Opinion

Keeping the faith of a youth justice worker

2 mins read Youth Justice
I celebrated my 50th anniversary of working in youth justice a month ago. It’s been a real privilege to be engaged in this work for such a long period. While I am not stopping quite yet, this is my last column for Children & Young People Now. After six years it is high time to hand over to fresher voices.
John Drew is senior associate at the Prison Reform Trust
John Drew's final CYP Now column reflects on the qualities of youth justice workers

For my last column, I wanted to draw on a conversation I had earlier in the year at a funeral of a former mentor of mine, Avril, who was one of many people from whom I have drawn inspiration along the way.

In giving this column its title, I want to describe some of the things that have sustained me through good times and bad.

My first inspiration comes from criminology. It is our certain knowledge that the peak of offending and antisocial behaviour lies for most people in the period somewhere between mid to late teens and early 20s. Explanations for this vary but the fact itself is undeniable. This has not changed for a lot longer than 50 years, but I remember realising it in the 1970s and holding it dear ever since. If we can shepherd children through this period, keeping them out of the most criminogenic elements of our system – especially but not exclusively custody – we can help them make real differences to their chances of a good life.

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