Issue - items at meetings - Youth Justice Service Plan 12-13 Revised

Report of the Interim Director, Children’s Services (copy attached)

            RESOLVED – (1) That the Youth Justice Strategy set out in Appendix 1 to the report be agreed; and

(2) That the Children and Young People Committee authorise the Interim Director of Children’s Services to proceed with the Youth Justice Strategy 2013-14.

60.1         The Committee considered a report of the Interim Director of Children’s Services setting out the Youth Justice Strategy 2013-14. Since 2000 there had been a requirement in the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 for Youth Offending Services (YOS) and their partnerships, to produce a Youth Justice Strategy, setting out how YOS would be resourced locally and detailing those services which would be available in relation to the statutory primary aim of YOS to prevent youth offending in the area.

60.2    It was noted that the plan had been produced by the YOS manager and overseen by the partnership board which included representatives of the “Safer in the City Partnership”, and wider statutory and voluntary services. The last year had been a period of change; a full restructure of the service had been undertaken and a new service structure would be in place for1 April 2013, designed to focus on the core purpose of the service, and taking into account current performance and feedback from inspections. The strategy set out the new delivery model and the partnership working that would be developed from this. A full Joint Strategic Need Assessment had been undertaken on youth offending across the city in 2012; and  had fed into a stakeholder event including partners from across statutory and voluntary sectors. The service and delivery of interventions to young offenders across the city had been scrutinised and as a result priority areas had been identified city in order to address prevention of youth offending in the city with focused support programmes to prevent reoffending. Following budgetary pressures over recent years and a subsequent restructure a team was in place which was ready to deliver on the key priorities set out.

60.3    A priority area had been the development of a more robust restorative justice programme across the city, greater intelligence sharing between the police and YOS, stronger links between YOS and probation, multi agency planning and work to address and reduce repeat offending within the city. These requirements had been incorporated into the new YOS structure and model of working. Over the past two years the Youth Offending Service had been inspected twice by HMI Probation, following which a peer review had been undertaken the most recent inspection had taken place in October 2012. The Youth Justice Strategy and Plan had been developed to incorporate the findings from these inspections, in order to develop a more robust, outcome focused services to reduce youth offending and to improve management of risk and safeguarding of young people. Implementation of the strategy and delivery of the plan would be monitored by the YOS partnership board on a quarterly basis. The YOS partnership board was made up of council, strategic and voluntary sector partners and was accountable to the Safe in the City Partnership Board and chaired by the Director of Children’s Services.

60.4    Councillor Shanks, the Chair, welcomed the report commending the work that had been carried out to ensure that the new structure would be in place for 1 April 2013.

60.5    Councillor Wealls also welcomed the report referring to the development of an overarching policy aimed at helping to prevent looked after children from re-offending and working to avoid their criminalisation. Clarification was sought regarding the role of the Safeguarding Children Board in dovetailing with the work of the LEA and other partners. It was confirmed that work was on-going between all partners to ensure that robust measures were in place and all relevant information was shared. Mr Bedford explained that this would be his last meeting as he was stepping down as Chair of the Safeguarding Children Board and would be replaced by former Chief Superintendent Bartlett wef 1 April.

60.6    It was noted in answer to questions that as a consequence of the changes in legislation brought in at the beginning of the year  in addition to the work being undertaken with carers and foster parents of vulnerable young people to seek to prevent re-offending, in future all youngsters placed on remand would automatically be treated as looked after children. It was intended that robust bail packages would be put into place and that advice and support from the team would be available six days a week. Whilst there had been a reduction in first time entrants to the YOS from 231 in 2009/10 to 95 in 2011/12, 30% of that number re-offended within 12months. Although that was a lower figure than for the city’s statistical neighbours this was still a high figure (3.68) when viewed nationally and measures had been put into place to seek to address this. One strand of this would be to for YOS to link its work to that of the Stronger Families, Stronger Communities team given the additional resources available from within that team to assist.

60.6    Councillor Buckley referred to those children who experienced delay with speech and language and the period of time for which these children were tracked. It was explained that work was being undertaken in concert with Education Welfare. All young people who came onto the system would be tracked for at least 12 months and there would be a focus on early intervention which would also link into pre-school initiatives.

60.7    Ms Travers Amaze referred to the fact that 57% of young people supported by the YOS were of school age and a significant number of them attended Queensdown/Pupil Referral Unit, there could often be a correlation between behavioural difficulties, lack of social skills and offending. As a number of these young people had speech and language difficulties she requested a breakdown on the numbers seen by YOS and those in receipt of statements for SEN.

60.8    Councillor Powell stated that there was a recognized causal link between housing issues, poor literacy and educational under achievement, there was a need for overarching linkage between all relevant services.

60.9    It was noted that one of the team’s priority areas was around the on-going development of a restorative justice programme.

60.10  Councilllors Pissaridou and Wealls referred to the involvement of the Scrutiny Panel Chaired by Councillor Wealls, stating that the Panel needed to be made aware of the changes made and that it would be premature for the report to be referred to Full Council at the present time. The Chair, Councilor Shanks concurred stating that as it stood at present the Committee were being requested to agree the Strategy and to authorise the Interim Director of Children’s Services to proceed with it.

60.11  RESOLVED – (1) That the Youth Justice Strategy set out in Appendix 1 to the report be agreed; and

(2) That the Children and Young People Committee authorise the Interim Director of Children’s Services to proceed with the Youth Justice Strategy 2013-14.