Having remained stubbornly high in recent years, tackling the reoffending rate among juveniles has been identified as a top priority by the Youth Justice Board (YJB).
Latest Ministry of Justice figures show that of the 75,504 under-18s released from custody or convicted of a crime in England and Wales between April 2011 and March 2012, a total of 25,009 went on to reoffend within 12 months.
The resultant reoffending rate of 35.5 per cent - although marginally lower than it was for the period between January and December 2011 - is still nearly two percentage points higher than it was in 2005, when it stood at 33.6 per cent.
The average rate does, however, mask wide variations across youth offending team (YOT) areas. The highest is Merthyr Tydfil in Wales at 50 per cent, while the lowest is Windsor & Maidenhead at 20.9 per cent.
Accommodation is key
Among the best performing authorities is Dudley in the West Midlands, which has a reoffending rate of 26.5 per cent, a fall of four percentage points since 2005.
Mike Galikowski, youth offending team manager in Dudley, says focusing on accommodation is key to addressing longer-term aims for a young person such as accessing training and employment.
"Unless someone knows where they are living and what they are eating, they are never going to achieve anything else," he says.
Accommodation provision includes "crash pads" that allow young people to have "time out" that can help prevent homelessness.
"They can spend a week or two there and we can work with them and the family and decide what's best for them," he says. "It's all about trying to maintain stability."
Beyond this, the service runs a housing support scheme in partnership with a housing association and Dudley Council's housing services.
The project provides safe and secure accommodation to 16- to 19-year-olds who are either living in unsuitable accommodation, homeless or at risk of becoming homeless after research that highlighted a high number of young people on community orders were having problems with accommodation.
During 2011/12, the project supported 39 young people.
Preventative measures
Galikowski says the authority is also planning to use a YJB tool currently being trialled in Wolverhampton and Birmingham to get a better understanding of the reasons young people reoffend and the kind of services that can prevent it.
"We already monitor the cohort, but this digs down further to spot trends," he says.
"It will help us to analyse the common factors among the cohort who are reoffending in our area.
"We could find that there are lots of children with ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder) coming to the fore or it could be substance misuse, mental health, retail crime or gangs - the factors will be individual to each YOT.
"You can then ensure your strategies are alert to those particular areas and increase resources in them.
"I think it is something that will help people focus on the specific needs of the reoffending cohort.
"It may have implications for partners. If you find that mental health is a big issue, then you can make the case for more mental health support," he adds.
Warwickshire is also among the leading areas in terms of tackling reoffending. Its current reoffending rate of 27.4 per cent, represents a reduction of 9.1 percentage points since 2005.
Lesley Tregear, youth justice and family intervention service manager at the authority, says the outreach work that the team has to adopt because of the large size of the county means staff can have a more personal relationship with young offenders and their families.
Team restructure
Tregear has also changed the way the team works - in the past the YOT was formed of case managers and specialist workers, but now, as a result of restructure due to funding cuts, every member of the team is responsible for some element of case management.
"It gives staff a much clearer understanding across all the disciplines," she says.
"It could be the case in the past that a young person with substance misuse problems had a case manager and a substance misuse worker.
"Now, if the issue is predominantly substance misuse, that young person will be almost entirely managed by a substance misuse worker who will do the assessment, the plan and undertake the work.
"Specialist intervention workers are doing full case management and I think that is beneficial."
Best performing youth offending teams *
1. Windsor & Maidenhead 20.9%
2. Flintshire 25.3%
Wokingham 25.3%
4. Dudley 26.5%
5. Solihull 26.9%
6. Gwynedd Mon 27.4%
Warwickshire 27.4%
Source: MoJ ?* Reoffending rate for juveniles released from custody, serving community orders, or cautioned or reprimanded between April 2011 and March 2012 in England and Wales
1. Windsor & Maidenhead 20.9
2. Flintshire 25.3
Wokingham 25.3
4. Dudley 26.5
5. Solihull 26.9
6. Gwynedd Mon 27.4
Warwickshire 27.4
Source: MoJ * Reoffending rate for juveniles released from custody,
serving community orders, or cautioned or reprimanded between April 2011
and March 2012 in England and Wales
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