Good afternoon and welcome to the 33rd meeting in 2004 of the Justice 2 Committee. I intimate that we have apologies from Maureen Macmillan, Colin Fox and Jackie Baillie.
I have none to make.
Thank you.
The youth justice strategy groups are now working much more effectively in a number of authorities. People have had the opportunity to review the membership of their groups, particularly in light of the publication of the Executive's youth justice standards. That is an on-going process. The previous youth justice audit highlighted some of the issues related to membership of the strategy steering group and indicated the range and status of its current members. Clearly, that is not a stand-alone group and an important issue is how it relates to other children's services planning structures. The new children's services planning guidance seeks better-integrated working, so youth justice strategy groups may make a greater impact than they have made previously.
That is very helpful. I put the same question to Assistant Chief Constable Graham.
From a policing perspective, there is no doubt that the strategy groups are increasingly effective. We are seeing a positive picture countrywide.
Can you expand on the point about co-ordination? Without co-ordination, not everything is being achieved that might be achieved. The committee would welcome a little more information about that.
Although all the players that we would wish to be at the table are involved at strategy group level, it may be necessary to have another group that sits either above that level or below it. In other words, we need a group that is very focused on decision making and that is small enough to be dynamic and to progress issues. At the moment, some groups are quite unwieldy in size and membership. A two-layered approach might be more effective in allowing us to advance issues and to co-ordinate work much more meaningfully.
You are suggesting a strategic group that would take an overview.
The composition of youth justice strategy groups differs across the country, no matter where we look. A smaller group might be able to play a more co-ordinated role, to take strategic decisions and to focus on and determine the direction. Another group could allow wider networking with groups that are not currently involved or at the table. I refer to partners outwith the statutory agencies.
You are suggesting that it might be useful to have another, smaller group.
Yes, or the local youth justice strategy group could be disaggregated, so that there is a stronger, strategically focused group. That would be another layer of networking and sharing information, which is clearly an issue and is crucial to effectiveness.
That is helpful.
We agree with a lot of the comments made by Norma Graham and Sandra Paterson. Our perspective is on the child with offending difficulties, but also with other difficulties. We are keen that there is a link to other local government and national strategies. The children's services planning developments are welcome. We hope that there are further developments to co-ordinate what is happening with young people who are involved in offending. We share Sandra Paterson's concerns that there should be co-ordination in terms of outcomes and service delivery for children.
I entirely agree that the youth justice strategy groups need to deal with the strategic issues, and that other groups are required to take forward operational matters or networking. We need to examine the groups that are working to slightly different agendas. I am talking about the broader aspects of the children's services planning process. We might be able to conflate groups, or at least give them a clear remit on some aspects of youth justice. In our submission, we felt that the continuum spread from the preventive end up to the persistent offending end. Within local authorities, groups and forums are already examining aspects of that in the youth strategy—not the youth justice strategy—which may have an impact. We need to make best use of what we have, not just have more groups.
Sandra Paterson and Norma Graham talked about progress being made. Everyone said that there has been a move forward. Norma Graham talked about difficulties in engaging with partners outwith the statutory agencies when attempting to integrate work better and take a two-layered approach.
Yes.
Which partners have been most difficult to engage with on the youth justice agenda and why?
It is not so much about difficulties in engaging with individual agencies and organisations—
Well, which have been difficult to bring in to the process?
It is about ensuring that they are at the table, as opposed to encountering cultural or organisational difficulties in bringing them on board. A number of agencies can deliver services, but they differ from area to area—there is enormous variation throughout the county. It is about having the opportunity within the groups that are key co-ordinators of services for children and young people to ask whether we can bring into the wider partnership everyone who needs to be involved. That is part of my argument about trying to disentangle and separate out the highly strategic level. We need wider networking in order to take on board everybody who needs to be involved.
Which groups or partners should be part of the wider networking?
That will differ from area to area, but an example is voluntary or charitable organisations that provide the link to services or that are the service providers. Such organisations may not be represented on strategy groups, but they need to be part of the wider networking and have a voice in youth issues.
Many strategy groups have good representation, but the issue is whether all those people know why they are there and how their sphere of work impacts on youth justice work. That is the difficulty. Work must be done to show people the relevance of being there and what they can bring to the agenda.
The youth justice strategy groups that seem to work well and be effective have a range of partners round the table, although not all the partners attend every meeting—the issue is one of true participation and commitment to what is happening. Input from mental health and local authority education services can be important, but it is not always possible to get representatives of those services to attend meetings. However, the situation is patchy and my comments do not represent the picture across the piece. The better able a group is to consider the work and the children who are involved and to make progress, the more the partners will come to the table.
I presume, therefore, that the integrated working will be better.
Yes.
We should not be too negative, because in my experience in the west of Scotland, good examples exist of the wider community of service providers becoming involved in the issues of youth justice, youth crime and offending behaviour. Mainstream agencies such as housing and building services now have an interest in the issues and realise that they have something to offer, which is a new development that we welcome. We even have interest from the private sector—for example, bus companies have a commercial interest in restorative justice initiatives, but they also have something to offer to the range of available resources.
I presume from what you have said that local variations exist in the quality of decision making and the range of service provision. The committee is wondering whether we have the right balance between local areas being able to respond to their distinctive needs and wants, and central consistency and availability of service. If we have not got the balance right, in what way is it out of kilter and what should we change? Alternatively, should the balance remain more with the local rather than the central?
For the reasons that have been highlighted, the things that make multi-agency or integrated working happen are all beginning to happen now and were evident in some groups before. For example, standards are available, some kind of direction is set nationally on policy objectives and the local areas are able to resolve problems and allow those who work with young offenders to make available services that suit the needs of the children with whom they are dealing. Those are all beginning to become more the norm across the piece. That process must be allowed to happen and areas must be resourced.
To what extent is there different need in different regions? Is there a need for consistency, or should what operates in Gairloch be different from what operates in Glasgow?
I am sure that others will wish to comment on that. There may be a need to examine particular aspects of youth offending and to find out what type of offence is being committed or what services are available to respond to need, but those who work in the system should be aware of what works with young offenders, what is based on good research and which available services have been properly examined and validated. In a way, there should be consistency, but it should not restrict workers in dealing with the individual children, which is why it is important to get the right people round the table locally to consider the children's needs.
It answers my question. Does any of the other witnesses have a view from a different perspective?
I agree with Jackie Robeson. We need to ensure that whatever package we have is tailored to the needs of the individual young person, because although we are dealing with their offending, we need to address the other aspects of their life. By and large, if the package is community based, the other aspects will be local and will be present in the community. The package needs to be developed with reference to the area's particular demography or the profile of young people who involve themselves in crime. The local youth justice services identify such profiles and we need flexibility to be able to do so. Guidance is needed in respect of the national policy and the evidence about what works for certain young people in certain circumstances. We absolutely need that information, because we do not want to work away on something that will not be productive.
Is that because the residential establishments are provided privately or because you are expected to pay market rates?
They are independent. People would not take issue with part of the reason for the increase in cost, which is that the establishments have to address issues in relation to the Scottish Commission for the Regulation of Care. They are improving the standard of their assets and putting in more staff to increase staff to child ratios. Frankly, local authorities have not been recompensed for those improvements, which they are still having to commission.
Is that an argument for the central provision of such services, as opposed to private provision and market forces?
It would be difficult to provide the services centrally, but there could be a mechanism for the Scottish Executive to enter into contracts, rather than each local authority having contracts with individual providers—that is what ADSW was looking for at one point.
Are you looking for a greater uniformity of costings nationally?
Yes.
One of the key strengths of the system that is developing is that there is local ownership. There is an understanding of local cultures in direct service delivery, and that is an absolute strength and a principle to build on. However, there is difficulty with the learning of lessons from other areas, the sharing of best practice and the ability quickly to recognise what works. There are local variations but often only a little local tweaking is needed to adapt practices for other areas. We should quickly pick up lessons about what works.
I will try to develop that theme. I expect only brief answers from you on this point, but has anything particularly hampered good working in relation to youth justice strategy groups?
I suggest that we could have developed further in a number of cases throughout the country but for funding issues. Money is made available on an individual service basis but, at times, it would have been more productive for work to have been jointly funded. That applies particularly to joint action plans for which people are accountable and on which they have to deliver. Funding has perhaps inhibited progress in some areas.
Is that an on-going problem?
Yes.
On that point, work is going on in North Ayrshire on the back of the Antisocial Behaviour etc (Scotland) Act 2004 on developing an information protocol with all partners. I hope that that work will be useful not only to North Ayrshire but to the rest of Scotland. It is funded by the Scottish Executive.
Can you tell us a little more about information protocols?
A number of information-sharing protocols exist, but they currently exist only among health, social services and education and relate to child protection. That is a major issue, as has been identified, which has not yet been resolved. Bits of paper are floating around but there is no definitive piece of paper that says that we can share information under any circumstances—that would be difficult to get. However, work is going on that might have a wider application, because it would involve children's reporters and the police as well as housing, social services and education.
Would that work benefit from guidance from the Executive?
I presume that the work will draw on any expertise and help that is available. In the Scottish Executive, Vijay Patel is working on the integrated assessment framework for children's services and on information-sharing protocols.
A barrier that was mentioned and which should be addressed is the competing calls on local partners. The different strategic or policy initiatives need to be better co-ordinated and focused on children. There is probably evidence that that is happening in some parts of the country, but priorities should be set so that youth offending priorities do not compete with other priorities or with child-protection issues. Work should be co-ordinated so that people work towards better outcomes for children.
Who should set those priorities?
That takes us back to local input to objectives that are set nationally. There should be a national steer, but local agencies should be able to co-ordinate in the best way possible.
Integrated working will also be driven by the work on integrated inspection, which is kicking off in January with pilots on child protection and will be broadened out to enable integrated inspection of all children's services. Local authorities and other partners will work up the areas that will be inspected in relation to good practice and good outcomes, and they will develop best-practice illustrations that will follow the "How good is our school?" model in education. That work will improve integrated working and have an impact on youth justice.
I do not think that I am alone in not knowing the detail about the protocol on inspection. Is that work being driven by the Executive or has it arisen with the co-operation of local authorities?
It has arisen with the co-operation of local authorities.
The witnesses talked about the obstacles that have most hindered the strategy groups in the development of partnership working, and have mentioned steps that are being taken to avoid such obstacles, such as the development of information protocols and integrated inspection. I want to consider the other side of the coin. For the record, what factors have most assisted the strategy groups' progress in the development of partnership working?
There can be little doubt that the drive towards national standards has provided a clear set of expectations and guidelines. That has set parameters so that people are clear about what we are aiming for, which—from a policing perspective—has been enormously helpful in focusing minds.
Do other witnesses agree with Norma Graham's comments? Does anyone wish to add to or even to contradict what she said?
On the whole, we agree that the development of national standards seems to have been the main driver for improvement. For example, the youth justice standards and the relaunched key standards from the time intervals working group have helped to keep people focused.
Is there now more ability for lateral thinking?
I would say so, as that has been my experience. For example, we had a meeting with the Association of Directors of Social Work yesterday to consider specifically how information is provided to children's reporters. In some local authorities, big jams in provision of such information slow down the process and lead to outcomes that are not so good. However, the group was willing to look radically at how we can create a situation in which assessment information can be given to the children's reporter so that decisions can be made more speedily. It was heartening that the discussion was very open, but that is not as unusual now as it might have been previously.
Do other witnesses wish to add anything to that?
I am conscious of the time, so I ask the witnesses please to make their responses fairly short.
I would like to see dedicated staff being involved in policy and not necessarily dedicated teams. We do not have a dedicated team in North Ayrshire; we did not adopt that model, but our approach is working. I agree entirely that the information that is being passed between children's reporters and local authorities is better. Better management information will lead to improvements in how local authorities deliver services.
I will briefly give an example in which there have been tangible results. Youth tracking systems are now established in the police areas of Grampian, Fife and Central Scotland. Those systems show the effectiveness of multi-agency working with young people and present a real opportunity to see tangible results in terms of reoffending and positive outcomes for the young people concerned.
So that happens in Grampian, Fife and Central Scotland.
Yes.
Moving on from the lateral-thinking approach of the blank sheet of paper, what developments have there been in diversionary services and early intervention? I ask Tom Philliben and Sandra Paterson whether there are natural limits to those developments, or have we got some way to go?
Sandra Paterson is probably best placed to talk about early intervention, because it is part of the continuum of service provision that comes before the involvement of the children's reporter. There are around the country examples of diversions from formal processes, some of which involve voluntary organisations and some of which involve restorative justice staff.
I will focus on two aspects of intervention in a child's life, the first of which is early intervention for pre-fives. We are only now beginning to gather information on whether services for very young children have a cost benefit at a later stage in the child's life. The issue is one of life opportunities; people are beginning to take that on board. This year and over the next three years, much money will go into early-years intervention, which should produce benefits several years down the line. I also believe that the Executive is going to track the spend over 20 years in order to examine outcomes.
I am conscious that Sergeant Fitzcharles, who we are happy to have with us, has so far been rendered mute. I hope that he feels able to contribute if he is minded to say anything.
I have nothing to add.
I reinforce the point that was made earlier by Tom Philliben about restorative justice and the use of restorative cautioning at perhaps quite a high level, in terms of offending young people, but also as a diversionary tactic so that fewer young people come into the formal system. We have found that to be particularly effective. Tom Philliben has spoken about the issues in central Glasgow and a number of other areas in Scotland where that is being done effectively.
Sandra Paterson referred to residential provision and its cost. What quality of care is provided in secure care and residential provision, and is it improving? There has been a lot of talk about improving it. How does care continue when young people leave residential care or secure accommodation and go out into the community? Is that being followed up enough? What is the aftercare like?
From a policing perspective, it is quite difficult to give a view on the level of care in the establishments. That perhaps leads us into another area of interest, which is the ability to respond to specific groups of young people. If I may, I will answer in relation to young people with mental health issues and learning difficulties. We see an absolute dearth of care in that regard. Quite often, such people come into our care and our only recourse is to detain them. Clearly, that is not helpful for anyone who is involved and it is not something that the policing system wants to be involved in. It happens because there is a lack of any other care.
What would be your preference in respect of young people with mental health problems and learning difficulties? Would you like there to be more social workers so that the youngsters could be supported in their homes or on some other community basis?
Where such youngsters are cared for is perhaps another issue. You are right that that is another element of the discussion. The issue is about numbers. There is just not sufficient care, which impacts not only on the ability to assign someone to examine a young person's issues before they become of real concern, but on the ability to fast track work. We live in a society in which a number of mental health issues that we may not have seen several years ago will manifest themselves in later years because of persistent drug use. That is a real threat and it needs to be addressed.
There will always be a need to provide secure care for the young people who need that level of security. One of the benefits of the system is that there is flexibility, so young people's needs can still be met under that level of security.
Earlier, I think I said that I thought that some cost increases were linked to better provision, but I do not think that provision is perfect yet. Some schools do better than others in what they have to offer. An example relates to mental health input and whether schools can afford drug counselling for young people or whether they can work on programmes for them. There are still also gender issues involved in what some schools can offer. I refer particularly to the small number of girls who are in secure care, although I see matters improving in that respect.
So you are saying that when people come out of residential care or secure accommodation, there is good follow-up, as you receive extra funding from the Scottish Executive. However, the most important issue is surely that a person who has been in secure accommodation will need intensive support when they come out of that accommodation in order to prevent their going back into it. If a person is on the cusp of the age group that you mentioned, we should try to stop them going into a young offenders institution. Are you saying that most local authorities need support in that area?
I think that many local authorities would be unable to provide intensive support for such young people. That is a resources issue that has already been mentioned.
Does Assistant Chief Constable Graham want to clarify that for me?
Absolutely. Aftercare is absolutely crucial to throughcare. It has been said that professionals have made great efforts and have the will to consider alternatives and to move away from considering the issue as a resources issue, but matters also come down to the number of qualified individuals. That is difficult to move away from, although much innovative work is going on.
It is critical that support exists when children come out of a longer-term residential unit or secure care. From our point of view, those are the most vulnerable children in terms of the risk of their going into the criminal justice system. From the research that is available, we know that the outcome for people who have been through residential or secure care is worse in terms of how they are treated in the criminal justice system as a young adult. It is critical that support be put in place and sustained for a period of time. We know that the longer such support can be provided, the better the outcome for everyone concerned. I support whole heartedly what Sandra Paterson said.
That is helpful. This has been an invaluable opportunity for us and we appreciate the fact that you have made time to come and speak to us.
I would like each of you to describe the composition and way of working of each youth justice strategy group. Who chairs them? Who are the key contributors? Which partners are most difficult to engage with and why?
I am the chair of the Forth valley youth justice strategy group. The Forth valley criminal justice group has been in action since 1995, prior to local government reorganisation. At that time, the principal drivers were partnership arrangements between Barnardo's, Central Regional Council and Central Scotland police in relation to the development of programmes for young people in trouble.
It would be opportune for us to have that mission statement.
Bill Butler asked whether any partners were difficult to engage with.
Absolutely not. I am very pleased to say that there is an excellent working partnership.
My name is Liam McPherson and I am youth services manager for Scottish Borders Council. I will be chair of the Borders youth justice strategy group until the new head of service from social work takes up appointment in December.
We have brought along two folders that contain information about everything that is happening in Fife. I have the pleasure of serving as chair of the Fife youth justice strategy group. That is a very worthwhile task and I am strongly supported by all the professional agencies in Fife. I have no problems inviting people to meetings. If there is a need to share information, representatives attend meetings of the youth justice strategy group. I am well supported not only by fellow councillors, but by the chief constable, by the service manager for criminal justice and by community, housing, information, youth drugs and youth justice services. All are run together by our committee administrator, who is sitting in the public gallery and keeps us all right.
Our group covers just Moray—we are not in a partnership arrangement with anybody. As my colleagues have said, the situation has evolved. We have probably shared the problem of achieving representation at the right level.
With which other agencies would greater engagement be beneficial?
We have difficulties with housing arrangements for young people who get into trouble with the law. The health services—child and adolescent psychiatry—work with us, but the demands of very testing clinical cases mean that young people who have behaviours that lead them into conflict with the law and who might have a mental welfare problem are left slightly out of the centre. We can think of that as similar to a stone landing in a pool—people who are closer to the middle are engaged, but as we go further out, engagement may not be as strong.
We have much material to cover. If witnesses agree with their colleagues, I am happy for them just to say that they agree, rather than feeling that they must chip in their tuppenceworth. Witnesses can use their own judgment on that.
All the witnesses have touched on my question. How and to what extent has shared ownership of the agenda been developed in the groups? I do not know whether the answer is uniform and just one individual wants to comment. I appreciate that difficulties exist because some do not participate to the same extent, but among those who participate, how has an agenda been created?
Since I took over as chair of my group, I have believed that every member who attends our meetings has an important role to play. We have developed that by taking our group and the workers who support group representatives on visits to Polmont and Cornton Vale. That was worth while and was most beneficial at our meeting after the visits, as everyone had an input. The generation had started to kick in.
Three local authorities are involved in the Forth valley group. The fact that we are coterminous with Forth Valley NHS Board and Central Scotland police has been pivotal over the years in encouraging a partnership approach and developing the common themes of youth justice that have emerged.
On the engagement notion that has been mentioned, it is when there is a particular problem to be solved that we see the strength of people coming together, especially when that is played out at a local level. We try to deliver our services through local neighbourhoods. If specific issues emerge, people come forward and work hard to try to address them. I would not like to give the impression that, somehow or other, there is a lack of co-operation in Moray; I just think that it manifests itself in different ways.
Much of what my colleague from Moray says is true. On the local side, with regard to the local resolution of issues, the group has worked together and has gone from strength to strength, although some people still have some way to go to meet the philosophy of youth justice and the strategy. That may impact on the roles that health and education may play, and it is increasingly becoming the responsibility of the more involved members of the group to bring them in at the times when they can play a vital role.
I would like to ask about the local facilities in youth justice services. What has advanced and helped the development of good facilities?
One of the key things that has happened over the past two years—perhaps because we have been fortunate enough to have one of the fast-track pilot schemes in our area—concerns the knowledge and profiling of young people who offend, especially persistent offenders. Over the past two years, we have recognised that we will not resolve those issues, reduce offending and make communities safer if we do not work together as a group to provide resources in an integrated way. We will have to work hard to provide a range of services for persistent offenders, and we are starting to know what works and what does not work. Organisations that felt that they did not have a role to play in youth offending can now see that they do have a role to play and can make a valuable contribution.
Fast-tracking has helped to focus that work.
It has given us the resources, albeit temporarily, as we do not know whether we will be able to sustain those resources come the new year. It has given us the opportunity to find out which resources work.
What factors have facilitated progress in Fife?
The commitment to joint working and playing that out beyond the strategy group level. For example, our youth justice team includes social work staff and clinical psychology staff who carry out assessments on young people. Coupled with that, we take an approach that is much more evidence based and programme focused, so that it is clear what outcomes we are trying to achieve. We try to match the aims of any group work programme for young people with an assessment of their needs, so that what they actually need and how we might operate that is much clearer to us. That gives us the opportunity to be much clearer about the outcomes and how we measure them, and we can be more focused, which is a step beyond our past practice.
And in Moray, Mr Carney?
We were fortunate—probably by accident rather than design—to get an ex-police house for our youth justice team, which is next to the police station in Lossiemouth. In fact, there is an interconnecting door. One of the advantages has been the confidence building. We developed a restorative justice scheme, and a number of police officers were redirected to work in Lossiemouth so that they could participate in that. The youth justice strategy has a mission statement, but there is a hearts-and-minds element that enables those things to work. It has been very positive. In the past, there have been rocky relationships between police and social work, but I think that we have been pretty fortunate.
On the projects and work that front-line staff undertake, we can refer to Barnardo's Freagarrach project, which has been nationally recognised and researched, and the evidence shows that it is a project that works. As was mentioned in the response from the Fife youth justice strategy group, however, it does take a bit of time to make the concept into a reality. Getting the work done on the Freagarrach project took a few years to build up, from 1994 to 1996, as we translated ideas into action for getting young people through specific programmes. In Forth valley, we built on that through the other Barnardo's project—the matrix project—which concentrates on eight to 12-year-olds. The Freagarrach project was initially for 12 to 16-year-olds, but it was then extended into the criminal justice arena to cover 16 to 18-year-olds, who are now seeing the benefits of that project.
We have looked at the sunny side of the street. I would like to ask you now to tell us simply whether there has been any particular factor that has hindered progress. Again, we shall start with Mr McPherson.
It will be an evolutionary process. There is nothing that actually hinders the process, in the sense that there is something that needs to be resolved, but we can clearly do more work on communication with our local community. The perception of crime may still be high and that is something that we have to take on board. We all welcomed the aspects of serious communications strategies that allowed us to communicate effectively with our local community. We have to tell our local community what we are doing about crime, and the strategy group has a particularly good role there, because it brings together all the organisations, some of which have great respect in the community. If we are going to reduce crime, we must believe that youth justice belongs to all. We should start it as early as possible and we must have preventive and diversionary schemes. That involves intensive input.
Do you think that that is an area that requires strengthening?
It is about tackling the whole range of offending. If I were to criticise the approach we take in our area, it would be by saying that we concentrate on the persistent end of the range because that has been the subject of a pilot for fast tracking. We must ensure that we have a range of services that tackle offending at the earliest stage.
I echo what my colleague said. Being a councillor gives me the opportunity to listen to colleagues on the council and hear what their communities are going through. One of the strengths is excellent community police work, with young men and ladies going to talk in schools. A few years ago, youngsters would keep on the opposite side of the road from the police, but now they walk on the same side of the road. They talk to each other and call each other by their first names. That is building up a good relationship between the police and young people at school.
What about negative issues? I am trying to establish if any factors have been difficult.
Negativity comes about if we do not listen to young people and do things without consulting communities. If we consult well, we will do better at serving young people in Fife.
Does Michelle Miller want to add anything?
I am conscious of time, Mr Pringle. We have a lot to get through. If something is pressing, please indicate that you want to speak.
I just thought that Michelle Miller might want to answer.
One of the challenges is short-term funding. We develop services that are supported by short-term funding initiatives, but they are not sustainable in the longer term. The previous panel talked about the importance of throughcare and aftercare. We have developed a range of multi-agency services that is supported through new futures funding. That will cease in March next year, which will have a significant negative impact on the level of service that we can deliver to young people who come out of residential and secure care.
Thank you, that is helpful.
The issue that has emerged for us is the understandable targeting of resources towards persistency in young offenders who get into the offending cycle, which diverts time, attention and money away from young people who are on the edge of persistent offending. In Moray, we deal reasonably well with persistent young offenders, but the recruitment of young people into that group can become a problem. As was mentioned, prevention is important. To some extent, I suppose that we are closing the stable door if we concentrate only on young people who have entrenched problems and ignore the potential development of those issues with other young people.
I concur with Michelle Miller; it would be helpful if we could consider other funding models. We would not necessarily want to replicate the adult criminal justice system and import it into children's services, but there are well cemented arrangements for funding, which would help the long-term strategy to which Michelle Miller referred.
That is helpful. Bill Butler wanted to quiz the witnesses about local examples of good practice, but quite a lot of evidence has already unfolded.
I think that my question has been pre-empted. We heard about the restorative justice team in Moray and Mr McGeoch told us about the matrix project in the Forth valley and gave other examples. I think that we have covered the issue.
Are there issues of good practice in relation to which the witnesses would feel deprived if they could not mention them? I have noted some of the examples that Bill Butler mentioned.
The use of mentors on a one-to-one basis offers a tremendous resource and we hope that that resource will grow. Mentors are especially useful in rural areas, where much work is carried out on a one-to-one basis. We have been able to take account of the rural dimension by using mentors as role models and asking them to work with young offenders, targeting the times when they are most likely to offend. That has been critical to the change in offending patterns over the past two years.
The most interesting example that I can mention is a partnership between voluntary organisations, social work and the fire service, which worked for several weeks with young people who had been getting involved in raising fires and finished off—somewhat to my surprise—with a barbecue. That might have been a mixed message, but the initiative seems to have gone well.
That is novel.
Are there are areas of the youth justice service, in rural and urban areas, that need development locally and nationally? The witnesses have probably touched on some areas, but do you want to mention any other aspects?
This will relate partly to the convener's question, because I did not get a chance to talk about features that we might consider. Employment and training are critical; the Forth valley report, which I will e-mail to the committee, will highlight good practice among the projects that I mentioned.
It amazes me how much we can help simply by listening to young people, even of primary school age. I chair a child care partnership which, at the moment, has 400 staff. Three years ago, the team had only two members and within the next year, the number will increase to 800. We are there for children from their early years, right through primary and secondary school. I have asked the colleges in Fife to come on board to provide the opportunity to involve young people who might not have been involved because of simple factors such as lack of transport. Although many of those young people have problems, they also have skills, so we would like to offer them education facilities to enable them to develop those skills. That is a positive step forward for young people.
I have a comment on the rural dimension. In Moray, we seem to have a relatively high number of persistent offenders, which relates to how funding is allocated. We think that our numbers are due partly to the profile that one or two young people may develop within smaller communities and towns, and to how well the police are able to investigate crimes and sort things out. We find that some of the larger authorities get more generous grants—they will not view the situation in that way—even though, proportionally speaking, we experience significant demand. It is not true to say that a rural area equates to a quiet backwater.
I concur with the point that the Fife youth justice strategy group made about the early years—it would have been remiss not to mention that significant area. In the United States, there has been much research on the benefits that accrue from investment in good services at that early stage. Again, it is part of nurturing; it is about looking at matters longitudinally instead of adopting a narrow, get-it-fixed-now approach.
I am interested in to what extent the groups' approach is evidence based. During your answers, you have revealed much of what has directed your thinking. Would I be correct to say that, before making a decision about what to do or how to proceed, everyone in your groups relates that to the evidence that is in front of them? From what you have said, I infer that that is the case. All the witnesses are nodding.
I will add to that. We develop specific programmes that are based on research that says that certain things work or that certain things impact on children's behaviour. That allows us to develop targeted services that meet those different objectives.
Is that true of all the groups? Again, all the witnesses are nodding.
There is an issue that my colleagues might be able to help me with. In the trade, the approaches that we take are called cognitive behavioural approaches. That means that, for example, one must have some understanding of what one is doing and some empathy with people. We have a few problems with much younger children who get into trouble with the law. Cognitive behavioural approaches are not so applicable to them, so we are searching for a model for working with younger children.
What age group are you talking about?
I am thinking about children aged between 8 and 12 years—in other words, children who are of late primary-school age. I do not know whether that is an issue for the other witnesses.
I concur with what my colleague from Moray has said.
A cognitive behavioural approach is neither appropriate nor effective for very young children. The body of knowledge on younger children who offend is sparse, so we have—rather than look for anything more specific—relied on standard child development and attachment theory to formulate our responses.
I concur with that. That is what I was trying to say earlier when I was talking about importing the cognitive approach from adult psychology. There is a danger that we are suffocating children and young people and not allowing them to develop and thrive as good and useful citizens of the future. We have to take stock of the development of children and young people when we consider the youth crime agenda.
We have considered what you do in your various areas. How do you assess or audit future need? How do you evaluate what you have done and how successful it is?
The group has developed in conjunction with the police and we have systems for tracking; that was mentioned by the previous panel. That is a longer-term evaluation process for the next two years.
I referred to the Freagarrach project, which is being researched at national level for use across Scotland; it is certainly being used by the Scottish Executive as a model for the future. We in the Forth valley have an action plan on which we have been working for the past couple of years, which will progress our agenda. There are some unmet criteria, which we hope partially at first, then fully, to meet. We will then take up another set of criteria. We have been considering monitoring and evaluation very closely. The Freagarrach and matrix projects have been evaluated externally, which gives us evidence for progressing certain programmes.
I am not going to repeat what other witnesses said, but sustainability is key. If we are taking young people out of crime, are we keeping them out of it? We have to get better at measuring issues around employability training and sport and leisure activities, and we have to allow successes in those. We have come a long way in measuring outcomes statistically, but we still have not got it perfect because we are still not able to put together all the statistical information that we collect from different agencies. However, we are getting there. I am confident that we will get there.
I will pick up on the point about evaluation. From the outset, we have employed a chap called Tim Chapman who works at CTC Associates to evaluate our strategy. We were not just examining the hard outcomes, but considering the practice and engagement issues. Interestingly, we also engaged with the University of Huddersfield in something called realist evaluation, which tries to assess the impact of programmes and activities with young people at a very practical level, so that young people can see how their lives are changing and so that we can learn something about what we do at a micro level. We are trying hard to learn our own private lessons alongside the messages from research that are now available through the University of Edinburgh.
I cannot speak highly enough of our detached youth work programme, in which young people are out on the street talking to other young people, from whom they can bring back an amazing amount of information, based on which we can take a wide range of actions.
We have linked our children's rights officer to young people who come into the system to ensure that we are working within the framework of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. We have asked that officer to proofread the various strategy documents to ensure that they are consistent with the convention, which is something that we will be looking for in the future.
As there are no further questions from the committee or concluding points from the witnesses, I thank the witnesses for joining us. We have found your evidence interesting and helpful and are grateful to you for making your time available for us.
Meeting suspended.
On resuming—
I welcome members back to the meeting. To continue our evidence taking on our youth justice inquiry, I welcome on behalf of the committee two witnesses—Mr Jon Bannister, senior lecturer in the department of urban studies at the University of Glasgow, and Professor Gill McIvor, who is director of the social work research centre at the University of Stirling.
Perhaps you would outline the range of different forms of intervention that might be employed to reduce or, indeed, to prevent crime.
It is useful to think of three different approaches. One could be called primary intervention, which is focused on prevention of offending. That work targets factors that might lead to the development of an offending profile. One might then consider secondary interventions, which are about early intervention. That approach is concerned with identification of the beginnings of problematic behaviour. Again, one is looking there at similar criminogenic factors, but they are at a different stage of development. The final approach is concerned with tertiary intervention, which considers programmes to help prevent young people from continuing their offending; it is more to do with persistent offenders.
I do not have much to add to that. It is useful to conceptualise the approaches at different stages in that way because approaches that are appropriate for young people who are already persistently offending are quite different to what one does to try to prevent young people from offending in the first place. It is important to recognise that the types of intervention, the factors that are addressed and the scope of the intervention will be different at different stages in a young person's development.
I do not know whether the witnesses are able to comment on this, but do you have any opinions on the relative cost-effectiveness of the different approaches?
I will say a little, but Jon Bannister is probably better placed to respond to that question. One of the difficulties, particularly in relation to the earlier interventions, is that the benefits that come from reduced offending will not be achieved until we have gone a considerable way down the line. It can be difficult to quantify the cost-effectiveness of an intervention with, for example, a young person aged between birth and two years. One needs to wait a considerable time to see the longer-term benefits of reduced crime. There are genuine complexities involved.
To date, there has been rather limited research into cost-effectiveness; indeed, there is limited research on what constitutes the approach to investigating cost-effectiveness. The tools are available, but they have not been developed in a way that can be readily applied by most organisations.
You just said that aspects of effectiveness other than cost effectiveness must also be considered. You talked about the importance of the onset and the cessation of offending. You gave the example of the evaluation of the Dundee families project and you stressed the importance of early interventions. Can you say anything more about the relative effectiveness of different types of sanctions, including restorative justice, that might be imposed on young offenders? Has work been done on that area?
My colleague is better placed to answer that. My specialism is earlier interventions.
There is a growing body of research evidence on which approaches to young people involved in offending are more promising than others. There is an emerging agreement that, in responding to young people who offend, there must be an holistic approach and that focusing simply on one aspect of a young person's behaviour is unlikely to bring about a reduction in their offending behaviour.
Obviously, such an approach is evidenced by the use of multisystemic therapy in the United States. Is that common to all states of the union, or has it been developed in only one or two states? Can such an approach teach us anything about effectiveness? How long has it taken for it to be effective and does it have any limitations?
As far as I am aware, multisystemic therapy is operational in a number of parts of the US. It is evidence based, in the sense that it developed from research that pointed to effective ways of working with young people and incorporated aspects of practice wisdom by learning from practitioners who are already trying to engage with difficult young people in difficult circumstances.
That matches strongly with our understanding of early intervention and prevention work. We cannot concentrate simply on offending. We need to take into account other factors that affect a young person's life and upbringing.
Are there any aspects of early intervention that have been shown not to work?
Before I answer the question, I am aware that I did not respond fully to the previous question, as I did not address the restorative justice aspect of intervention. Restorative justice is an approach that is being embraced increasingly in the United Kingdom. It is drawing on experiences in other jurisdictions: most notably New Zealand and, to a lesser extent, Australia.
I can give you a list of things that increase the likelihood that a programme will fail: failure to consider the child in its wider environment; failure to provide a continuum of interventions throughout childhood; not having a clear model of change at the heart of a programme; having poorly trained staff; and failure to utilise the evidence base. As the committee will no doubt be aware, evidence is worthless unless we have the ability to interpret it. To that list, I should also add single-issue interventions and interventions that prematurely target the individual and the family, which are more likely to fail than are interventions that are employed more universally at the community level.
We are all agreed on the value of early intervention. Is the system working in identifying difficulties and targeting youngsters at a sufficiently early stage? If not, what do you think would help to improve that?
It is difficult to say. There is an inherent difficulty in trying to identify young people who are at risk and to ensure that the appropriate services are put in place to minimise the chances of their subsequently being involved in offending or other risky behaviours.
I agree with much of that. Early intervention in Scotland is relatively underdeveloped in relation to aspects of the management of children and young people who have developed offending profiles. Nevertheless, advances have been made such that we now have the tools to engage in the early identification of children who may develop problem behaviours. I echo the point that the targeting of those individuals is not necessarily beneficial. Targeting the communities in which those individuals find themselves is beneficial, and we have the tools to enable us to do that. Various programmes purport to do just that. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation has funded the communities that care programme to undertake a risk and protection assessment of communities, and it is developing its database. Such programmes have also been piloted in Scotland.
What is known about what works in early intervention and diversion as opposed to formal sanctions? Is there a need for a review of the available research in that area?
I will say a little about that and then pass the question over to my colleague.
There is a range of interventions that have been shown to be effective, and they are available through a variety of organisations. We might consider them as interventions aimed at the family, at the school, at the community or at individuals. There have been positive evaluations of a variety of parenting education programmes and of pre and post-natal care programmes. I know that that is very early intervention, but it has benefits in developing the prevention of offending profiles. Pre-school education has been shown to have a positive impact on the prevention of offending at school level. Aspects of school organisation have also been shown to be important.
What do you mean by that?
There is a range of specific aspects of school organisation that have been shown to be effective in reducing offending. For example, programmes that try to combat truancy and reincorporate a young person into the school have been shown to have positive benefits. We all know that those people who truant or are excluded from school are more likely than others to develop an offending profile, so programmes that encourage them to get back into school have been shown to be effective.
When you said "school organisation", Bill Butler and I thought you meant that children should join the stamp club or something. Thank you for explaining.
There are programmes aimed at the individual. As we heard earlier, there are some American examples of the notions of community mentoring and peer mentoring.
What standard should it reach?
There are clear models of evaluation and experimental design, which include both process evaluation and impact assessment. Impact assessment has to run for a considerable period of time for us to be able to see the true worth of a programme.
How long?
It varies according to the nature of the programme, but if it is an early intervention programme aimed at two-year-olds and you are looking at the prevention of offending, you would need to follow that programme—or at least an example of that programme—through until the child reached adolescence and beyond.
Can you comment on the effectiveness of the system operating in Scotland? If you could give us some examples of good Scottish practice, that would be useful. Has any work been done on comparing what is happening in Scotland with what is happening elsewhere? Are we doing it better and are we more effective, or are there other areas that we can learn from?
I can talk about the relationship between Scotland and the rest of the world. I recently went to the international juvenile justice observatory, which is in Salamanca in Spain. The observatory invited a variety of politicians, policy makers and academics from around the world to talk about youth justice.
Was there someone there from Scotland?
I was.
Was there anyone there from the Scottish political world?
No.
Mr Pringle asked whether we are doing quite a good job in Scotland, compared with other countries. Is that the case?
The data that enable us to answer that question are difficult to interpret. The nature of problems that we have in Scotland is different from the nature of problems that exist elsewhere. If you were to ask me whether we have an appropriate framework, I would say that the framework that is based on the philosophy of Kilbrandon is an enlightened and—if applied properly—effective one. If Scotland is able to achieve a balance between prevention and early intervention and dealing with those young people who have developed offending profiles, instead of concentrating too much on people with offending profiles, we will be able to make a significant advance. We have a system that allows for that to happen.
It would be fair to say that many jurisdictions look at Scotland with some interest and, perhaps, envy because of the system that we have and the fact that it is able to respond to young people as people who have particular needs rather than separating out issues of offending from other issues such as care and protection. There is no evidence to suggest that the Scottish system is any less effective than systems that have been developed elsewhere. The data on the numbers of young people who are involved in the children's hearings system and in the adult criminal justice system do not show that there is an increasing number of young people becoming involved in offending behaviour. Certainly, in the 16-and-over category, the group whose incidence of offending, in terms of court convictions, is decreasing more than any other is the under-21 group.
You said that we are doing quite well in comparison to other places. Is funding the critical thing for getting the line on the graph to continue going in the right direction? Is the issue just about funding, or could the Executive do other things to help that downward trend to continue, which is clearly what we are all aiming for?
The issue is not, and never has been, just money but the appropriateness of the intervention. We are in a position to know what we should do, but I would argue that we have tended to neglect the staffing of the public bodies and programmes. If anything, there is a shortage of highly qualified and trained staff who have an understanding of what factors can lead to the onset of offending and what can inhibit offending. I would argue that staffing and training need careful attention.
Are you referring to the training only of social workers or of other staff as well?
I mean staff in other areas as well. As I argued earlier, some factors that lead to the onset of offending also lead to poor health outcomes, drug misuse and the like. Agencies need to co-operate with one another and receive some joint training. Aspects of the criminal justice system also need to engage with other planning frameworks. For example, the community planning framework offers an ideal opportunity for various organisations to have an impact by using their resources in a way that helps to prevent offending and to achieve other positive outcomes.
I agree that there is a need not just for more resources but for better use to be made of the existing provision. We need better co-ordination of the work of the different agencies and services that are already in place. We know that young people's offending is not a single issue, as it impacts on, and has implications for, a wide range of agencies. Better co-ordination of the existing resources and agencies is the key issue.
Does either witness wish to make any concluding remarks?
The question was raised whether we need a review of the literature. I understand that NCH Scotland will shortly issue a publication—which has been edited by Maggie Mellon, who is now at Children 1st and Bill Whyte and Janice McGhee, who are from the University of Edinburgh—that pulls together a range of papers by academics and practitioners on the issue of young people's offending in Scotland. I am not sure of the publication timescale, but I think that it is imminent.
On behalf of the committee, I thank the witnesses for giving evidence. Although their evidence has come at the tail-end of the day, we have found their contribution immensely helpful, as it has taken us into areas that we have not explored previously. We are grateful to them for coming before us this afternoon.