Youth justice

Reducing youth crime and reforming the youth justice system are a major part of the Government's effort to build safer communities and tackle social exclusion.

The Government has embarked on the most radical reform of the youth justice system for 50 years. Reform focuses on preventing offending by children and young people, through:

• a clear strategy to prevent offending and re-offending by children and young people;
• helping offenders, and their parents, to face up to their offending behaviour and take responsibility for it;
• earlier, more effective intervention when young people first offend;
• faster, more efficient procedures from arrest to sentence; and
• partnership between all youth justice agencies to deliver a better, faster system.

The Crime and Disorder Act 1998 establishes preventing offending as the principal aim of the youth justice system and places a statutory duty on all those working in the youth justice system to have regard to that aim. What this means in practice for different agencies, professions and individuals is set out in the framework document 'Youth Justice - the statutory principal aim of preventing offending by children and young people', published in September 1998.

A new approach to tackling youth crime

The Act provides a range of new interventions and punishments to help local communities and youth justice agencies take effective action to tackle youth crime.

These include new powers to enable early, targeted intervention to deal with anti-social behaviour and to divert the very young from crime:

• local child curfew schemes to protect children under the age of 10 in a particular area from getting into trouble. Under these powers, which were brought into force on 30 September 1998, local authorities may apply to the Home Office to establish a local scheme which may, for example, form part of local crime and disorder strategies required under section 6 of the Act;
  New legislation under sections 48 and 49 of the Criminal Justice and Police Act 2001 raises the upper age limit of children who may be the subject of a local child curfew to 15 and also allows the police as well as local authorities to apply for a local curfew scheme. The new legislation takes effect from 1 August 2001 and new guidance to explain the changes has been produced. Local child curfew guidance ( (file size: 77 Kb)
• child safety order to provide targeted intervention with children under 10 at risk of getting into trouble ;
• anti-social behaviour orders to deal with serious, but not necessarily criminal, anti-social behaviour by those aged 10 and above. These powers were brought into force on 1 April 1999; and
• powers for the police to remove truants to designated premises to allow the police, working with local authorities and schools, to tackle truancy, one of the factors that put young people at risk of offending. These powers came into force on 1 December 1998.

The Act includes new powers for the police and courts to intervene when young people do offend:

• Final Warning Guidance Booklet( file size 491 kb)
• reparation order requiring young offenders to make amends to their victim or the wider community;
• Action plan order: guidance document ( file size 246 kb) – guidance on drug treatment and testing requirements as part of an action plan order or supervision order
• parenting order (file size 246 kb) to help reinforce and support parental responsibility (a parenting order may also be used in combination with an anti-social behaviour order or a child safety order); and
• court ordered secure remands - to remand certain alleged offenders to local authority secure accommodation.

• detention and training order to provide a constructive and flexible custodial sentence with a clear focus on preventing reoffending.

New structures at local and national level have been introduced to provide the framework to tackle youth offending. Youth offending teams will bring together the staff and wider resources of the police, social services, the probation service, education and health, in the delivery of youth justice services, with the scope to involve others, including the voluntary sector. At national level, the Youth Justice Board for England and Wales, which began operation on 30 September 1998, will provide oversight of the operation of the teams and the youth justice system as a whole.

Pilots of the final warning scheme, reparation order, action plan order, child safety order, parenting order and youth offending teams began on 30 September 1998 for 18 months. Subject to the outcome of the pilots, the Government aims to bring into force nationally the provisions for youth offending teams in April 2000, and the final warning scheme and the new court orders during 2000-2001.

Speeding up justice

The Government has made it a priority to speed up justice for all young people who offend or are alleged to have offended and, in particular, to halve the average time from arrest to sentence for persistent young offenders. In 1996 the average was 142 days from arrest to sentence. It fell to 125 days on average in 1998, and to 106 days by December 1998.

There are now fast track schemes operating in most youth court areas, covering 95% of persistent young offenders. Some schemes have delivered significant improvements. The Government's aim is to ensure that every scheme succeeds in speeding up justice for persistent young offenders by ensuring that all local youth justice agencies are working together on joint improvement plans, and by ensuring that each scheme covers every stage of the process from arrest to sentence.

The Youth Justice Board will be issuing new guidance on fast tracking, and also making available consultancy help to put the guidance into practice, and to draw up joint improvement plans.

In October 1998 new monitoring arrangements were set in place across the country, and demanding performance targets set for all agencies for all stages of the proceedings up to and after trial for persistent young offender cases. These targets are currently under review.

Young offenders are also targeted by the fast-tracking provisions in the Crime and Disorder Act designed to get offenders into court the day after charge. To help achieve this, the Crown Prosecution Service are working in police stations to help prepare the papers, and improved case management procedures have been introduced in the magistrates' courts. Adult offenders are also covered by these provisions, which have been successfully piloted in six areas around the country. National roll - out will take place on 1st November.

The Crime and Disorder Act also includes provision for setting statutory time limits for young offender and persistent young offender cases, as well as for adult cases. Statutory time limits are being piloted for 18 months from the 1 November 1999 in the youth court only in the six Narey pilot sites. Guidance on the operation of Statutory Time Limits is available.  A letter (Statutory Time Limits: Guidance for Pilots) accompanies this Guidance.

In addition to the measures currently being piloted, the Act also introduced a range of other procedural changes specifically relating to the youth court. These changes - many of which also follow recommendations made in the Narey Report - came into operation on 30 September 1998.

Referral Orders

Reform has continued with measures in the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999 (this is held on the HMSO website). Those measures introduce a radical new approach to ensuring effective intervention with first time offenders, emphasising personal responsibility, reparation and the role of the family, friends and other responsible adults in tackling offending behaviour. Under these measures, first time offenders who plead guilty and and do not require a custodial sentence will be referred through a referral order to a panel drawn from the community and facilitated by the youth offending team. The panel will look at the causes of offending and draw up a contract with the young offender and their parents to tackle these. The panel arrangements will be piloted in 2000.  Guidance on the Referral Order  and Guidance to the Courts are currently out to public consultation.

Establishing Referral Order Schemes: A Guidance Note for Youth Offending Teams  (file size 195 Kb) was published by the Home Office and the Youth Justice Board in March 2001.

Introduction of Referral Orders into the Youth Justice System

• Referral Orders and Youth Offenders Panel - FAQs  (file size 19 Kb)
• Referral Orders and Youth Offenders Panel - Guidance for Courts, Youth Offending Teams and Youth Offender Panels  (file size 670 Kb)
• Important changes to Referral Order from 18 August 2003: Supplementary guidance for courts, Youth Offending Teams and Youth Offender Panels (file size 153 Kb)
• 2nd Interim report (July 2001) on the Introduction of Referral Orders into the Youth Justice System (file size 1.2 Mb)
• Commentary by the Home Office & Youth Justice Board on the 2nd Interim report (July 2001) on the Introduction of Referral Orders into the Youth Justice System:   (file size 59 Kb)
• 1st Interim report (January 2001) on the Introduction of Referral Orders into the Youth Justice System:  (RDS Occasional Paper)  (file size 319 Kb) 
• Commentary by the Home Office & Youth Justice Board on the 1st Interim report (January 2001) on the introduction of  Referral Orders into the Youth Justice System

Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999

• Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999
• Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999: Implementation
• Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act. Part 1: questions and answers
• Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act. Part 1: Referral to a Youth Offender Panel

The Detention and Training Order

• The Detention and Training Order: Preparing for electronically monitored early release  (file size 118 kb)
• The Detention and Training Order: revised guidance on electronically-monitored early release (file size 181 kb)

Extension of the Home Detention Curfew Scheme

• Extension of the Home Detention Curfew Scheme To Juveniles Serving Sentences Of Detention Under Section 91 Of The Powers Of Criminal Courts (Sentencing) Act 2000 (file size 377 kb)
• Extension of Home Detention Curfew to under-18's serving sentences of detention under Section 91 of the Powers of Criminal Courts (Sentencing) Act 2000 (file size 61 kb)

Youth Justice - The Next Steps

• Children and young people's consultation document: Stopping Youth Crime - Tell us what you think (English)   (file size 1.40 Mb)
  We’ve come up with ideas for changing the way we deal with young
  people involved in crime. If you’re aged between 10 and 17,
  we’d like to know what you think. This leaflet describes our ideas
  and gives you space to have your say.
• Children and young people's consultation document: Stopping Youth Crime - Tell us what you think (Welsh)   (file size 84 Kb)
• Summary of children's and young people's responses to Stopping Youth Crime - Tell us what you think and the Government's response (English version)
• Youth Justice - The Next Steps (English) (file size 187 Kb)
  This companion to Every Child Matters sets out possible reforms, on
  which the Government seeks your views to develop the youth justice system
  over the next few years.
• Youth Justice - The Next Steps (Welsh) (file size 208 Kb)
• Summary of responses to Youth Justice - The Next Steps consultation and the Government's response (English version)

Penalty Notice Disorder (PDS) Scheme

The use of Penalty Notices for Disorder for offences committed by Young People aged 16 and 17. - Supplementary Operational Guidance for Police Officers (file size 46 Kb)

Sections 1 - 11 of the Criminal Justice and Police Act provide for the PDS Scheme.

Government Response to Audit Commission report, Youth Justice 2004: A review of the reformed youth justice system.

The Government's response to the Audit Commission report on youth justice was published on 16 December 2004, (file size 146 Kb)

The Audit Commission report on youth justice titled: Youth Justice 2004-A review of the reformed youth justice system, is available on the Audit Commission website.

The Government's response to the Public Accounts Committee report published on 16 December 2004 is available on the Official Documents website.