The London Association for Youth Justice

NOTES OF MEETING of 11.4.02

 HELD AT CORAM FAMILY

Present:

Lis Davies                    -           Enfield

Louise Kemp                -           Harrow

Malcolm Pacey             -           Inner London Youth Justice Services

Simon Stone                  -           Islington           

Kev Wood                    -           Greenwich

Tim Bateman                -           Nacro

Apologies:

Steve O’ Donoghue

Matters Arising

1. Nacro / LAYJ Conference

It was agreed at the last meeting that we should aim to hold another one day conference in December – provisional date of Friday 13^th. Tim has approached Keith Towler to close the conference again and he has agreed. It was suggested that we should approach Jeremy Coleman who is a specialist youth district judge to talk on addressing the youth court.

2. Revised National Standards

The LAYJ has submitted a response to the standards. It was agreed that we should attempt to have this put on the web site – address: www.layj.org.uk. Tim to speak to webmaster.

At the recent round of Board business meetings, it was said that the reference to increased contact in the standards was a mistake – (although it is a mistake which is repeated twice in the document). Nothing to that effect however has appeared in writing.

3. Nacro Youth Crime Conference

The Conference is next week and is now more or less fully booked.

4. Appropriate Adults

Malcolm raised the issue of the police avoiding the use of YOT appropriate adults because of their insistence on having a solicitor at the Inner London Youth Justice Managers Meeting and a third borough has also noticed a problem. Malcolm will e mail outer London managers to see whether there is any problem among those YOTs.

Tim has raised it on the NAYJ website discussion forum to see whether it is an issue outside London but so far has had little response. (See www.nayj.org.uk)

The next step is to raise it with David Monk who has this week taken up post as London regional advisor with the YJB.

5. Local child curfews

There was some media coverage indicating that Corby were intending to apply for a local child curfew but on further investigation it transpired that it was one if a number of possible measures discussed at a community meeting called by police. The police have yet to take it any further. Lewisham police are also understood to be considering an application but it is likely to be opposed by the YOT.

Stand Down Reports

1. Malcolm introduced a discussion on stand downs. The issue has arisen because:

At the same time there are some potential dangers:

2. It was agreed that it would be good practice for YOT staff to be proactive in developing a protocol which tightly defines the circumstances in which a stand down will be produced. Malcolm outlined a number of questions which needed to be considered in any protocol and handed round a draft model agreement.

3. It was suggested that stand downs should only be provided on:

§         young people who are known

§         there is a recent ASSET or PSR

§         and in circumstances where an order concurrent to that already in place is being considered or a limited low tariff option.

4. It was noted that London probation is in the process of introducing a standardised PSR which is derived from a model used in Cornwall following a poor inspection report. It is being piloted in Tower Hamlets where reports are beginning to look a tad the same. It was acknowledged that it might help to avoid some poor reports but would also be likely to generate fewer very good PSRs. The section on risk is particularly concerning. It is not clear whether YOT probation staff are supposed to use it.

Referral Orders

1. The orders went live last week although at least two boroughs have yet to complete training of panel members. Orders were available from day one because, although they can only be imposed for offences committed after commencement, that was judged to have happened on 26^th June 2000 at the start of the pilots. This caused some confusion and has led to some bizarre outcomes – eg where codefendants sentenced at different hearings get very different results.

2. Guidance was published on 22 March which has some interesting content. In particular it is more prescriptive as to the forms of contracts than was anticipated – with a clear expectation that there will always be reparation and that the young person will see a member of the YOT at least once a fortnight for the first half of the order (as in the revised standards). Moreover, the guidance suggests a formula for the number of hours reparation to be included depending up on the length of the order. For longer orders, this is above the maximum number of hours available for a reparation order. (Available on the Home Office website at www.homeoffice.gov.uk)

3.  The guidance also indicates how the length of orders should be matched to offence seriousness – and replicates extracts from the Youth Court Bench book in the appendices - and that orders over 9 months should be reserved for exceptional cases. Those that are particularly serious, to reflect a late guilty plea, to allow for mixed pleas in discretional cases, and to allow for additional offences coming to light.

4. It was noted that there is no pro forma for reports to the panel although the guidance contains pro formas for just about everything else – including letters telling the young person that their contract is finished! It was agreed that it was not good practice to give ASSETs to the panel or PSRs in cases where they have been prepared.

5. Another document published rather too late is the ‘The Introduction of Referral Orders into the Youth Justice System: Final Report’ which became available on the second of April (Executive Summary attached). It notes problems over recruitment of representative panel members, that magistrates became more concerned during the pilots at the loss of discretion, there was an increased use of compensation orders, no increase in custody, low victim involvement but general satisfaction with how things are going. 74% of contracts were successfully concluded and further offences were committed during the life of the order (resulting in resentencing) in 23% of cases. The full report is available free from the Home Office on 020 7273 12084 or the Home Office website www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/index.html

6. It was confirmed that the referral order is not available in the crown court (except on appeal).

Street Crime Inititative

1. Last month a number of YOT managers were summonsed to a meeting with other worthies to discuss how to tackle the problem of ‘street crime’. The main issues for YOT staff appear to be that robbery cases are to be fast tracked – ie 10 day PSRs - and there may be a greater use of ISSP (with possible geographic extensions and/ or increases in the period of intensive contact). 

2. The Board and the Police at hosting a London Conference on Crime on 16^th April and it is rumoured that the Home Secretary will use it to announce the implementation of DTOs for 10 –11 year olds. (Prison for 8 year olds not far away). An alternative suggestion is that the announcement will be implementation of revised criteria for court ordered secure remands / remands to custody for 15 – 16 year olds boys (s130 of Criminal Justice and Police Act). In either event, rather unwelcome news.

3. There was a general feeling that custody had increased significantly in the wake of the Lord Chief Justice’s reported comments on mobile phone offences – with it becoming increasingly hard to avoid custody in robbery cases.

Tagging on Bail

‘Phase 1’ is to start on 22^nd April and it is anticipated that revised guidance will be available before then. It is not yet clear whether it will include 17 year olds as they were excluded in the draft version.

The situation is very confused.

§         The legislation appears to include 17 year olds

§         The Home Office says that 17 year olds were not included in guidance because tagging on bail is already available for adults and 17 year olds are adults for remand purposes. (However the Bail Act does not distinguish between adults and youth for the purposes of bail so this appears to be an untenable distinction). If the Home Office is right on this point, courts can then use tagging without the YOT saying it is suitable in the case of 17 year olds (and 10 –11 year olds presumably).

§         It may be that the HO is only to contract with providers for 12- 16 year olds (Malcolm will check with Premier) but that would be clearly discriminatory.

§         In some respects tagging for 17 year olds makes more sense than for the younger age group because they cannot be remanded to LA accommodation and are more likely to be remanded to custody.

LAYJ believes that YOTs should explore the possibility of using tagging with 17 year olds as a clear alternative to a custodial remand and promote a challenge on the basis of discrimination if it proves not to be available.

Vulnerability Assessments

A recent case has confirmed that the decision as to vulnerability is for the court, not for the YOT, the Youth Justice Board or secure units. Where a young person has been deemed vulnerable, he can have a legitimate expectation that that status will not change without compelling reasons. Bad behaviour in a secure unit is not enough. The case was reported in Volume 166 of Justice of the Peace at page 209.

The case also confirmed a previous decision that the fact that 15  - 16 year old girls cannot be remanded to custody is not discriminatory under the Human Rights Act because, as the LAYJ reads it, it would be very inconvenient for the Government if it was.

Specialisms within YOTs

There was a discussion about the extent to which YOTs had retained specialisms. Most but not all teams appear to have some specialist functions with, typically, PSRs being written by social workers or probation officers and police taking a lead on final warnings and victim contact. Further specialisation is however often limited by team size so only larger YOTs have been able to create various sub teams with a specific remit. Noone at the meeting had any direct experience of working within such a specialist sub team.

Publications

1. Nacro has produced a report entitled Children who commit grave crimes – notable mostly for the picture of Paul Dugmore from Haringey YOT on the front cover. The report is available from Nacro at a price of £12.50 on 7840 6439. 

2. The Home Office has published messages about anti social behaviour orders for practitioners. (Home Office Research Findings 160 available free from the Home Office).

3. A recent survey of policing of cannabis suggests that it costs at least £50m a year and absorbs the equivalent of 500 full time police officers.

4. The Prison Population Brief for February 2002 shows that the number of young people in prison service custody has risen over the last year by 2% largely as a result of increases in remands rather than sentences. The number of girls in prison service custody has shown a much steeper rise in relative terms – both in terms of remands and sentences. (Available on Home Office website www.homeoffice.gov.uk).

5. The Home Office has published the results of a survey about provisions for girls in the youth justice system and suggests that there are significant improvements that could be made – especially in relation to accommodation and programmes.

6. A recent book ‘Locked in, Locked Out’ by Angela Neustatter (a guardian journalist) looks at the experience of young people in prison and out of society. Published by Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation at £8.95.

7. The latest issue of the Probation journal has a letter from a probation officer in London criticising ‘Think First’ and the implementation of the What Works agenda. It suggests that in that POs area, there have been 186 starts on the programme but with only nine completions. The author of the letter is not expected to get promotion in the near future.