Probation chief calls for national guidance on out-of-court disposals
Nina Jacobs
Monday, October 14, 2019
The chief inspector of probation has called for national guidance to ensure young people involved in low-level offending are given consistent support.
It follows the latest publication of HM Inspectorate of Probation's annual report of youth offending services which revealed a "significant variation" in the way young people were treated by police and youth offending teams (YOTs) depending on where they lived.
The report, covering inspections of 26 youth offending services over the last 12 months, highlights incidences where young people were either given an out-of-court disposal or charged with an offence and dealt with by a youth court.
Chief inspector of probation Justin Russell said: "Some services were too punitive, while others were too lenient or too inconsistent.
"This has led to a postcode lottery, where young people face different outcomes depending on where they live.
"We need national guidance on this issue to ensure young people dealt with through out-of-court disposals receive more consistent supervision and support."
Russell said with low-level offending, services could take steps to divert children and young people away from the criminal justice system, potentially benefiting the offender and the public.
Offenders can be encouraged to apologise for their offence and make some form of reparation to the victim or wider community.
The inspector's report goes on to comment on a lack of demographic information on the children and young people cautioned or convicted in the youth justice annual statistics.
However, it states that information collected from 791 court disposal cases and 506 out-of-court disposal cases, shows the latter are more likely to involve younger females, who were less likely to be in care and had fewer previous sanctions.
The annual inspection report draws on the findings of hundreds of site visits and interviews and looked at more than 1,000 cases across the youth offending services surveyed.
Inspectors rate 12 aspects of the services' work and award an overall performance rating.
For the period 2018/19, the inspectorate rated three services "outstanding", 12 as "good", eight as "require improvement" and three as "inadequate".
Overall, inspectors said they were impressed with the "calibre of leadership" and staff working in youth offending services, with examples of strong working relationships to support children and young people to make better life choices.
However, they flagged up concerns about "poor" provision of education to children who had committed offences.
Russell said examples were uncovered of children known to youth offending services who are receiving little or no education.
"With time on their hands, some children are committing offences during school hours or are at risk of being groomed or enticed into crime," he added.
Russell highlighted how education representatives are absent from management boards in almost a third of the youth services inspected.
"The lack of representation at a senior level has prevented some services from making satisfactory progress on this issue," he said.
The report also includes initial findings of a survey carried out by the inspectorate earlier this year, of the work youth offending services are doing to tackle knife crime.
The inspectorate surveyed more than 150 youth offending services across England and Wales, attracting responses from half of those contacted.
It found a quarter of YOT managers assessed knife crime as a "major problem" in their area and 59 per cent felt it was increasing.
Overall, a fifth of caseloads involved knife crime offences and a majority (85 per cent) of schemes were supervising children who had been victims of knife crime.
Inspectors found that county lines offending had become a "major challenge" for youth offending services and other criminal justice agencies.
They praised "heroic efforts" by some YOTs to counteract county lines offending, but found a "deeply concerning lack of awareness" in other parts of the country.
Russell said there was a "dearth of national guidance" for youth offending services to identify and tackle county lines activity.
"These networks typically involve gangs, violence and exploitation, and have a significant impact on children and young people, their families and communities."
Despite this, he said there had been a "welcome reduction" in the number of children and young people entering the youth justice system for the first time.
"However, youth offending services still face multiple challenges in managing these young people - many of whom have had a very difficult start to life and have complex needs."
