to three-year project to support youth justice services by adopting a scaled approach to intervention—that is, one based more on the assessed level of risk of individual young people. It is designed to:

    —  support the introduction of the new sentencing framework subject to its approval by Parliament;

    —  strengthen case management across the youth justice system; and

    —  improve practice in individual assessment (Asset) completion, the writing of pre-sentence reports, and intervention-planning.

  To achieve this, the YJB's advice to Ministers on National Standards for Youth Justice Services are being revised, and new case management guidance produced. The project is aimed at helping YOTs focus resources on those who need it most.

YOUTH JUSTICE SYSTEM PERFORMANCE FRAMEWORK

  This is a project to design and implement a revise "end-to-end" performance management framework over the next two to three years. The benefits will be:

    —  increased focus on outcomes for the child or young person, and on the impact of interventions on preventing offending and reducing reoffending;

    —  better use of limited YJB resources, and more focus on less, but higher quality, monitoring information;

    —  ensuring the youth justice service providers' performance data are as accessible as possible, and suitable for many audiences; and

    —  aligning YOT and secure estate management information systems into a performance framework to inform understanding of the transition children and young people make from community to custody to community.






 
previous page contents next page

House of Commons home page Parliament home page House of Lords home page search page enquiries index

© Parliamentary copyright 2010
Prepared 14 January 2010