Government scheme helps councils cut custody use

In the final evaluation report of The Youth Justice Reinvestment Custody Pathfinder, which ran for two years between October 2011 and September 2013, researchers looked in-depth at the two areas involved across both years of the pilot.

The consortium covering West Yorkshire involving Leeds, Bradford, Calderdale, Kirklees and Wakefield councils reported a reduction in custody bed nights of 28 per cent in the first year and 42 per cent in the second. This exceeded the set target of 10 per cent in each year.

The west London area pilot, covering the boroughs of Hammersmith & Fulham, Kensington and Chelsea, Westminster, and Ealing, reported in 2013 that custody bed nights had reduced 40 per cent during the second year of the pilot.

In both cases this was above an England and Wales average fall in custody of 33 per cent over the second year the pilot took place.

Key factors in this reduction were better joint commissioning of support and ensuring young offenders did not miss appointments and in so doing breach terms of any community supervision orders that had a custodial penalty.

But the scheme was not wholly successful. Although both the West Yorkshire and west London council areas completed both years, two other areas, covering Birmingham and north-east London, dropped out after a year because they had recorded increases in the use of custody.

By leaving early they avoided a financial penalty that is built into the pilot for those that fail to hit targets over two years. The total funding to the West Yorkshire councils was £1.5m, while the west London councils received £300,000.

The evaluation concludes that the pilot’s model of upfront funding with a “claw back” mechanism if targets were not met “provide an effective way of incentivising sites to achieve their targets”, it states.

It adds that reduction of custody bed nights was a “clear and easy” target for councils to work towards.