YJB reforms focus on innovative services
Neil Puffett
Tuesday, January 20, 2015
Giving the Youth Justice Board more freedom over how it funds local provision could see more outcome-driven services being developed.
The way the Youth Justice Board (YJB) funds youth offending teams is to be reformed in a move that will have implications for the way local services are delivered.
The board provides grant funding to local authorities via a "good practice grant", which makes up about a third of total YOT funding. As stipulated at the moment, this is for "developing good practice and commissioning research in the area of youth justice".
But, following a "triennial review" of the YJB's functions in 2013, the government is now moving to extend the organisation's grant-making function to allow greater flexibility about how it is spent. Youth justice minister Andrew Selous, speaking during a debate on the proposals in the House of Commons earlier this month, said that by widening powers on grant-making, the government is seeking to increase the scope of services for which grant money can be used, "thereby better responding to the evolving local priorities of youth justice".
"The order will promote improved frontline delivery and more flexibility to improve outcomes for young people by funding key services," he said.
Experts are split on what the likely implications will be, with details of precisely what the change will mean thin on the ground. Some think it will mean the grant being linked to clear outcomes. Indeed, the triennial review of the YJB in 2013 recommended that the annual grant from the YJB to YOTs should be linked to specific outcomes to ensure it is spent effectively.
John Drew, former chief executive of the YJB, says the introduction of outcomes measures could work in favour of YOTs, potentially helping to protect the grant from Ministry of Justice efficiency savings going forward.
"It has been said on more than one occasion by senior civil servants - 'you (the YJB) spend more than £90m in grants aiding YOTs, what do you get for it?' They have asked if there is any way expenditure can be more tightly linked to a desired outcome. I think the changes are linked into that position."
Under consideration
YJB chief executive Lin Hinnigan has previously said that linking the grant to resettlement work to help drive down reoffending rates for under-18s has been under consideration by ministers.
But Drew adds that, given time constraints in the run-up to May's general election, a decision about which outcomes to pursue will likely be taken by the next government, not the current one.
"The question for the next government is what do they want to see that branch of expenditure spent on?" he says.
Tim Bateman, criminologist at the University of Bedfordshire, suggests the change could allow the YJB to be "much more picky" about who and what it funds.
He says the organisation could reduce the amount it hands out to YOTs, retaining the remaining money to create a separate fund for YOTs to apply for groundbreaking projects, similar to the Department for Education's innovation fund for children's services.
"Potentially, local authorities could make a case that they require start-up funding for a new initiative and put in a bid," he says. "Conversely, the board could start to ask more questions about what is being done with the money and what they are getting for their outlay."
Bateman says the change could cause problems for YOTs that have come to rely on YJB grant funding as a large part of their income.
"I suspect any change would be a bit incremental - with YOTs continuing to get some grant - but some monies being held back so that YOTs can apply for grants for specific initiatives," he says. "The advantage of such an approach is that it could foster innovation. The counter-position is that there is already an increasing discrepancy as to the YOT model and what services are available to children in trouble from area to area."
But Gareth Jones, chair of the Association of Youth Offending Team Managers, fears that the budgets of many YOTs are so tight anyway that they will be unable to divert funding to new initiatives, despite the changes to the way funding can be spent.
He highlights a 7.3 per cent cut to the YOT grant for 2015/16, which YOTs were informed of over Christmas, as evidence that funding continues to be on the wane.
"We are disappointed that yet again we have a significant cut from central government despite having achieved our ambitions on reducing numbers of first-time entrants, reducing numbers in custody and improvements to reoffending rates," he says.
Release on temporary licence
Another significant change is the intention to make the YJB responsible for decisions to allow young offenders to be released on temporary licence (ROTL) from secure training centres (STCs).
Where a young person is risk assessed as suitable for temporary release, permission will be given for them to leave the establishment for an agreed period of time to undertake "constructive activities".
Selous says ROTL can be used to allow young people to attend interviews, training courses or arrange accommodation ready for their release, with the aim of providing them with a "phased reintroduction into the community".
At present, temporary release is overseen by the National Offender Management Service and the directors of STCs. Drew says the contracts struck between the government and STC providers included fines if there were escapes, which could have contributed to a reluctance to use ROTL.
"That created caution around the use of ROTL that probably wasn't in young people's best interests," he says. "There is a broad consensus that we can be doing better on ROTL than we are at the moment and we should make it easier to release children on temporary licence.
Bateman says some of the work of the Beyond Youth Custody programme, established to highlight best practice within the youth justice system, suggests a more flexible use of ROTL is a pre-requisite of good resettlement work. "At present, its use is limited and tends to be determined by very risk-averse decision making," he says.
"It isn't much used just to help young people get used to being outside the custodial environment or to re-orientate themselves to family and friends.
"So giving YJB responsibility has significant potential in this regard."
Labour's shadow youth justice minister Dan Jarvis said the move was welcome, but raised concerns about when a released trainee will be deemed to have breached the terms of their licence and so be considered "unlawfully at large".
"The Care Quality Commission and others have estimated that as many as 30 per cent of people going through the criminal justice system suffer from learning difficulties of some sort, and it can sometimes be these factors that lead to some offenders breaching the terms of their release, rather than through malicious intent," he said.
New powers
- Grant funding Extending the YJB's grant-making function
- Release on temporary licence Giving the YJB powers, alongside the Justice Secretary, to temporarily release young people from Secure Training Centres
- Information technology Handing the YJB the function of providing assistance to councils on youth justice-related information technology systems
- Education contracts Give the YJB powers, alongside the Justice Secretary, to enter into education contracts for directly managed young offender institutions (YOIs)