Case studies

Multiple London Boroughs have come together and found new and innovative ways to work in partnership to solve the issue of children being remanded into custody in the capital.

Cheshire Youth Justice Service have focussed on addressing young people’s unmet health needs to tackle reoffending. The creation of the Cheshire-wide youth justice partnership in 2017 highlighted inequalities in justice-involved children’s health provision, which they have worked to address, and are now taking an innovative social prescribing approach to meet the wider health needs of their youth justice cohort.

Four youth offending services across Avon and Somerset are taking a different approach to supporting young people displaying high risk and high vulnerability. They are working in partnership with their Forensic Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service and using a psychologically-informed approach that takes a longitudinal view of a child’s life experiences to understand their current needs.

Kirklees have taken a ‘right worker, right support, right time’ approach to engaging young people involved in the criminal justice system and affected by criminal exploitation. Their Youth Engagement Service brings together colleagues from various youth services and through their consistent engagement approach, has allowed Kirklees to provide support to previously unreached children who are at risk of offending or are already involved in the criminal justice system.

The publication of the Punishing Abuse report in the West Midlands sparked Coventry Youth Justice Service to think about how to take a whole family approach to supporting young people involved in the criminal justice system, in recognition of the fact that families and wider networks are a key factor in reducing reoffending and meeting young people’s underlying needs.

West Berkshire has been using a focus on engagement in positive activities, education, training and employment to prevent reoffending and improve outcomes for children working with the Youth Offending Team.

A police-led pilot initially run in Tameside and Bury and now operating across Greater Manchester seeks to use police data in collaboration with youth justice services and local authority children’s services in order to make ‘invisible’ children in need of support, visible.

Barnsley Metropolitan Borough Council has ringfenced apprenticeship and work experience opportunities through the council’s ‘inclusive offer’, a scheme which creates opportunities for young people who need extra support to benefit from work.

Swindon combined a case formulation approach with a focus on identity and its link to offending, to promote interventions with young people which moved away from ‘managing risk’ to supporting them to develop a pro-social identity which naturally shifted them away from risk and offending behaviour.

Barnsley Council’s ‘inclusive offer’ creates opportunities for young people who need extra support to benefit from work.